How to move your history from Money Manager
There are two popular apps called Money Manager, made by different companies, and their export files have nothing in common. You do not need to know which one you installed: the first line of your file says it, and Money Talks reads both.
How to bring it in
- 1. Export your history from Money Manager. Both apps produce an XLSX file.
- 2. Open Money Talks, go to Settings and tap Import Data.
- 3. Choose Money Manager if the file has Expenses, Income and Transfers sheets, or Money Manager by Realbyte if it has one sheet with a currency-named column. Picking the wrong one of the two does not correct itself, so check the sheets first. If you would rather not, choose Smart Import instead: that path reads the header and sends the file to whichever reader matches.
- 4. Pick the file you exported.
- 5. Read the preview. It shows how many transactions will be added, which categories are new, and every row that was skipped along with the reason.
- 6. Confirm.
The file you need
Both apps export an XLSX spreadsheet, not a CSV.
You have the right file if its first line looks like this:
Realbyte:
Period | Accounts | Category | Subcategory | Note | UAH | Income/Expense | Description | Amount | Currency | Accounts
Orange Dog:
Date and time | Category | Account | Amount in default currency | Default currency | Amount in account currency | Account currency | ...If the header row contains a column named after a currency and the word Accounts twice, you have the Realbyte app. If the file has three sheets named Expenses, Income and Transfers, you have the Orange Dog one.
Frequently asked questions
How do I tell which Money Manager I have?
Open the export and look at the sheets. Three sheets named Expenses, Income and Transfers means the Orange Dog app. One sheet whose header includes a column named after a currency, such as UAH or EUR, and the word Accounts twice, means the Realbyte app. If you would rather not look, choose Smart Import: that path reads the header and hands the file to whichever reader matches. The two named entries do not do that for each other, so picking the wrong one of them gives you a file read by the wrong reader.
Why is one of my columns named UAH, or EUR, or USD?
The Realbyte app names that column after the base currency your app was set to, so the header is different for every user. It holds each amount converted into that currency. Money Talks reads the currency the transaction was actually made in instead, from the Currency column, and converts to your own base currency from there.
Why does the word Accounts appear twice in the header?
The Realbyte export uses the same name for two different columns: the account a transaction belongs to, and a converted amount. A spreadsheet reader that keeps the last column of a repeated name ends up with a number where the account name should be. Money Talks separates them before reading a single row.
Do transfers between my accounts come across?
Yes, from both apps. Realbyte writes a transfer as a Transfer-Out row plus a Transfer-In row that name each other. Orange Dog puts transfers on their own sheet with Outgoing and Incoming columns. Either way, Money Talks pairs the two sides into a single transfer with both amounts, so a cross-currency move keeps the rate you got.
What comes across from Money Manager
- Every transaction with its date, category and note
- Subcategories, where the app records them
- The currency on each row, including a transaction made in a currency other than the account's own
- Transfers between your own accounts, paired into one record with both sides
- The account each transaction came from
What does not come across
- Rows with a zero amount - There is nothing to record. They are marked as skipped on purpose.
- Tags - Money Talks has no tags. Notes and descriptions come across in full.
- The converted-amount column - Both apps write a second copy of each amount converted to the base currency they were set to. Money Talks converts to your base currency itself, using the currency the transaction was really made in, so the pre-converted copy is not needed.
- Your accounts themselves - Each transaction remembers the account name it came from. Money Talks does not recreate the accounts or their balances.
Two apps, one name
Search the App Store for Money Manager and you get two serious apps. One is made by Realbyte and has been installed tens of millions of times. The other is made by Orange Dog. They are unrelated, and their exports look nothing alike.
This trips people up in a specific way: you follow a guide written for the other app, the columns do not match, and you conclude your file is broken. It is not.
Money Talks lists both separately. Choosing the wrong one of the two does not silently correct itself, so it is worth the five seconds below to tell them apart. If you would rather not look, pick Smart Import instead: that path reads the header and hands the file to whichever of the two readers matches.
Telling them apart in five seconds
Open the file and count the sheets.
Three sheets named Expenses, Income and Transfers means the Orange Dog app.
Each sheet has a sentence above the header saying which period it covers, which is
why a spreadsheet tool sometimes shows the first row as one long line of text.
One sheet, with a header that includes the word Accounts twice and a column
named after a currency, means the Realbyte app.
The column named after your own currency
The Realbyte export writes a column whose header is your base currency: UAH,
EUR, USD, whatever your app was set to. It holds every amount converted into
that currency.
That means the header is different for every person who exports, which is unusual
and worth knowing if you ever write a script against these files. It also means
the column is a conversion, not the original. Money Talks reads the Currency
column instead, which holds what the transaction was really made in, and converts
from there to your base currency.
The practical difference shows up on holiday. A EUR 40 dinner recorded while your
app was set to hryvnia is EUR 40 in the Currency column and roughly 1,800 in the
UAH column. Import the first and your history stays honest about where you were.
Transfers
Realbyte writes a move between accounts as two rows, Transfer-Out and
Transfer-In, each naming the other account. Orange Dog gives transfers their own
sheet with Outgoing and Incoming columns side by side.
Money Talks pairs the two halves back into one transfer before anything is saved, so the money does not appear as a spend on one account and mysterious income on the other. If the two sides are in different currencies, both amounts are kept.