Looking to learn how to save money fast? Well, in this post you'll learn about 10 money saving apps to make saving money a breeze.
Whether it's preparing to buy a big-ticket item, building a nest egg for retirement, or just saving dimes and dollars on every day and recurring purchases you're already making, saving money is crucially important.
But it doesn't have to be painful — especially with a powerful personal computer in your pocket disguised as a telephone.
Here are 10 apps to help you save money — for today or tomorrow.
10 Apps to Help You Save Money Fast
1. Fidelity
Whether you have an employer-backed retirement account or a personal Roth IRA, there's a good chance it's serviced by Fidelity. Using the mobile and web app, it's easy to watch your accounts grow or make additional one-time investments in your future as often as you can afford to do so.
Or click here to learn more about Fidelity
2. Digit
The Digit web and mobile apps make it genuinely painless to save money “in the background.” It works by keeping an eye on a linked personal checking account and saving small amounts of money at a time based on your incoming profit or wages.
Or click here to learn more about Digit
3. Acorns
Like Digit, Acorns offers a mobile and web app. It too functions by saving small amounts of money automatically, this time by rounding up your purchases on a linked account or card and by investing the difference in your Acorns account. The service recently launched “Acorns Later” — a full-featured retirement account that that's perfect for anybody without an employer-sponsored retirement plan.
Or click here to learn more about Acorns
4. Credit Sesame
Sometimes, saving money for the future or a major purchase requires a little personal finance triage first. If that's the case, the Credit Sesame app is a good starting point for anybody who wants to find out where they stand credit-wise and get some practical tips for improving it, saving money on ordinary expenses while you do so.
Or click here to learn more about Credit Sesame
5. Ibotta
You can probably file this one under “sounds too good to be true but isn't.” Ibotta is an app that works with 250 major retailers, including big-box stores, to help you get some money back, retroactively, on purchases you already make regularly. Some users report savings of up to $25 in their first month without changing their shopping habits.
Or click here to learn more about Ibotta
6. Amazon.com
Concerns about Amazon's working conditions have finally reached the mainstream, but there's little doubt Amazon can be a cost-savings godsend when you know how to work the system. A good start is using the Amazon.com mobile app to scan barcodes when you're out shopping. If Amazon — or a third-party affiliate — has a lower price on the item, it'll let you know.
Or click here to learn more about Amazon
7. Swagbucks
If you're looking for a way to browse for cool deals, search for specific items, conduct paid surveys and generally earn a little bit back on all of the shopping research you'd be doing anyway, SwagBucks is for you. After you link a PayPal account, most of your activity on the app — from doing product searches to providing marketing feedback — helps you earn points toward cash rewards.
Or click here to learn more about Swagbucks
8. Trim
Trim makes the bold claim that its machine learning-facilitated app platform saves its users one million dollars per month. How? By looking over your finances and canceling unused subscriptions, finding more affordable utility and service providers and generally looking for waste and redundancy. Give it a try.
Or click here to learn morea about Trim
9. Qapital
Qapital is another mobile-focused savings app that makes automatic or manual deposits based on your income. But it goes a step further than some of the others by offering a social and family component, where you can save money as part of a group, as well as robust goal-setting features for when you have specific savings milestones in mind.
Or click here to visit Qapital
10. Ebates
Ebates functions a little like an outlet store for 2500 internet retailers. By making Ebates your “shopping portal,” either through the web app or a browser extension, you have access to thousands of great deals — up to 40 percent off — on almost anything you can imagine, straight from your retailers of choice.
Or click here to learn more about Ebates
Want to Save Money Fast? Go Do It!
To close, let's reflect on the fact that there's often no better way to get a handle on your finances than to make them more accessible.
To that end, find out if your regional credit union or bank has a mobile app.
If they do, it means you can go everywhere with the means, in your pocket, to move money between accounts, check your balance or identify questionable transactions right when they happen.
If saving money is the goal, then keeping your eyes on your money in the first place is step one.