Costflow vs Kresus
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted budgeting & finance options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.
Not the right match-up?
Costflow
Natural-language interface for plain-text accounting
VS
Kresus
Self-hosted personal finance manager
| Feature | Costflow | Kresus |
|---|---|---|
| Category | Budgeting & Finance | Budgeting & Finance |
| License | MIT | AGPL-3.0 |
| Language | JavaScript | JavaScript |
| Setup difficulty | Medium | Medium |
| Min. RAM | 128 MB | 256 MB |
| Deployment | source, binary | docker, bare-metal, source |
| GitHub stars | ★ 33 | ★ 800 |
| First released | 2019 | 2015 |
| Replaces | Expensify, Mint | Mint, Bankin |
Why pick each one
Choose Costflow if…
- Released under the MIT license
- Written in JavaScript
- Tiny footprint — runs in 128 MB RAM
Frequently asked questions
Is Costflow or Kresus better?
Neither is universally better. Kresus has the larger community; both share a medium setup difficulty, so the decision comes down to features and licensing.
Are Costflow and Kresus free and open-source?
Yes. Costflow is licensed under MIT and Kresus under AGPL-3.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run Costflow and Kresus with Docker?
Costflow: check the project docs for container support. Kresus: yes.