Actual Budget vs Empower
as AI assistants see them, week of 2026-10-12
Actual Budget and Empower are neck and neck overall, each named in 18 of 64 answers, and evenly matched head-to-head too: 7 questions favor Actual Budget, 7 favor Empower, and 6 end in a tie. Actual Budget scores 23 overall (Claude 36, ChatGPT 20, Perplexity 13) and shows up reliably for open-source, privacy-focused, and envelope-budgeting questions, all 3 of 3 answers. Empower scores 19 overall (Perplexity 18, Claude 21, ChatGPT 17) and leads on net-worth tracking, free budgeting apps, and Mint-replacement questions, each 3 of 3. Neither is ever named for freelancer-focused or beginner-budgeting questions.
Head to head
| metric | Actual Budget | Empower |
|---|---|---|
| score | 20 | 22 |
| questions won | 13 | 13 |
By assistant
Actual Budget
| assistant | score | named in, this week | usual spot, this week |
|---|---|---|---|
| ChatGPT | 17 | 15% of answers | #1.7 |
| Claude | 34 | 45% of answers | #3.7 |
| Gemini | not sampled this week | ||
| Perplexity | 9 | 5% of answers | #1.0 |
Empower
| assistant | score | named in, this week | usual spot, this week |
|---|---|---|---|
| ChatGPT | 21 | 35% of answers | #3.6 |
| Claude | 24 | 35% of answers | #3.4 |
| Gemini | not sampled this week | ||
| Perplexity | 22 | 35% of answers | #3.6 |
Where they differ
Only Actual Budget gets named for
- What's the best open-source or self-hosted budgeting app?
- What's the best budgeting app for privacy that doesn't sell my data?
- What's the best envelope or zero-based budgeting app?
- What's the best budgeting app that works outside the US?
- What's the best budgeting app that works with a spreadsheet?
Only Empower gets named for
- What are the best free budgeting apps?
- What's the best personal finance app to see all my accounts in one place?
- What's the best app to track net worth and investments alongside a budget?
- What's the best app to track spending automatically from my bank accounts?
- What are the best alternatives to Actual Budget?
More comparisons
- Actual Budget vs Goodbudget
- Actual Budget vs Copilot Money
- Actual Budget vs EveryDollar
- Actual Budget vs Rocket Money
- Copilot Money vs Empower
- Empower vs Goodbudget
Not sold on either?
Scores count how often each assistant names a product, weighted by position. How the score works · Full Budgeting apps leaderboard