Why Nett never links to your bank account

Most budgeting apps open with the same screen: connect your bank. It feels convenient, and it is, for the app. You hand over read access to every transaction you have ever made, and from then on your money data lives on someone else’s server.

Nett is built the other way round.

What “no bank link” means in practice

• You enter transactions yourself. A coffee is ₹180 (about $2) and three taps: amount, category, done. The in-app keypad and category grid are tuned for this, so entry takes seconds, not a form.
• Recurring entries do the boring part. Rent, salary, subscriptions and EMIs are logged once and repeat on their schedule.
• Receipts ride along. Snap the bill; it stays attached to the entry.

Where the data lives

Everything (transactions, budgets, goals, accounts) sits in a local database on your phone. There is no Nett account, no login and no server holding a copy. If you want a backup, Nett writes a file to your iCloud Drive or Google Drive and never sees it again.

Why this is a feature, not a limitation

A bank feed knows what you spent. It does not know why, which Space it belongs to (personal, business, the Goa trip), or whether the ₹40,000 ($480) that landed was an advance you still have to deliver on. Typing the entry is where that context gets attached, and it is the reason your monthly report actually explains the month.

Examples use Nett, a free tracker that does not link to your bank; the method works with any notebook or spreadsheet too.