After growing frustrated with slow, cluttered expense apps, a developer built Expense Buddy. This privacy-first, local-first tracker keeps data on-device by default, avoiding the common trade-off between convenience and data ownership. It's built with React Native (Expo) for mobile use.

The app prioritizes speed and control. Users can log expenses quickly, edit them via a history view, and analyze spending by category or payment method. For those wanting a backup, an optional GitHub sync feature commits daily CSV files to a personal repository, keeping everything under the user's control.

Expense Buddy is currently in internal testing on Google Play. The developer, who shared the project on DEV Community, has open-sourced the code, offering transparency for those wary of closed-source financial tools. Access requires contacting the developer directly for now.