Costflow vs Sure
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted budgeting & finance options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.
Sure
Community-driven personal finance app
| Feature | Costflow | Sure |
|---|---|---|
| Deploy effort | Read-the-docs project | Under-an-hour setup |
| Health score | 0 · At risk | 93 · Excellent |
| Category | Budgeting & Finance | Budgeting & Finance |
| License | MIT | AGPL-3.0 |
| Language | JavaScript | Ruby |
| Setup difficulty | Medium | Medium |
| Min. RAM | 128 MB | 1,024 MB |
| Deployment | source, binary | docker, source |
| GitHub stars | ★ 33 | ★ 10,024 |
| First released | 2019 | 2025 |
| Replaces | Expensify, Mint | Mint, Quicken |
What are Costflow and Sure?
Costflow
Costflow is an open-source parser that turns plain-language messages into Beancount, Ledger, or hledger entries. It lets users record transactions from chat apps and append them to a journal file.
- Natural-language entries
- Beancount and Ledger output
- Chat app integration
- Plain-text journals
Sure
Sure is a self-hosted personal finance application maintained by the community as a continuation of an archived finance project. It tracks accounts, transactions, budgets, and net worth in a single dashboard.
- Accounts and transaction tracking
- Budgets and net worth view
- Community-maintained
- Self-hosted with Docker
Costflow vs Sure: key differences
Costflow is written in JavaScript, while Sure is built with Ruby. Licensing differs — MIT for Costflow versus AGPL-3.0 for Sure. Costflow is the lighter option, starting around 128 MB of RAM against 1,024 MB for Sure. Costflow is the more established project (first released 2019), while Sure arrived in 2025. Sure has the considerably larger community, at 10,024 GitHub stars versus 33. Sure lists first-class Docker deployment; Costflow does not.
Why pick each one
Choose Costflow if…
- Released under the MIT license
- Written in JavaScript
- Tiny footprint — runs in 128 MB RAM
Choose Sure if…
- Released under the AGPL-3.0 license
- First-class Docker support for quick deployment
- Mature project with 10k GitHub stars
- Written in Ruby
Frequently asked questions
Is Costflow or Sure better?
Neither is universally better. Sure has the larger community; both share a medium setup difficulty, so the decision comes down to features and licensing.
Are Costflow and Sure free and open-source?
Yes. Costflow is licensed under MIT and Sure under AGPL-3.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run Costflow and Sure with Docker?
Costflow: check the project docs for container support. Sure: yes.
Which is lighter on resources, Costflow or Sure?
Costflow has the smaller minimum footprint at 128 MB of RAM, compared to about 1,024 MB for Sure. Real-world usage depends on library size, user count, and enabled features.