Everything you need to know about BalVault — and nothing you don't.
Any account type supported by SimpleFIN Bridge: checking, savings, credit cards, loans, mortgages, and investment accounts. If SimpleFIN can pull it, BalVault can write it to CSV.
No. You never enter bank credentials into BalVault. You authenticate with your banks through SimpleFIN Bridge's website (once), and SimpleFIN gives you a one-time setup token. You paste that token into BalVault. That token — and only that token — is stored locally on your computer.
SimpleFIN Bridge is a third-party service that connects to your bank, handles multi-factor authentication, and provides a read-only feed of your balances and transactions. BalVault uses that feed instead of scraping bank websites directly. SimpleFIN Bridge costs $1.50/month and is billed separately by SimpleFIN. Learn more about SimpleFIN.
On your computer, and only on your computer. BalVault stores your SimpleFIN token and account data in a local SQLite database. Nothing is uploaded to any cloud service. If you uninstall BalVault and delete its data directory, every trace of your financial data is gone.
Yes. Install BalVault on as many computers as you own. You'll need to enter your SimpleFIN setup token on each one. Because everything is local, data doesn't sync between computers — each installation is independent. If you want the same data on two machines, export the CSV and transfer it, or set up SimpleFIN on both.
Download BalVault on your new computer, enter your SimpleFIN setup token, and you're back in business. Your license is tied to you, not a specific machine. If you want to transfer your historical data, copy the BalVault SQLite database file from your old computer to the new one.
You get 14 days of full access with up to 2 accounts — no credit card required. After the trial, if you want to continue using BalVault (and connect more than 2 accounts), you'll need to purchase a license. The one-time purchase is $29 and includes ongoing updates.
No. BalVault is a one-time purchase of $29. You pay once and use it forever, including future updates. The only recurring cost is SimpleFIN Bridge at $1.50/month, which is a separate service billed by SimpleFIN — not by us.
You need an internet connection to fetch balances (BalVault talks to SimpleFIN Bridge, which talks to your bank). Once balances are fetched, you can view and export them offline. The CSV file, once written, is a plain file on your computer — no internet required to open it.
No. BalVault has no cloud component. It doesn't upload your balances, your token, or any other data to any server. The only network request it makes is to SimpleFIN Bridge's API to fetch your account balances — and that's a direct connection from your computer to SimpleFIN's servers.
Anything that opens CSV files: LibreOffice Calc, Microsoft Excel, Google Sheets, Apple Numbers, and essentially every other spreadsheet application. The CSV BalVault produces uses standard formatting that works everywhere.
Currently, BalVault is focused on balances — the snapshot of what you have and what you owe across all accounts. Transaction history support may come in a future update, depending on demand.
Any institution supported by SimpleFIN Bridge. SimpleFIN uses the same underlying connections as major financial apps. You can check your bank's compatibility by signing up at beta-bridge.simplefin.org and seeing if your institution appears when you add a connection.