The Sweet Way
to Budget

Anyone who is looking for a simple way to budget. We know budgeting can be difficult and stressful. Jelli makes budgeting easy. Our AI-Powered Budgeting Assistant, JJ, helps you create a baseline budget in minutes. Once your budget and JelliJARS have been created, JJ will allocate your paycheck to your jars each time you get paid. When you make a purchase, JJ lets you know in the app and prompts you to assign the purchase to a jar. The jar balance is debited showing you the new funds amount available for spending. You always know how much you have to spend. It’s that easy. Jelli is especially built for people whose income isn’t the same every paycheck — gig workers, freelancers, tipped and commission-based employees, and anyone juggling multiple income streams. Instead of requiring a fixed monthly income, Jelli splits whatever comes in proportionally across your JelliJARS, so your budget never breaks just because your paycheck does.

JelliJARS are colorful, digital spending containers — one for each category in your budget, like Rent, Groceries, or Entertainment. Each jar holds the money set aside for that purpose, so instead of staring at one big bank balance and doing mental math, you glance at a jar and instantly know how much you have left to spend in that category. There’s no required list of categories — every jar can be renamed, resized, given a savings goal, or capped with a Lid, so your jars end up reflecting how you actually live, not a generic template.

Yes — every JelliJAR is fully customizable. Rename it to fit your real life, set any budget amount, add a savings goal, and toggle the Lid on or off. There’s no required category list, so if your life needs a Dragon-Boating Jar, a Guitar Jar, or anything else, Jelli tracks it exactly the way you set it up.

Every time a transaction hits your connected bank account, debit card, or credit card, Jelli automatically pulls it in and drops it into your Unassigned Transactions list — think of it as your spending inbox, holding every purchase until you tell Jelli which jar it belongs to. Tap any unassigned transaction, pick the right JelliJAR, and that jar’s balance is instantly debited by the amount, with the new balance shown right there — so you always know exactly where you stand in every jar. Jelli remembers your choice, too: the next time you shop at that same merchant, it suggests the same jar automatically, so repeat purchases get faster to assign over time. And if a single purchase covers more than one category — say a Target run that’s part groceries, part household — you can split that one transaction across multiple jars instead of forcing it into just one.

Here’s the important part: your Total Available is deducted the moment a transaction shows up — whether or not you’ve assigned it to a jar yet. That’s because Total Available equals the sum of all your jar balances plus your unassigned transactions, so the money is already accounted for the instant it’s spent. When you assign a transaction, it simply moves from the Unassigned list into a specific jar — the jar’s balance drops, but your Total Available doesn’t change, because it was already reflected there the moment the transaction posted. Assigning transactions daily only takes about a minute, and it’s what keeps each individual jar balance accurate — nothing you’ve already spent slips through the cracks, and nothing gets double-counted.

Yes. If a single purchase covers more than one category — say a Walmart run that includes groceries and a few clothing items — you can split that one transaction across multiple JelliJARS, assigning each portion to the right jar. Jelli also remembers your assignment, so the next time you shop at the same merchant, it suggests the same jar automatically.

Connect your bank account through Plaid, and Jelli’s AI reads 12 months of your real transaction history to build a personalized budget from how you actually spend — not a generic template. Here’s how it works: Jelli identifies the main categories you actually spend money in — things like Rent, Groceries, Transportation, and Entertainment — by grouping your past transactions. For each category, it calculates your average monthly spend and sets that dollar amount as your budget for that category. That budget amount becomes a JelliJAR, and Jelli also calculates what percentage of your total monthly budget each jar represents — so if Rent averages $2,000 out of a $3,600 total budget, that jar is set at roughly 56%. Those percentages are what let Jelli split any future paycheck proportionally across all your jars, no matter the amount or timing. You can review the proposed budget and tweak any category before you start — and since your budget isn’t set in stone, you can update it any time after that too. Most people are fully set up in under 10 minutes, with no income field to fill out and no manual categorizing.

Yes — Jelli was built for exactly this. Instead of requiring a fixed monthly income, Jelli uses percentage-based allocation: whatever amount comes in, big or small, gets split proportionally across your JelliJARS with one tap. The Lid Feature caps a jar once it hits its budget for the month and automatically routes the overflow to your Spare Change Jar, which builds a cushion on good weeks and acts as a buffer on lean ones. No reconfiguring, no broken budget when income changes.

A Lid is a cap you can put on any JelliJAR that keeps it from filling past a set limit. If the jar has no Goal ($0), the Lid caps it at its Monthly Budget amount. If the jar has a Goal set, that Goal amount becomes the fill limit instead. Either way, once the jar hits its limit, the Lid kicks in and any extra money that would have gone into that jar gets automatically redirected to your Spare Change Jar instead of just sitting unallocated. It’s especially handy on a big income month, when a paycheck might otherwise overfund a category past what you actually need.

The Spare Change Jar is Jelli’s built-in catch-all for extra money — it automatically collects any overflow from jars that have hit their Lid. Over time it builds into a cushion you can dip into on leaner weeks or let grow as a cash buffer, all without you having to manually move money around.

It’s designed to. You earn JelliBEANS for everyday budgeting actions — assigning transactions, splitting your paycheck, hitting milestones — and spend them on Jar Themes, custom visual skins for your jars that drop quarterly. You can also unlock 12 Apple Game Center Achievements across your first year, each one adding a bonus round of JelliBEANS. The daily habit only takes about 60 seconds.

JJ is Jelli’s AI budgeting companion — a smart little jar with gold glasses who helps you set up your budget, flags things worth your attention, and celebrates your wins.

No — and it isn’t trying to. Complex financial planning like investments, tax strategy, and retirement modeling really benefits from a trained human advisor with fiduciary responsibility. What JJ does instead is handle the daily spending decisions a financial advisor can’t be there for — like whether you can afford something on a Wednesday night. JJ is always available, always knows your jar balances, and always answers in plain language. Think of JJ and a financial advisor as solving two different problems, not competing for the same one.

Yes. Ask JJ to look at your subscriptions from the last 30 days and he’ll pull up every recurring charge, merchant by merchant. Most people find at least one subscription they forgot they were paying for — often $30 to $80 a month. Beyond subscriptions, JJ can also flag jars that consistently have leftover money, which usually signals a category you’re over-budgeting.

Most budgeting apps treat a credit card like debt, not a spending tool — they can’t show you the real-time impact on your budget when you swipe. Jelli is different. Every credit card transaction is assigned to a jar, like debit card transactions, and your Total Available is updated to reflect the money spent using your credit card. Behind the scenes, Jelli automatically reserves the matching funds in your bank account as your credit card balance grows, so the money to pay your statement in full is always set aside without any manual work on your part. That means you can swipe all month for the rewards and points, pay off your credit card balance using those reserved funds, stay on budget, and never carry a balance.

Jelli handles it gracefully. Since any charges made before you connected the card were never assigned to a JelliJAR, Jelli tracks two separate numbers behind the scenes: your Credit Card Purchases Balance — the total of what you’ve spent and assigned to jars since joining Jelli, which is what gets reserved from your bank account — and your actual Credit Card Balance, your full statement balance including the prior charges. When you make a payment, Jelli automatically matches the portion that covers your Jelli-tracked purchases. If your payment is larger than that, because some of it is going toward the prior balance, Jelli will prompt you to assign that leftover piece to a jar so your budget stays complete. Once the prior balance is paid off, the prompt disappears and everything runs automatically from there.

Yes. Create a dedicated JelliJAR for any predictable but infrequent expense — holiday gifts, car registration, an annual insurance premium, a big trip — set a target amount, and assign it a budget percentage. Every paycheck funds it a little at a time, so a $600 holiday budget becomes $50 a month funded automatically, and by the time the expense hits, the money is already there. No scrambling, no surprise hit to your checking account.

Yes. Create a JelliJAR for any goal — an emergency fund, a vacation, a debt payoff target — name it, set a target amount, and assign it a budget percentage. Every paycheck funds it automatically and proportionally, so progress happens without you having to move money manually. JJ tracks the progress with you and marks milestones along the way.

Yes. Self-employed users can create a dedicated Tax Jar and set it to receive 25–30% of every deposit, the same way any other JelliJAR works. Since Jelli splits every deposit proportionally regardless of size or source, your tax set-aside grows automatically with every client payment or invoice — no separate spreadsheet, no year-end scramble.

Not automatically — there’s no digital record once cash leaves your account, so no app can track it after the fact. But Jelli makes it fast to log manually: when you withdraw cash at an ATM, that withdrawal shows up in your Unassigned Transactions list, and you can assign it straight to a Cash & Misc jar. For the purchases themselves, you can add them with a quick manual entry — tap a jar, enter the amount, done. Most day-to-day spending is digital, so this only comes up occasionally.

Jelli integrates directly with your bank account via Plaid. When you sign up, the Jelli App will walk you through the integration process in just a few steps. Jelli connects your credit card the same way, through Plaid, so both your bank account and credit card activity update automatically throughout the day — you always know where you stand. And for those who want to do some old-school budgeting with a spreadsheet, you can download your activity any time.

Yes. Jelli’s AI-Powered Budgeting Assistant, JJ, is central to Jelli’s budgeting platform. JJ analyzes your spending in your bank account and prepares a base-line budget from your spending history. From there, you are able to make adjustments and add additional jars that you may need. While JJ automates some budgeting processes, he allows you to have the ultimate control, giving you the power to make any adjustments you see fit. He will make recommendations but the final choice is left up to you, he won’t do things without asking 🙂

Bank-linking anxiety is common, and it’s worth addressing head-on rather than glossing over. Jelli connects through Plaid, the same secure infrastructure used by thousands of banks and financial apps. Here’s exactly what that means: Jelli never sees or stores your bank username or password — the login happens directly between you and your bank through Plaid’s encrypted connection, and Jelli only receives a secure token in return. Jelli has read-only access to your transaction data, meaning it can see what you’ve spent and where, but it has no ability to move, withdraw, or transfer money out of your account — there’s no mechanism for Jelli to initiate a transaction of any kind. All data is protected with bank-level encryption, and you can revoke access at any time, either in the app or through your bank’s or Plaid’s own permissions settings. If you’ve seen concerns online about bank-linking apps generally, the short version is: read-only means read-only — Jelli can look, but it can’t touch.

Jelli offers two options. Our Rookie plan covers one bank account and one credit card, and it’s available now at $2.99 per month. Our Pro plan, coming soon, covers multiple bank accounts and multiple credit cards at $5.99 per month. There are no contracts — you can sign up or cancel at any time.

Most competitors run $13–$18/month. Jelli’s Rookie plan is $2.99/month for one bank account and one credit card, and it’s available now. The Pro plan, coming soon at $5.99/month, covers multiple bank accounts and multiple credit cards. No contracts, and both tiers include full AI budget setup, JelliJARS, automatic paycheck splitting, JJ, gamification, and credit card integration.

Not yet, but it’s coming soon. Jelli will support shared accounts — essentially one account accessed by two users — so both partners log in on their own phone and see the exact same JelliJARS in real time. When the Entertainment Jar shows $85, you both see $85, and when it hits zero, you both see that too.

No, Jelli is not a bank account. It’s a budgeting app that connects to your bank account. When a transaction occurs in your bank account, it will be mirrored in your Jelli Account.

No. If you want to send money to someone, you have to use a P2P platform like Venmo or Zelle. If you want to move money from your checking to your savings account or to another bank account, you have to use your bank’s mobile app to do so. Jelli only reports on money movements, you can’t initiate any money movements with Jelli.

No. Jelli will not send you a card. Jelli is a budgeting app only. You use your own existing bank debit card and credit card for making purchases, and Jelli tracks both — every purchase, whether it comes from your bank account or your credit card, shows up in the Jelli App and is assigned to a JelliJAR.

No, Jelli does not run a credit check when you sign up for an account.

Yes, simply sign up again and JJ will help you get started. However, we don’t store your old account data so you will begin fresh.

If you would like to become a Jelli Affiliate or Brand Enthusiast to refer Jelli to others, reach out to hello@jelli.us to learn more about our Jelli Affiliate and Brand Enthusiast Programs.