Subscription Management
Wallos, Rocket Money, Bobby — find, track, and cancel the recurring charges you forgot about.
The "I'm paying for three streaming services and a meditation app I haven't opened in a year" problem. Two main strategies: bank-tier scanning (Rocket Money / Truebill find subscriptions in your transactions) and manual cataloging (Wallos, Bobby — you enter them, you watch them). For broader finance see Bill Tracking & Household Finance; for the OSS subscription tracker (Wallos) see Self-Hosted Personal Apps; for the household password vault that often holds the cancellation links see Self-Hosted Passwords.
Bank-aggregator scanning (find them automatically)
- ★ ★ Rocket Money (formerly Truebill) — paid + free; scans your transactions, surfaces recurring charges, and offers a "cancel for me" service. Premium tier ($4-12/mo, user-set) unlocks the bill-negotiation. The default "I want this done with minimal effort."
- Citi / Chase / Apple Card / Capital One subscription views — most major bank apps now have a "recurring charges" tab. Free, narrower than Rocket Money but no third-party access required.
- Bobby — paid + free; iOS / macOS; manual entry but with bank-import on paid tier.
Manual catalog apps (you enter them)
- ★ Bobby — paid + free; cleanest UX for "type in your subs, see your monthly total." iOS / macOS native. The aesthetic pick for Apple-house households.
- Subby — paid + free; iOS / Android; younger user base.
- Subscriptions Tracker — paid + free; cross-platform.
- TrackMySubs — free; web-only; older.
- Notion / spreadsheet templates — works fine; the "take a Sunday and list everything" approach.
Free / OSS / self-host
- ★ Wallos — free OSS; self-hosted subscription tracker. What am I paying every month? Push notifications before renewal, multi-currency, categories. The 2026 OSS default — see Self-Hosted Personal Apps.
- Stash subs — niche OSS; less mature.
- Firefly III rules — Firefly can categorize "Netflix, Spotify, NYT" as subscriptions and report monthly totals. See Self-Hosted Personal Apps.
The annual cancellation ritual
The thing that actually moves the needle: once a year, list every subscription, justify each, cancel anything below the threshold. Tools just enable the ritual. Pair it with:
- A password manager (1Password, Bitwarden — see Self-Hosted Passwords) to find the login + cancellation page for old subscriptions.
- A "subscriptions" email folder / label to catch the renewal reminders.
- A virtual card per subscription (privacy.com, Apple Card virtual numbers, Revolut disposable) — easiest cancellation: kill the card.
License / pricing
- Rocket Money: paid + free; freemium.
- Bobby, Subby, Subscriptions Tracker: paid + free.
- Wallos: AGPLv3, free, self-host.
- Bank apps (Apple Card, Citi, Chase): free.
Pick this if…
- Scan-my-bank, no manual work, one app: Rocket Money.
- Manual entry, beautiful UX, Apple-house: Bobby.
- OSS, self-host: Wallos.
- Already on Firefly III: add a "subscriptions" budget category there.
- Already in Apple / Chase / Citi: check the bank app's recurring tab; you may not need a separate tool.
- Disciplined annual cancellation ritual: any of the above + virtual cards.