FinWise in your browser

iPhone, Android or laptop — nothing to install, no app store, and your data stays in your browser on your device. 6 quick steps and your transactions flow in automatically.

Stuck on something not covered here? Email us or WhatsApp +91 86862 06428 with a screenshot.

🌐 How is the web app different from the Android app?

Same FinWise, same screens, same privacy — with two platform differences:

No silent SMS reading. Browsers never let a website read your messages (that's a platform rule for every website, not a FinWise limit). Transactions come in via Auto-Sync, message exports or bank statements — steps 4–6.
Your data lives in that browser. Each browser/device keeps its own private database. The web app and the Android app don't sync automatically — use More → Backup to export from one and restore into the other.

Don't use it in Incognito/Private mode — private windows wipe their storage when closed, and your data would go with them.

⚡ Advanced: make bank messages arrive on their own

You do not need this. Steps 4 and 5 already cover everything. This is only worth trying if you're comfortable setting up phone automations — and it takes about ten minutes.

First, get your personal link — this happens inside FinWise:

Tap the FinWise icon on your home screen (the one you added in Step 2 — that is the app on your iPhone).
Tap More at the bottom, then Auto-Sync.
Tap Enable, then Copy link. Your phone now holds that link in its clipboard.

Now switch to the Shortcuts app — grey icon with two coloured squares, already on every iPhone:

Tap Automation at the bottom → + (top right) → scroll to Message.
Choose Message Contains and type: debited
Set it to Run Immediately, then tap Next.
Search for and add the action Get Contents of URL.
Press and hold the URL field → Paste (your FinWise link).
Tap the arrow to expand it, set Method to POST, and set the Request Body to the message text.
Tap Done.

Now repeat all of that a second time — identical, but with the word credited instead of debited. Without the second one, money going out is captured but money coming in (salary, refunds) is never seen. Some banks use "credit"/"debit" instead — check your own bank's wording and match it.

Finally, go back into FinWise → More → Auto-Sync and tap Sync now. Anything your phone has forwarded appears in your Transaction Inbox for review.

Honest note: Apple changes how Shortcuts automations behave between iOS versions, and we have not been able to test this on a real iPhone yet. If it doesn't work on yours, nothing is broken — Steps 4 and 5 still capture everything. Please tell us what you saw so we can fix these instructions.

🔒 Where exactly is my money data stored on iPhone?

On your iPhone, inside FinWise's own private storage — not on our servers. Apple gives every website a locked box that only that website can open. No other site, app or person can read FinWise's box, and we never receive a copy of your transactions.

Two things genuinely protect it:

Your iPhone's own encryption. Whenever your phone is locked, everything in that box is encrypted by iOS itself. Someone who steals the phone can't read it without your passcode.
Your Secure Vault is encrypted a second time with your passphrase — so even unlocked, those entries stay scrambled without it.

The real risk is not theft — it's loss. Because nothing is on our servers, we cannot recover your records for you. You would lose them if you:

delete the FinWise icon from your home screen,
erase or clear Safari's website data,
lose or factory-reset the phone,
or leave the app unused for a long time — iPhones sometimes clear storage belonging to sites you haven't opened in a while.

That last one is why Step 2 matters. Adding FinWise to your home screen and opening it from there tells iPhone this is a real app you use, which protects its storage from being cleared. FinWise also asks iOS for permanent storage automatically the first time it loads.

Do the backup in Step 6. It's a single file containing your records. Send it to yourself once a month. If anything ever happens to the phone, that file is how you get everything back — and it's the only way, because we hold nothing.