When you’re in debt, it can feel like you’ll never pay it all off. No matter how many repayments you make, the debts just keep piling up, and you’re not sure you’ll ever be free of this awful albatross around your neck.
Thankfully, you have a tool in your pocket that could be the key to unlocking your potential when it comes to debt repayment. Naturally, we’re talking about your smartphone, and if you’ve got an iPhone, you’re in an even better position. Here are the 10 best apps for debt management on iOS.
1. Mint
Mint is, quite simply, the best money management app available on iOS. Whether you’re looking to pay back an unsecured personal loan, create a budget for the month, or just cut back on subscriptions, Mint will help you. It can track repayments across multiple loans, make suggestions about where you could cut back to help you add more to your repayments, and generally act as a finance manager for you. If you’re not using Mint, you’re missing out.
2. Digit
Digit is free for your first 30 days, and then you’ll need to pay a $5-a-month subscription fee, but it’s absolutely worth it. All you need to do is connect your bank account and Digit will start making recommendations about where you could be saving money. Digit isn’t really for you if you’re seriously struggling with money, but if you’re mostly doing OK and just in need of a little extra financial advice, you’ll need to get Digit in your life and on your iPhone ASAP.
3. ChangEd
This is a very specific option for a very specific group of people. If you’ve got student loans that need to be repaid, ChangEd is absolutely the app for you. It’ll help you to make regular repayments on your student debt, and it’ll ask you when you want to round up amounts to the nearest dollar or add an extra windfall here and there to make more of a dent. You can even add multiple student loans if you’ve spent longer in full-time education.
4. Tally
Be careful not to get Tally confused with a similarly-named app that simply tracks various stats in your life. Credit card debt is one of the most prominent types of debt (as well as one of the most difficult to shift), but Tally is aiming to change that. You can manage all of your credit cards across the simple, easy-to-use interface, discover how much you could be saving each month, and monitor late fees so that you never miss a repayment again.
5. YNAB
YNAB stands for “You Need a Budget”, and it’s true – we all do. Using YNAB, you can set up repayment plans for your loans, but you can also track all of your other financial statistics, which is helpful for understanding where to make savings. You can see when payments are leaving your account, sync with your bank in real time, and even create a simple debt repayment plan that should help you leave your debts behind in the long term.
This app is just as simple as it sounds – no bells and whistles, no extras, and no unnecessary clutter on its user interface. Using Debt Payoff Planner, you can structure your debts according to importance, create repayment plans, and use the loan calculator to see exactly where you should be making repayments at any given time. This isn’t an all-purpose financial planning app, but it’s excellent if all you want to do is repay your debts.
In many ways, Debt Payoff Assistant is even simpler and more austere than Debt Payoff Planner. It’s a super-clean, super-intuitive app that allows you to sort loans by severity, create plans to help you prioritise them, and even see detailed visual breakdowns of how your finances are going. You can pay $0.99 if you don’t want ads, but the free version is more than sufficient for most users. This is a less flashy app than some of its competitors, but it gets the job done.
8. Qoins
Qoins is a debt repayment app with a difference. Instead of actually helping you to make repayments by creating a budget for you, it rounds up every payment that you make (with your permission, of course) and sends the difference to your Qoins account. At the end of each month, you can choose to use what’s in your Qoins account to make an additional debt repayment if you wish. You’ll hardly notice the payments rounding up; in fact, it might actually make your finances easier to track!
The core conceit of Debt Strategy is not just to help you make loan repayments, but also to put the power back in your hands. This app asks you how you want to repay your loans, then helps you to identify ways that you can execute that strategy. It’s not interested in taking over your financial life; rather, it simply wants to augment the strategy you’re already using. Of course, you can trust Debt Strategy to help you out if you’re not sure, but it’s also a great “background option”.
10. Experian
It’s incredibly important to know your credit score, especially if you want to keep an eye on your financial health. The Experian app allows you to see a detailed breakdown of your credit score, including debts that are hindering you and ways that you could make repayments to improve your score. This statistic is vital for everything from getting a loan to acquiring a credit card, so using Experian to keep an eye on your credit score is a no-brainer.
