What is the best bank account for budgeting?

The best bank accounts for budgeting are from Wells Fargo, U.S. Bank, and Bank of America. These banks have good mobile app ratings and provide budgeting tools that are integrated into your accounts, allowing you to do things like easily create a budget and receive insight into your spending.

Best Banks Accounts for Budgeting

Wells Fargo: Best for making a budget

WalletHub User Rating: 3.7

Average App Rating: 4.9/5

Best Bank Account: Everyday Checking Account

Wells Fargo has a budgeting tool called Budget Watch that lets you make an online budget with information about your transactions and savings goals. Color-coded charts also help you quickly identify when you are at, below or over budget in different spending categories. In addition, Wells Fargo’s My Savings Plan feature allows you to set up goals for things like buying a new house or car and set alerts so you can track your progress toward those goals.

Ally: Best for envelope budgeting

WalletHub User Rating: 3.2

Average App Rating: 4.4/5

Best Bank Account: Ally Bank Spending Account

Ally specializes in online banking, as it has no physical branch locations or ATMs. The bank has a feature called spending buckets, which is available with their checking account. The feature works just like the envelope budgeting method since you can categorize each expense into a bucket, set a spending limit, and keep track of how much you have left in the bucket for that expense.

Ally lets you create up to 30 buckets for each account. The buckets feature also works with an Ally savings account, so you can set up and track multiple savings goals. 

Bank of America: Best for interactive charts

WalletHub User Rating: 3.7

Average App Rating: 4.7/5

Best Bank Account: Advantage Plus Banking

Bank of America lets you create a budget, schedule payments for bills, set financial goals and track your progress. The bank also provides category-specific, interactive charts that can help you easily determine where you are overspending. The charts break down your spending for the month using customizable budget categories.

In addition, you’ll have access to Erica, Bank of America’s virtual assistant, which can help you with things such as monitoring recurring charges and increases on subscriptions and sending bill reminders for when payments are due.

Capital One: Best virtual assistant

WalletHub User Rating: 3.7

Average App Rating: 4.7/5

Best Bank Account: 360 Checking Account

Capital One offers multiple budgeting tools that can help you keep track of your spending. One of those tools is Eno, Capital One’s virtual assistant. You can ask Eno for things like your current account balance and a list of your recent transactions. Eno also gives you a heads up when it has spotted a free trial and can send you a reminder before the trial ends so you can cancel the trial if you want.

Chase: Best for tracking spending

WalletHub User Rating: 3.8

Average App Rating: 4.6/5

Best Bank Account: Chase Total Checking

Chase has two notable tools. Its Spending Planner provides you with bar charts and tables to help you identify trends in your spending. This can allow you to see where you are spending the most money and where you can save. In addition, the Chase Spending Report gets you a monthly or annual view of your spending, and you can separate your transactions by merchant category. You can also link your external accounts to make it easier to track your spending across all your accounts. Furthermore, Chase lets you make a budget, set goals and track your progress on those goals.

PNC: Best budgeting calculators

WalletHub User Rating: 3.6

Average App Rating: 4.7/5

Best Bank Account: Virtual Wallet with Performance Select

PNC has many tools that you can access without being a PNC customer. In addition to a budget worksheet that you can use to plan out your monthly expenses, PNC has calculators to help you determine how much you need to save for retirement, emergencies, education, and more.

If you are a PNC Bank Virtual Wallet customer, you also have access to the Spending + Budgets tool. This lets you create a budget and set notifications for when you are close to reaching your spending limit.

U.S. Bank: Best for linking external accounts

WalletHub User Rating: 3.9

Average App Rating: 4.8/5

Best Bank Account: Bank Smartly Checking

U.S. Bank makes it easy for you to get a full view of your spending across all your accounts by letting you link your external accounts, so you can see your transactions in one place. The app also lets you make a budget, track your expenses, and set and track your financial goals.

Additional Budgeting Tools

Some notable mentions are Regions and Huntington Bank. Both banks have branches in a limited number of states, but they offer their customers budgeting tools to manage their finances.

If your bank currently doesn’t offer budgeting features, there are budgeting apps, like the WalletHub app, that can help you manage your finances. WalletHub lets you sync your financial accounts so you can have your transactions automatically tracked, and it provides a personalized plan to pay off your debts faster. WalletHub also provides recommendations for the best checking and savings accounts so you can find the right one for your needs.   

For more options, check out WalletHub’s picks for the best budget apps.