MyFin vs Paisa
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted budgeting & finance options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.
| Feature | MyFin | Paisa |
|---|---|---|
| Deploy effort | Under-an-hour setup | Under-an-hour setup |
| Health score | 77 · Good | 88 · Excellent |
| Category | Budgeting & Finance | Budgeting & Finance |
| License | GPL-3.0 | AGPL-3.0 |
| Language | TypeScript | TypeScript |
| Setup difficulty | Medium | Medium |
| Min. RAM | 512 MB | 256 MB |
| Deployment | docker, source | docker, binary, source |
| GitHub stars | ★ 312 | ★ 3,217 |
| First released | 2022 | 2022 |
| Replaces | YNAB, Mint | Mint, Personal Capital |
What are MyFin and Paisa?
MyFin
MyFin is a self-hosted personal finance platform for tracking accounts, budgets, and transactions. It provides reports and forecasting to help understand spending patterns over time.
- Account and budget tracking
- Spending forecasts
- Transaction categorization
- Self-hosted finance reports
Paisa
Paisa is an open-source personal finance manager built on top of the Ledger plain-text accounting format. It provides budgeting, net worth tracking, retirement planning, and rich visualizations.
- Built on Ledger format
- Net worth and retirement planning
- Rich interactive charts
- Goal tracking
MyFin vs Paisa: key differences
Both projects are written in TypeScript. Licensing differs — GPL-3.0 for MyFin versus AGPL-3.0 for Paisa. Paisa is the lighter option, starting around 256 MB of RAM against 512 MB for MyFin. Paisa has the considerably larger community, at 3,217 GitHub stars versus 312.
Why pick each one
Choose MyFin if…
- Released under the GPL-3.0 license
- First-class Docker support for quick deployment
- Written in TypeScript
- Lightweight — runs in 512 MB RAM
Choose Paisa if…
- Beautiful visualizations
- Plain-text portable data
Watch out for
- Requires Ledger knowledge
- Single-user focused
Frequently asked questions
Is MyFin or Paisa better?
Neither is universally better. Paisa has the larger community; both share a medium setup difficulty, so the decision comes down to features and licensing.
Are MyFin and Paisa free and open-source?
Yes. MyFin is licensed under GPL-3.0 and Paisa under AGPL-3.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run MyFin and Paisa with Docker?
MyFin: yes. Paisa: yes.
Which is lighter on resources, MyFin or Paisa?
Paisa has the smaller minimum footprint at 256 MB of RAM, compared to about 512 MB for MyFin. Real-world usage depends on library size, user count, and enabled features.