How to Use Dinero


Getting Started

After signing up and verifying your email, start by setting up your currencies. One currency is marked as the default (the base currency everything is converted to, e.g. PLN). Then you can begin logging incomes, expenses, and possessions.

The typical setup order is:

  1. Add your currencies (e.g. PLN as default, EUR, USD)
  2. Add your possessions (bank accounts, savings, cash)
  3. Start logging incomes and expenses

Use the dark/light mode toggle (sun/moon icon in the navbar) to switch between themes. It defaults to your operating system preference.

Dashboard

The dashboard shows a running balance over a date range. It starts from your total possessions value (converted to PLN) and adds incomes / subtracts expenses day by day.

Filters
  • Start / End date — the period to display. Defaults to the current month through 2 months ahead.
  • Level — filters expenses by priority. Level 1 shows only "Must spend", level 3 includes everything.
What you see

Each row is a day with transactions. Incomes appear in green with a + prefix, expenses in black with a - prefix. The rightmost column shows the running balance after that day. A thick line separates months.

Click the edit button next to any entry to jump to its edit form on the corresponding Incomes or Expenses page.

Recurring entries are automatically expanded within the date range — a monthly salary starting in February will appear on the 10th of each following month.

Incomes

Log each source of income with a description, amount, currency, and date.

Fields
Description What the income is (e.g. "Salary", "Freelance project")
Date When you received the income
Value Amount received
Currency Defaults to your default currency. For other currencies, an exchange rate field appears
Type Standard for regular income, Loan for loans you give (see Loans)
Icon Optional Bootstrap icon for visual identification. Click the grid button to browse icons
Cyclic Mark as recurring. See Recurring Entries
Auto archive Past occurrences automatically move to "Archived" status
Filtering

The list defaults to showing entries from today through one month ahead. Use the Date from / to fields to change the range. The Status filter switches between Active, Archived, or All entries.

Actions
  • Edit — modify the entry. For recurring entries, you choose whether to update all occurrences, only this one, or this and future ones
  • Copy — create a new entry pre-filled with the same values
  • Archive — move to archived status. For recurring entries, choose scope
  • Unarchive — restore an archived entry to active
  • Delete — permanently remove (only available for archived entries)

Expenses

Track spending with detailed expense entries. Expenses have all the same fields as incomes, plus:

Priority Levels
Must Essential expenses (rent, utilities, food)
Should Important but not critical (insurance, savings)
Nice Discretionary spending (entertainment, dining out)

The dashboard uses these levels for filtering — you can see your balance with only essential expenses, or with everything included.

Components

Each expense can have multiple components (line items). For example, a grocery bill might have components for different categories. Each component has:

  • Description — what the item is
  • Quantity and Unit price — total = quantity × unit price
  • Currency — can differ from the parent expense (e.g. buying something in EUR for a PLN expense)
  • Exchange rate — for cross-currency components

When components exist, the expense's total value is automatically calculated from the sum of its components (converted to the expense's currency). Without components, you set the value directly.

Filtering

In addition to date and status filters, expenses can be filtered by Level and Cyclic status.

Possessions

Possessions represent your accounts, assets, and holdings. They form the initial balance on the dashboard — the starting point before incomes and expenses are applied.

Fields
Account name Name of the account or asset (e.g. "Savings account", "Cash EUR")
Value Current value/balance
Currency Currency of the account. For non-default currencies, set the exchange rate
Notes Optional notes (e.g. bank name, account number)
Transfer on Archive

When archiving an income, you can optionally transfer its value to a possession. This is useful for recording that income money was deposited into a specific account. The value is converted between currencies automatically.

Currencies & Exchange Rates

Setting Up Currencies

Go to Currencies in the navigation bar. Add each currency you use (e.g. USD, EUR, GBP). One currency must be set as the default — this is your base currency (e.g. PLN). Entries in the default currency always have a rate of 1 and do not need exchange rate information.

Exchange Rate Sources

When you create an income, expense, or possession in a non-default currency, you choose how the exchange rate is determined:

Source Description
Auto Automatically looks up the rate for the entry date. Tries, in order: a user-entered rate for that date, a constant rate, or the NBP mid rate (Table A). This is the simplest option.
Manual You type in the exact rate yourself. Useful when you know the precise rate from your bank or exchange office.
NBP Mid The middle rate published by the National Bank of Poland (NBP) in Table A. This is the standard reference rate.
NBP Bid (buy) The buying rate from NBP Table C. This is the rate at which banks buy foreign currency from you (you receive less PLN).
NBP Ask (sell) The selling rate from NBP Table C. This is the rate at which banks sell foreign currency to you (you pay more PLN).
How Rate Lookup Works

When you select an NBP source (Mid, Bid, or Ask), the app resolves the rate using the following logic:

  1. If the entry date is in the future, today's date is used instead, and the rate is marked as estimated.
  2. The app checks for a cached rate for that exact date and source. If found, it is used immediately.
  3. If no cached rate exists, the app fetches from the NBP API for that date.
  4. If the API returns no data (e.g. the date is a weekend or public holiday — NBP does not publish rates on non-business days), the app falls back to the most recent cached rate of that source type.
  5. As a last resort, the app fetches the latest published rate from NBP (the most recent business day). This rate is marked as estimated.
Fetching Rates Manually

On the Currencies page, use the Fetch NBP button to download rates for a specific currency and date. This fetches all three rates (mid, bid, ask) at once and stores them for future use.

If no rates are available for the chosen date (weekend or holiday), you will see a warning. Try the preceding Friday or business day instead.

Constant & User Rates
  • User rate — a rate for a specific date. Used by "Auto" before falling back to NBP.
  • Constant rate — a fixed rate with no date. Used by "Auto" when no date-specific rate exists. Handy for currencies with a pegged exchange rate.

Recurring Entries

Both incomes and expenses can be marked as cyclic (recurring). A recurring entry is stored once but appears as multiple occurrences in the list and dashboard.

Setting Up
  1. Check the Cyclic checkbox when creating or editing an entry
  2. Select the Cycle Period: daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly, or yearly
  3. Optionally set a Cycle End Date — if left empty, the entry repeats indefinitely

The entry's date is the first occurrence. Subsequent occurrences are generated automatically based on the period. For example, a monthly income dated February 10 will appear on March 10, April 10, etc.

Editing Occurrences

When you edit a recurring entry, you are asked what should be updated:

All occurrences Changes apply to the entire cycle — past, present, and future
Only this occurrence Changes apply to this specific date only. Other occurrences are unaffected. If you later revert the changes to match the parent, the override is automatically removed
This and future The original cycle ends just before this date. A new cycle starts from this date with your changes

The same three options apply when archiving or deleting a recurring entry.

Recurring entries and auto-archive

If Auto archive is enabled on a recurring entry, past occurrences automatically appear under the "Archived" filter. Future and today's occurrences remain active. You can override auto-archive for individual occurrences using "Only this occurrence" editing.

Loans

Dinero can track loans you give to others. A loan is an income of type Loan that automatically generates expense installments for the expected repayments.

Creating a Loan
  1. Go to Incomes and click Add Income
  2. Set the type to Loan
  3. Use Preview Installments to see the repayment schedule before committing
  4. Adjust installment dates and amounts if needed
  5. Click Create with Installments

This creates one income record (the loan) and multiple expense records (the installments). Each installment links back to the loan. When you archive or delete the loan, its installments are archived too.

Archiving

Entries have three states: Active, Archived, and Deleted (soft-deleted, hidden from all views).

  • Active — visible in the default list view and counted in the dashboard
  • Archived — hidden from the default view but accessible via the "Archived" filter. Not counted in the dashboard
  • Deleted — only possible for archived entries. Permanently hidden
Auto-archive

Entries with Auto archive enabled are automatically treated as archived once their date passes. For recurring entries, each past occurrence is individually archived while future occurrences remain active.

Archive with Transfer (Incomes)

When archiving an income, you can optionally select a target possession. The income's value will be added to that possession (converted between currencies if needed). This is useful for recording that income money was deposited into a specific bank account.