PocketSmith vs Frollo: should you pay for depth or take the free feeds?
PocketSmith charges a subscription for calendar budgeting and decades-long forecasting. Frollo gives Australians genuinely free open-banking feeds from a company that powers banks. We compare what the money buys, what free really costs, and who each app suits.
The short version
- Frollo is completely free (no ads, no subscriptions) and runs real CDR open-banking feeds from an unrestricted accredited data recipient.
- PocketSmith charges up to A$39.95 a month and buys you calendar budgeting, multi-currency net worth and forecasting decades ahead.
- Frollo is mobile-only and gets maintenance updates; PocketSmith is web-first and keeps shipping new consumer features. Choose on depth versus price.
This pairing comes down to what a money app should cost. Frollo's consumer app is free, ad-free and subscription-free, funded by the company's business of powering open banking for lenders.
PocketSmith charges a subscription and sells planning depth that a free app has no incentive to build. Both answers are legitimate, and the right one depends on what you need the app to do.
Full disclosure before we referee: we build Kleev, a money app that competes with both, and every claim below was checked against primary sources in July 2026.
What is PocketSmith?
PocketSmith is an 18-year-old personal finance product from a New Zealand company. It is built around three things: automatic feeds from over 12,000 institutions, budgeting on a calendar, and daily-balance forecasting that projects up to 60 years ahead on its top plan.
PocketSmith claims over 382,000 users and offers a limited free tier, then charges between A$9.99 and A$39.95 a month for the rest. It suits deliberate planners, multi-currency households and people who share finances with a partner or advisor.
What is Frollo?
Frollo is an Australian open-banking company whose main customers are banks, lenders and mortgage brokers. NAB, ubank and Beyond Bank run on its infrastructure.
Frollo for You is the company's free consumer app. You connect your banks through the Consumer Data Right and get auto-categorised transactions, budgets, bill tracking, savings goals and net worth.
The app claims over 145,000 Australian users and shipped updates as recently as mid-July 2026, though the company's public attention is on its business products. It suits anyone who wants clean, free bank feeds with nothing being sold to them.
| PocketSmith | Frollo | |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing (July 2026) | Free tier (2 accounts); paid plans A$14.95 to A$39.95/mo, cheaper billed annually | Completely free; no ads, no subscriptions, no in-app purchases |
| Data method | Open-banking feeds via Basiq (CDR) in Australia, global aggregators elsewhere, plus OFX/QFX/QIF/CSV import | CDR feeds as an unrestricted accredited data recipient; optional Yodlee fallback; no CSV import that we could find |
| Budgeting model | Calendar-based budgets with daily balance forecasting 10 to 60 years ahead | Budgets, savings goals and bill tracking focused on the present |
| Standout features | What-if forecasting, multi-currency net worth, advisor sharing, document library | Bank-grade CDR accreditation, Australian storage of CDR data, broker-ready Financial Passport |
| Platforms | Web app plus iOS and Android companion | iOS and Android only; no consumer web app |
| Privacy posture | CDR feeds credential-free; legacy overseas feeds credential-based; hosting country not stated | CDR data stored in Australia, deleted within 24 hours of consent withdrawal; Yodlee fallback can transfer data to the US |
PocketSmith and Frollo side by side, from their published pages as at July 2026.
What does PocketSmith's subscription buy?
PocketSmith's forecasting projects daily balances years or decades ahead, models what-if scenarios, and calculates interest automatically from a rate you enter. Frollo has nothing in this category.
PocketSmith also handles multi-currency accounts with daily exchange rates, tracks holdings like bitcoin and gold in net worth, lets you invite a partner or advisor into the account, and recently launched a Files document library for household paperwork.
The web app is PocketSmith's primary product. That suits anyone who prefers doing money admin with a keyboard and a big screen.
What does Frollo give you for nothing?
Frollo's counterargument is that most people never use those features. The essentials cost nothing here: real CDR feeds, automatic categorisation, budgets, bill reminders, goals and a net worth view with manual assets.
Frollo also has one feature PocketSmith lacks entirely. Its verified Financial Passport hands your financial position to a mortgage broker as a PDF, which is genuinely useful if a home loan application is in your near future.
Is Frollo's free app a safe bet if the company is focused on business customers?
The app is alive and maintained. Its iOS version shipped on 16 July 2026, its Android build updated the day before, and Frollo has published no discontinuation notice.
It is equally fair to say the company's attention is elsewhere. Frollo's blog and media releases are entirely about brokers, lenders and open-banking infrastructure, and the consumer app's Android rating sits around 2.9 stars.
Our honest read: Frollo for You is a stable free tool running on serious infrastructure, and it is not a product racing ahead. PocketSmith, by contrast, is the company's whole business, with a public changelog of consumer features landing through 2026.
If you want your money app to keep getting better, weigh that difference against the subscription price.
How does Frollo handle your data?
Frollo's CDR posture is about as strong as Australian consumer finance gets. It holds unrestricted accredited-data-recipient status in its own right, states that CDR data is stored in Australia, re-notifies you about consents every 90 days, and commits to irretrievably deleting shared data within 24 hours if you withdraw consent.
The caveat is Frollo's optional Yodlee fallback for banks outside CDR, which is credential-based screen-scraping and can involve transfer to the United States. Its Apple privacy label also records data collected and linked to identity.
How does PocketSmith handle your data?
PocketSmith's Australian feeds are credential-free CDR through Basiq, and its feeds are read-only with 2FA available. Against that, its privacy policy carried a 2019 date when we checked, and its pages don't say which country hosts your data.
Neither posture is alarming. Frollo's CDR-side commitments are the strictest on paper.
The verdict, by user type
- Wanting free, clean bank feeds with no sales agenda: Frollo. No ads, no subscriptions, and CDR credentials most fintechs can't match.
- Planning years ahead, modelling scenarios: PocketSmith. The forecasting engine has no equivalent in Frollo.
- Doing money admin at a desk: PocketSmith. Frollo has no consumer web app at all.
- Preparing for a home loan application: Frollo. The broker-ready Financial Passport is a genuine head start.
- Holding overseas accounts or multiple currencies: PocketSmith. Frollo is Australian banks only.
- On a strict budget for subscriptions: Frollo, clearly. PocketSmith's free tier stops at 2 accounts.
And if neither quite fits
We publish this on kleev.ai and we build Kleev, so treat this closing note as the one ad in the article. Kleev works differently from both apps.
Instead of live bank feeds you upload CSV exports, so there is no bank login and no aggregator involved. Kleev's depth is in investment property, with loan amortisation, offset what-ifs and property cashflow.
If that matches your situation, look at how Kleev tracks spending, the Kleev-versus-the-field roundup, or the head-to-heads with PocketSmith and Frollo.
The fine print
- This article is general information, not financial advice. Kleev describes your own data and does not give financial advice.
- Prices and features were verified on PocketSmith's and Frollo's published pages in July 2026 and may change; check their sites before relying on them.
- We build Kleev, a competing money app, and have flagged that bias openly rather than pretending neutrality we don't have.
Common questions
Is Frollo really free?
Yes. Frollo's consumer app has no ads, no subscriptions and no in-app purchases; the company earns its money from enterprise open-banking services for banks and lenders, and from its broker platform. The consumer app is a showcase for that infrastructure rather than a profit centre.
Does PocketSmith have better bank connections than Frollo in Australia?
They arrive by different routes. Frollo is an unrestricted accredited data recipient under the Consumer Data Right in its own right and claims support for Australian banks where CDR is available. PocketSmith reaches Australian banks through Basiq, an accredited recipient it partners with, and adds worldwide coverage of over 12,000 institutions through other aggregators. For purely Australian banking both get you consent-based feeds; PocketSmith wins if you also hold overseas accounts.
Can I use Frollo on my computer?
No. Frollo's consumer app is iOS and Android only; its web portals serve brokers and business clients. PocketSmith is the opposite: it's web-first with a companion mobile app. If you do your money admin at a desk with a keyboard, that difference matters more than any feature list.
Which app forecasts further ahead?
PocketSmith, by a wide margin. Daily balance forecasting 10 to 60 years ahead (depending on plan) with what-if scenarios is its signature feature. Frollo focuses on the present: budgets, bill tracking, savings goals and spending insights, with no long-range forecasting engine.