Count-up budgeting

A count-up category doesn’t hand you the whole amount on day one. It earns a slice every day, so the number you can spend grows while you don’t spend it. You can mix count-up and regular categories in the same budget.

Turn it on

• When creating a budget, switch on Count-Up for the category.
• For an existing category, tap it, choose Edit Category, and switch on Count-Up Budgeting (“Earn your budget daily instead of all at once”).

Turning on count-up also turns on rollover for that category.

How the daily allowance is worked out

Buoy divides the category amount by the number of days in the current period. A $300 monthly Dining Out category in a 30-day month earns $10.00 a day.

• Earned so far is the daily allowance times the days elapsed, counting today. A new day’s allowance arrives at your local midnight.
• Available is what you’ve earned minus what you’ve spent.

So by day 10 of that month you’ve earned $100. If you’ve spent $64 on dining, $36 is available.

The allowance follows the category. Change the amount, or move into a period with a different number of days, and the daily allowance updates to match.

What you see

Each count-up card shows Available Balance, Projected Savings, your Streak and Zero Days (days you spent nothing in that category). When at least one category uses count-up, a Count-Up view appears next to Compact with “Today’s Count-Up Summary”: your total daily earning across categories.

The live ticker

Settings → Budget Settings → Live count-up ticker makes today’s allowance tick up smoothly through the day instead of arriving at midnight. It only changes the display and never shows more than you’ve actually earned. It’s off by default and saved per device.

End of the period

In Edit Category you choose what happens to the balance when the period ends:

• Roll Over (the default): the balance carries into the next period. That includes an overspend, which starts the next period in the red.
• Transfer to Savings: whatever is left goes to a savings goal you pick. With no goal picked, it rolls over instead.
• Start Fresh: back to zero. Leftovers are dropped and an overspend is forgiven.

Try the numbers for your own budget with the daily allowance calculator.