A free budget spreadsheet for Australian households, set up for fortnightly pay. Plan your bills, everyday spending and savings in Australian dollars, then compare what you planned with what you actually spent.
Writing a budget is the easy part. Knowing whether you actually stuck to it is where most spreadsheets leave you guessing.
Pages of categories and formulas make it hard to know where to start, so it never gets started.
You finish the fortnight still unsure: did you stay on track, and where did it go over?
It's set to fortnightly. Change it if you’re paid weekly, every 4 weeks or monthly.
Add your take-home pay, rent or mortgage, bills, groceries, transport and savings for this pay period.
During the fortnight, type your actual spending, or import your bank file instead.
Planned vs actual for every category, with each one marked on track or over.
Check your pay cycle, fill in the yellow boxes, add what you really spent, then open the Dashboard. If a box is yellow, type in it. If it is not, leave it alone.
Type your pay, your planned spending and what you want to save. Each category shows whether you are on track or over.
Money coming in, planned and actual spending, your savings plan and your surplus, plus a chart comparing plan and reality for each category.
Paste in your bank transactions and the spreadsheet sorts them into groceries, fuel, subscriptions and more, then fills in your actual spending for you. Need to prepare a statement first? Try the free Bank Statement Converter.
Add a keyword like your local cafe or gym and it sticks for every future import. Over a hundred common ones come ready to go.
This is a complete, working budget, given away free. It began as the spreadsheet I wanted when I first tried to get on top of our single-income household, useful enough on its own that you never have to buy a thing.
Yes. No payment. Enter your email and you'll go straight to your download.
Yes. The spreadsheet starts with a fortnightly pay cycle, but you can change it to weekly, every four weeks or monthly. Enter your plan and actual spending for the same pay period so you can compare them clearly. If you are paid fortnightly but your bills are monthly, see how to budget fortnightly when your bills are monthly.
Yes. It's a standard .xlsx file, so it opens in Google Sheets and Microsoft Excel. Some features, like the dashboard chart and the optional bank import, can look or work a little differently outside Excel.
No. Importing is optional. You can type what you spent straight into the Actual column. If you do import, keyword rules sort each transaction into a category, and you can add your own.
No. Nothing connects to your accounts. Anything you add, you add yourself, so your data stays in your own file.
No. This is an educational budgeting tool, not personalised financial advice.
For savings goals and bills with different payment frequencies, explore Fortnightly Budget Plus, the paid upgrade. If your question is what you can spend before your next pay, start with the free Payday Check. The free budget is yours to keep either way. Not sure which expenses to include? Use the Australian household bills checklist as a prompt.
Plan your next fortnight and see how your spending compares. Your free spreadsheet is ready to download after email sign-up.
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