Budget settings

The Budget Settings modal lets you choose how budgets are displayed and how changes are applied by default.

Opening Budget Settings

Click the Budget Settings button in the page header while on the Budgets page. The button appears next to the help icon at the top right of the screen.

Budget Mode

Budget Mode controls how the Budgets page organizes your expense categories. There are two options:

Category Budget (default) Displays all expense categories in a grouped view or a flat detailed list. You set a target for each category individually. This is the traditional budgeting approach.

Flex Budget Focuses your attention on a single flexible spending number. Fixed and non-monthly categories keep their individual targets, but all flexible categories are pooled together under one "Flexible Expenses" section with a combined total. You can still see individual category spending, but you budget against the pool, not each line.

For a full comparison of when to use each mode, see Flex vs category budgets.

Switching modes

1. Click Budget Settings in the page header.
2. Select Category Budget or Flex Budget.
3. Click Save Settings.

The page re-renders immediately. Your underlying budget amounts are not changed — only the view changes.

Persistence

Budget Mode is stored server-side as a user preference (budget_mode). It applies across all sessions and devices logged in to the same account.

Default Apply Behavior

When you change a budget amount in the inline popover, a checkbox lets you choose whether to apply the amount to the current month only or to the next 12 months. Default Apply Behavior sets the starting state for that checkbox.

• This month only (default) — changes apply to the month you are currently viewing.
• All future months — changes apply to the current month and the next 11 months forward.

You can override the default on any individual edit by checking or unchecking the box in the popover before the input loses focus.

Persistence

This setting is stored server-side as a user preference (budget_apply_mode) and applies across sessions.

Budget Actions

The Budget Actions section in the modal provides two bulk operations for the currently-viewed month.

Recalculate default budgets

Looks back at the prior six months of spending for each category and sets the budget for the current month to the average monthly spend across the months that had any spending. Categories with no spending history in the six-month window are left unchanged.

This is a safe operation: it only modifies the current month you are viewing, and you can adjust individual amounts afterward.

Clear all budget values

Sets every budget amount for the current month to $0. This does not delete budget records — it resets amounts to zero.

MoneyVue asks you to confirm before clearing. The operation cannot be undone through the UI, so use it with care.

FAQ

Does changing Budget Mode affect my data? No. Switching between Flex and Category mode is a display preference. Your budget amounts, spending, and rollover are unchanged.

If I set Default Apply Behavior to "All future months," does every change I make apply to 12 months? The setting controls the checkbox default in the budget popover. You can still uncheck it before saving if you want a specific change to apply to the current month only.

How far back does Recalculate look? Six calendar months immediately before the month you are viewing.

Does Clear all affect past months? No. Clear all only affects the month currently displayed on the Budgets page.

See also

• Flex vs category budgets
• How budget rollover works
• How budgets work