How to Track Expenses in Monarch Money (2026 Verified Walkthrough)

A budget tells you what you should spend. Cash Flow tells you what you actually did. Monarch's expense tracking lives at the intersection — auto-categorized transactions feeding into a Cash Flow visualization that breaks spending down by category, group, or merchant, with the ability to zoom in on any time window from a single day to a full year.

Here's the verified walkthrough.

The fast answer

To track expenses in Monarch:

1. Connect every account that money flows through (covered in How to Connect Bank Accounts).
2. Open the Cash Flow page from the left navigation.
3. Pick a time window (monthly is the default; quarterly and yearly available).
4. View the breakdown by category, group, or merchant.
5. Click into any category or merchant to see the underlying transactions.
6. Re-categorize anything that landed in the wrong bucket.
7. Set up transaction rules for merchants where the auto-categorization keeps getting it wrong.

The whole expense-tracking workflow is automatic after initial setup — Monarch's machine learning categorizes new transactions, and the Cash Flow page updates in real time.

Step 1: Understand Monarch's three-layer category system

Per Monarch's documentation, every transaction lives in a three-tier hierarchy:

• Type — Income, Expenses, or Transfers (these are fixed; you can't change them)
• Group — Housing, Food, Transportation, Health, etc. (customizable)
• Category — Rent, Groceries, Restaurants, Gas, etc. (customizable)

A transaction at Whole Foods would be categorized as: - Type: Expenses - Group: Food - Category: Groceries

This three-layer system matters because Cash Flow and Reports can be viewed at any level. You can zoom out to see "Food" as a whole, or zoom in to see "Groceries" specifically separated from "Restaurants" and "Coffee Shops."

Default categories ship with about 60 options spanning common life categories. Monarch's machine learning auto-assigns most transactions correctly — Whole Foods → Groceries, Shell → Gas, Netflix → Subscriptions. You only intervene when it gets one wrong (or assigns something to "Uncategorized").

Step 2: Open the Cash Flow page

The Cash Flow page is where expenses come to life:

1. Click Cash Flow in the left sidebar (web) or in the bottom tab bar (mobile)
2. The default view shows the current month: total income at the top, total expenses below, broken down by Group

Per Monarch's documentation: "The Cash Flow page is where you can visualize your overall spending habits, and the information can be broken down by category, group, or merchant, with the ability to look at the data monthly, quarterly, or yearly."

The display options:

• Time period — Month / Quarter / Year (top of page)
• Breakdown view — Category / Group / Merchant (toggle near the chart)
• Compare — Optionally compare to previous period for trend visibility

Click any segment of the visualization to drill down. Click "Groceries" → see all grocery transactions. Click "Whole Foods" → see all Whole Foods transactions across the time window.

Step 3: Re-categorize transactions that landed wrong

Monarch's auto-categorization is good but not perfect. Common miscategorizations:

• Amazon purchases — auto-categorized as "Shopping" but might be groceries, household items, or kids' supplies depending on what you bought
• Costco — could be groceries, household, or gas (Costco fuel) depending on the trip
• Target / Walmart — broad merchants where the categorization needs review
• Venmo / Cash App / Zelle — transfers between people, often miscategorized

To re-categorize:

1. Click the transaction to expand
2. Click the Category field
3. Pick the correct category (or type to search)
4. Save (changes persist immediately)

For one-off corrections, this is enough. For merchants you'll see again and again, set up a transaction rule instead.

Step 4: Set up transaction rules

Per Monarch's documentation, "You can update the category for the transaction manually or create rules to automatically categorize transactions, or you can set up a transaction review system if you want to ensure everything is being sorted in the right category."

A transaction rule applies to all future transactions matching certain criteria — and optionally to historical transactions. The most common rule patterns:

By merchant name:

1. Open a transaction at the merchant
2. Click Create rule (or ... → Create rule from this transaction)
3. Set conditions: "Merchant equals 'Spotify'"
4. Set action: "Always categorize as 'Subscriptions'"
5. Apply to historical transactions (optional, but usually yes)
6. Save

By amount + merchant: For when the same merchant has different categorizations depending on the amount (e.g., your monthly mortgage vs your one-time repair payment to the same property management company).

By account + merchant: For when the same merchant means different things on different cards (your business card at Office Depot is supplies; your personal card at Office Depot is shopping).

Rules are powerful but stack overhead — a few well-chosen rules cover 80% of cases; trying to rule-ify every merchant becomes a maintenance burden. Most users end up with 10-20 rules at steady state.

Step 5: Use Cash Flow for monthly/quarterly review

The Cash Flow page is where the budget review actually happens. The pattern:

End of month review (15 min):

1. Open Cash Flow filtered to the current month
2. Compare actual spending to budgeted amounts (Budget page)
3. For categories that overspent, drill into the merchant breakdown — what specifically was the cause?
4. Re-categorize any miscategorized transactions
5. Adjust next month's budget if a permanent change is needed (e.g., gym membership increased)

End of quarter review (30 min):

1. Open Cash Flow filtered to the quarter
2. Look at category trends — is one creeping up over time?
3. Compare vs same quarter last year (the comparison feature)
4. Identify subscriptions that have crept in (cross-reference with Recurring view)

End of year review (1-2 hours):

1. Cash Flow filtered to the full year
2. Build a Report (more on Reports below) for tax-relevant categories
3. Export transactions (How to Export Transactions) for your CPA
4. Set new budget amounts for the year ahead based on actual data

Step 6: Build custom Reports for deeper analysis

Per Monarch's documentation: "Monarch's Reports feature provides powerful visual insights into your financial data, with detailed charts and flexible filters where you can track your cash flow, analyze spending habits, and monitor income trends—all in one place."

Reports go beyond Cash Flow's default views. Common custom reports:

• Restaurants spending year-over-year (track if you're eating out more or less than last year)
• Discretionary spending by category (entertainment + restaurants + shopping, tracked together)
• Tax-deductible expenses (charitable donations + deductible medical + business expenses)
• One specific merchant's history (Amazon spending all-time, useful for budget arguments with yourself)

To build a Report:

1. Click Reports in the left navigation
2. Click + New Report
3. Pick the metric (Spending / Income / Net Worth / Cash Flow)
4. Set filters (date range, categories, accounts, tags)
5. Pick the visualization (line chart, bar chart, table)
6. Save the report — it'll persist on the Reports page

Reports are powerful because they let you ask "is this category trending up or down" without rebuilding the filter each time. Most users have 4-5 saved reports they check monthly.

Step 7: Tags for cross-category tracking

Categories are hierarchical (one transaction = one category). Tags are flat and additive (one transaction = many tags).

Use tags for cross-cutting tracking that doesn't fit neatly into categories:

• business-reimbursable — flag receipts you're submitting for work reimbursement
• tax-deductible — flag charitable donations, medical, etc.
• with-friends — track shared spending you'll split later
• vacation-2026 — pull together all transactions for a specific trip across many categories

To add a tag:

1. Click the transaction
2. Click Add tag
3. Type the tag name (or pick from existing tags)
4. Save

Tags are filterable in Cash Flow and Reports, which is what makes them useful for tax season — pull up "tax-deductible" tagged transactions for the year and you have your itemized deductions.

Step 8: Handle credit card payments and transfers

Credit card payments are the trickiest part of expense tracking. Per Monarch's documentation, transfers and credit card payments are excluded from budgets and cash flow — they're categorized as Type: Transfers, not Type: Expenses.

This works correctly for most users:

• A $500 charge on your credit card → Expense (counted in spending)
• A $500 transfer from checking to credit card to pay it off → Transfer (NOT counted as an expense; otherwise the same $500 would count twice)

Monarch's auto-detection of credit card payments is solid for major issuers. If you see a credit card payment showing up as an expense (double-counting), re-categorize it as a Transfer manually.

Common pitfalls

Uncategorized transactions accumulating. New transactions Monarch can't auto-categorize land in "Uncategorized." If you ignore them, your Cash Flow undercounts spending. Set a weekly habit of clearing the Uncategorized bucket.

Refunds and reimbursements. A refund from Amazon shows up as positive (income side). If you don't category it as a "Returns" expense category, your monthly income will look inflated. Tag refunds correctly.

Internal transfers between your own accounts. Money moving from checking to savings is a transfer, not an expense. Monarch usually catches this; if not, manually categorize as "Transfer."

Monthly subscriptions billed annually. Your $179 annual Spotify Premium hits as a single expense in March. To smooth the budget, divide by 12 and use a "Non-monthly" budget bucket (covered in How to Create a Budget).

Credit card minimum payments. If you only pay the minimum on a credit card, the unpaid balance accrues interest. Monarch tracks the interest as a separate transaction (showing up as an expense). Watch for this — it's small per month but adds up.

How Monarch's expense tracking compares

Monarch's expense tracking is the strongest in the category for most users. The combination of solid auto-categorization, flexible rules, custom Reports, and tagging is unmatched in the budgeting-app tier. The only competitor with comparable depth is the legacy Quicken (desktop) — and Quicken's UX is decades older.

Common questions

How does Monarch's auto-categorization improve over time?

It learns from your manual corrections. If you re-categorize a Whole Foods transaction from "Shopping" to "Groceries," Monarch will categorize future Whole Foods transactions as Groceries. Across 60-90 days of regular use, accuracy typically reaches 90-95%.

What if my expense doesn't fit any default category?

Create a custom category. Settings → Categories → + Add Category. Custom categories work identically to defaults — they accept budgets, can have rollovers, and Monarch's ML learns to recognize them.

Can I track business expenses separately from personal?

Yes — either via tags (business-reimbursable), via separate accounts (link your business card and tag all transactions on that account), or via Monarch's Business Tracking feature (which requires a separate setup but provides P&L-style views for self-employed users).

Can I see who spent what in a couple's account?

Yes — Shared Views' ownership filters let you see Cash Flow by partner. See How to Share Finances With a Partner.

What about cash transactions?

Use receipt scanning on the mobile app, or manually create transactions from the Transactions page (+ Add transaction). Cash spending requires manual entry — it's the one case where automation can't help.

Can I export Cash Flow data for tax prep?

The chart itself doesn't export, but the underlying transactions do. Filter Transactions by date range and category, then export to CSV (full export walkthrough).

How do I see merchant-level spending across categories?

Cash Flow → Breakdown view → Merchant. Monarch will show your top merchants by spend. Useful for finding "where am I bleeding money" patterns.

Why does my spending look higher in Monarch than I expected?

Usually one of three reasons: (1) credit card spending counts as expenses immediately, even before you pay the card off; (2) refunds you forgot about are netted against expenses; (3) Monarch's categorization includes things you don't think of as "spending" (e.g., investment contributions might land in a category you're tracking). Drill in to find the cause.

If you want lighter-touch expense tracking without the budgeting structure, Rocket Money is the simpler alternative. If you want stricter envelope-style tracking where every dollar is assigned, YNAB is the rigor-first option. For deeper comparisons see Monarch vs Rocket Money and Monarch vs YNAB.

Related reading:

• Monarch Money Review 2026
• Is Monarch Money Worth It?
• How to Connect Bank Accounts to Monarch
• How to Create a Budget in Monarch
• How to Track Subscriptions in Monarch
• How to Set Financial Goals in Monarch
• How to Share Finances With a Partner in Monarch
• How to Use Monarch's AI Assistant
• How to Export Transactions from Monarch
• How to Scan Receipts in Monarch

Not financial, legal, or tax advice. We earn a commission if you sign up for Monarch through a link on this page; the price is the same. Every step verified against Monarch's official Help Center documentation as of May 7, 2026.