Spliit

Spliit is built on a single premise: splitting expenses should not require an account. You create a group, share a link, and everyone is in. Sebastien Castiel wrote the first version in Montreal and released it under the MIT license, inviting the world to fork, improve, and run their own instance. Five years later, the project has grown to 2,939 stars on GitHub, attracted 100 contributors, and been forked 497 times, yet the core design has not changed: no sign-up form, no password, no email verification.

The app is a Next.js application written in TypeScript and styled with Tailwind CSS, which means it is fast and runs anywhere a browser does. It is available through a web interface, and a native iOS app has been rewritten from scratch in SwiftUI with groups kept in iCloud. The product is entirely free and open source.

How Money Gets In

Spliit only accepts manual entry. You open a group, type in an expense amount, choose who paid and who participated, and move on. There is no bank syncing, no card linking, and no connection to payment apps. This means no monthly subscriptions, no credit-card credentials on file, and no terms-of-service agreement that gives the company rights to your spending data.

The manual-only approach means every transaction requires typing, which is slower than auto-import but also simpler to understand. Spliit does offer receipt scanning in beta, powered by AI, so you can photograph a receipt and the app attempts to parse the items and amounts. The core product still requires you to decide splits and confirm the data, so the AI is a convenience rather than a black box.

Entering groups works with shared links. You send someone a link to your trip or apartment group, they open it in any browser or the iOS app, select their name from the list, and they can add expenses instantly. This model works across devices and operating systems without requiring any of the participants to install the software or create accounts.

How the Budgeting Works

Spliit tracks expenses in a group and calculates who owes whom. You can split equally, by amount, percentage, shares, or by itemization (dividing a restaurant bill line by line). The app visualizes your group's spending and shows simplified and original debt views, simplified means minimal transfers to settle everything, original shows every specific debt between pairs of people.

The app includes recurring expenses, so you can set daily, weekly, or monthly repeating charges (rent, utilities, streaming services shared in a group). You can assign categories to expenses, which helps understand spending patterns without being part of the settlement math. The app optimizes settlement transfers automatically: instead of Person A paying Person B, Person B paying Person C, and Person C paying Person A, it calculates the minimal set of transactions to clear all debts.

Spliit does not manage your personal budget. It is a group settlement tool.

The Open Source Model and Privacy

Because Spliit is open source and MIT licensed, anyone can download the code, review it, modify it, and run their own server. This is unusual among expense apps and carries real implications for privacy. The project publishes its funding on Open Collective with a public ledger of donations and server costs, so the economics are visible.

The application stores no user database. There are no email addresses, no passwords, and no persistent user accounts linked to your identity. Spliit treats group links as capabilities: if you have the link, you can access the group. This means Spliit cannot experience a data breach of usernames and passwords because it keeps neither.

Group IDs never reach analytics. Sebastien notes in a detailed blog post that the code is written to make it a compile error to attach a group ID to an analytics event, the feature simply cannot be built without removing that guard. For users who want absolute control, the iOS app and the web application can both be self-hosted behind a reverse proxy with OpenID Connect (OIDC), which adds a login screen without changing the app itself.

The open-source model does mean there are legitimate trade-offs. The link is the only key, so anyone who sees it can edit the group. This is fine for expenses between friends who already trust each other with money, but not for sensitive data among strangers. You also get no automatic sync of groups across devices, a new device starts empty until you open the link again, though starring groups or keeping links in a group chat message solves this in practice.

What It Costs and What You Get

Spliit is free to use. The entire product is available at no cost. You do not need a free trial period because there is no paid tier. The servers are paid for by donations collected through Open Collective, and the project publishes monthly summaries of donations received and costs paid.

The absence of a paid tier means no premium features, no upsells, and no artificial limits on group count or expense count. You can create as many groups as you need and add as many expenses as you like. This is unusual, almost every competitor offers a free tier with limits, and a paid version with more features.

A native iPhone app exists and was rewritten in SwiftUI to take advantage of Apple features. It keeps groups in iCloud and reads receipts from the camera without needing to route images through the server. This app is not free to download; it is a separate product sold through the App Store at a one-time purchase price, which funds development alongside donations.

Who It Suits

Spliit is built for people who value privacy and simplicity over features. It suits groups traveling together, roommates sharing rent and utilities, clubs or teams managing shared expenses, and anyone skeptical of companies storing their financial data.

The open-source model attracts people who care about code transparency and who want the option to run their own server. It suits developers and technical users who can self-host and integrate the software with their own infrastructure.

Spliit is not suitable for anyone who needs automatic bank syncing, scheduled bill payments, or personal budget tracking. It does not integrate with payment apps to settle up with a tap. These omissions are not roadmap items, they are decisions. Sebastien explains that adding accounts would pull the project toward becoming a different product, and the team prefers to stay focused on the core value: expense splitting without friction.

The Verdict

Spliit is rare among money apps in that its business model and code are as public as its product. For groups splitting expenses without needing to hand over email addresses or accept ads, it is a solid choice. The open-source nature means you can inspect exactly how it works, fork it, or run it yourself.

The limitations are real: no bank syncing, no payment app integration, and manual entry throughout. A group splitting restaurant checks or splitting rent across many people will spend time typing each transaction. For small groups, occasional trips, or anyone allergic to accounts and passwords, this overhead is acceptable. For frequent complex splitting, a paid app with auto-import may be more practical.