What happened to Mint
Intuit shut Mint down on March 23, 2024, ending a 17-year run as the default starting point for online personal finance.
Users were told to migrate to Credit Karma, also owned by Intuit. But anyone who made the move quickly discovered that Credit Karma wasn't a replacement. While account balances and basic net-worth numbers carried over, the actual tools that made Mint useful—custom budgets, granular categories, goal tracking, and detailed spending trends—did not.
For millions of people, the shutdown didn't just break an app; it broke a weekly routine. If you've been searching for a Mint alternative because the migration felt like landing in a marketplace rather than a budgeting app, you aren't imagining things. The app you relied on simply isn't there anymore.
What Mint actually was
It's easy to romanticize software once it's gone, but it’s worth being honest about what Mint was: a free tool funded by credit card ads and loan referrals.
That business model quietly dictated the product. Categorization was automated, but it was notoriously imprecise. If an algorithm mislabeled your transaction, fixing it was frustrating, and future syncs would often overwrite your manual work. Mint aggregated your accounts reasonably well, but deep goal tracking and transparent financial planning were never the priority—keeping you inside an ad-supported dashboard was.
None of that diminishes the value of the routine you built. Mint gave millions of people their first clear window into their spending. That habit—checking in, knowing your numbers, and staying aware of your cash flow—is genuinely worth protecting. It just deserves a better foundation than an ad engine.
The key differences
| Feature | Bao | Mint (Defunct) |
|---|---|---|
| Business Model | Flat subscription ($10/mo or $96/yr). No ads, no sponsored offers, nothing else to sell. | Free to use. Funded by display ads and referral commissions from credit cards and loans. |
| Primary Purpose | Day-to-day spending clarity, transparent categorization, net worth, and forward-looking goal modeling. | Account aggregation, high-level expense tracking, and credit card offer placement. |
| Categorization & Automation | Automated, transparent, and adaptive. Handles background math and imports automatically. Shows the clear origin of every label, adapts to your manual corrections, and never overwrites your edits. | Automated but brittle black box. Transactions were frequently mislabeled, with no clear sorting history and rules that easily broke. |
| Forward Projections | Multi-scenario goal planning factoring in inflation, rate adjustments, and plain-language assumptions. | Basic target tracking without realistic multi-scenario modeling or inflation adjustments. |
| Current Status | Actively developed and independent. | Permanently shut down on March 23, 2024. |
How Bao handles the details
Automated tracking that actually learns your habits.
The best part of Mint was the convenience: connecting your accounts and letting the software pull in the numbers. Bao preserves that ease, handling the background syncing, running the calculations, and organizing incoming transactions so you don’t have to do manual entry. But unlike legacy tools, you have total visibility:
- Clear origins: You can always see exactly why an expense was sorted the way it was.
- Zero guesswork: If a rule or suggestion gets it wrong, a single tap fixes it.
- Adaptive memory: Bao remembers your corrections. The more you use it, the smarter it gets at anticipating your categories.
- Permanent edits: Your manual calls are final. Bao never silently scrambles your ledger on the next sync.
Restraint over notification fatigue.
Mint was notorious for peppering your inbox and screen with alerts—many of which were thinly veiled pitches for new financial products. Bao holds to strict restraint: when something needs your attention, it surfaces the single most timely action and holds the rest. Checking your finances should feel like a thirty-second glance, not triage.
Clear-eyed planning, not guesswork.
Knowing what you spent on takeout three weeks ago only gets you so far. Bao models where your savings and net worth are headed over years and decades. You can adjust expected return rates, factor in inflation, and test what-if scenarios with understandable calculations. We help simplify your finances so you can be empowered to make decisions.
Who should look elsewhere?
If you are looking for an exact 1:1 clone of Mint's interface, or if your primary requirement is a completely free, ad-supported service, Bao won't be the right fit. Building private software with reliable bank connections and zero outside incentives requires a subscription model.
Similarly, if all you need right now is a free credit score check without any budgeting or spend-tracking features, Credit Karma can handle that single task at no cost.
Pick the habit back up
You don’t have to start from scratch just because an old app shut down. The habit you built—taking a few minutes each week to understand where you stand—is the real asset.
Bao gives that habit a clean, quiet home: automatic sync without ads, categorization that respects your corrections, and honest projections for the future. Start your 30-day free trial and pick your financial routine back up today.
Frequently asked questions
Intuit officially shut Mint down on March 23, 2024. Users were directed to migrate to Credit Karma, an Intuit-owned credit-monitoring platform, rather than a direct budgeting replacement.
No. Intuit permanently retired Mint to consolidate its consumer offerings under Credit Karma. There are no plans to revive Mint as a standalone budgeting app.
Bao does not import legacy Mint CSV files directly. Instead, you connect your accounts directly, and Bao immediately begins syncing fresh balances, categorizing transactions, and building forward-looking projections.
Not for budgeting. Credit Karma is designed primarily for free credit score monitoring and affiliate product recommendations. It lacks Mint's core budgeting workflows, monthly spending limits, and customizable category tracking.
Bao offers a 30-day free trial (credit card required; first charge occurs on day 30). After that, membership is $10 per month or $96 billed annually ($8 per month). Every feature is included with zero ads or upsells.
See Bao for yourself.
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