Sharing money with a partner or family member usually means two apps, two half-pictures, and a lot of “wait, did you already pay that?” It gets complicated fast when the rent comes out of one account, groceries out of another, and nobody has the whole picture.
A shared budget puts everyone on the same page. The same accounts, the same buckets, the same Free-to-Spend, updated for everyone as money moves. Beacon does the work of keeping one shared view in sync so you don’t have to compare notes.
You can also keep more than one budget, like a personal one and a shared one, and switch between them whenever you want.
Invite someone to your budget
First, the person you’re inviting needs their own Beacon account, and they need to create it before you invite them. Beacon matches the invite to an existing account by email, so if no account uses that email yet, the invite won’t go through. Have them sign up first, then invite the email they signed up with.
To invite them:
- Open the side panel. On mobile, tap Budgets. On the web, tap My Profile, then Manage & share budgets.
- Open the budget you want to share.
- In the Members section, tap the add member button (the group icon).
- Enter the person’s email and confirm.
Beacon sends them an invitation. They stay in the Members list as pending until they accept.
Accept an invitation
If someone invites you, open the side panel and tap Budgets (on the web, tap My Profile, then Manage & share budgets). The shared budget shows up there marked Invitation pending, with the option to Accept or decline. Once you accept, you can switch to that budget and see everything the owner set up.
Everyone shares the same budget
A shared budget is not a separate copy for each person. Everyone on it sees the exact same accounts, buckets, funding schedules, and transactions. When one person funds a bucket or a new transaction lands, everyone sees it. There is one set of numbers, not one per person.
Anyone on the budget can link their own bank accounts into it, so both people’s income and spending land in the same place. That is what makes it a real joint budget instead of one person’s numbers that the other can only watch.
Switch between your budgets
If you have more than one budget, switch between them from the budget switcher at the top of your Profile. Tap the current budget’s name, the one with the small arrow next to it, to open Switch Budget, then pick the one you want. The whole app reflects that budget until you switch again. On the web, the switcher is in the left navigation.
You can start another budget from that same Switch Budget screen with + New budget.
Manage members
The owner controls access from the budget’s Members section.
- Resend an invitation to someone who hasn’t accepted yet.
- Remove a member to take away their access.
If you were invited into a budget, you can leave it at any time from that budget’s page.