Finmap vs Excel: Cash Flow Tracking Compared

The short answer

Start with Excel for a custom model, scenarios or a one-off analysis, or if you already pay for Microsoft 365. Start with Finmap if you want transactions to arrive on their own, with cash flow and P&L reports already built, from $25 per month.

At a glance

What it costs

Finmap prices are in US dollars per month, billed monthly. A 6-month plan costs 15% less and annual billing costs 20% less.

Microsoft prices each country separately. Below are the consumer prices on its US and UK compare pages.

The US page says "Save up to 17% when you pay yearly for Microsoft 365", and that a subscription renews automatically at the regular price unless cancelled. Office Home 2024 gets security updates but no new features. Excel for the web is free with 5 GB of OneDrive storage, web versions only and "No technical support".

Microsoft's business pages list Business Basic at $7.00, Business Standard with Copilot at $23.50 and Business Premium with Copilot at $32.00 per user per month, paid yearly. The UK page lists £5.40, £18.10 and £24.60 and says "Price does not include VAT." The consumer pages carry no tax statement. We do not convert dollars to pounds: Microsoft sets each country's price, and its plans differ by people and features, while Finmap's differ by transactions, connections and team members.

Where Excel is stronger

• Custom models. A worksheet holds 1,048,576 rows by 16,384 columns, and a formula can run to 8,192 characters, per Microsoft's specifications page. Finmap's reports follow its published set: Cash Flow, P&L and Balance Sheet.
• Forecasting and scenarios. Forecast Sheet builds "a table of the historical and predicted values and a chart" with the ETS algorithm and a 95% confidence interval by default. A scenario is "a set of values that Excel saves and can substitute automatically", with up to 32 variable values each. Finmap's plan pages do not list scenarios.
• One-off analysis. PivotTables are "an interactive way to quickly summarize large amounts of data". Microsoft says Copilot in Excel helps when "updating budgets, creating financial models, or analyzing data", on eligible paid plans.
• Price and a free version. Excel for the web is free, and Microsoft 365 Personal is $9.99 per month on the US page, against Finmap's $25. The products do different jobs, so compare budgets only.
• Shared work. Microsoft says "You and your colleagues can open and work on the same Excel workbook." Finmap's plans allow 2, 7 or 30 team members.

Where Finmap fits better

• Transactions arrive on their own. Finmap includes 2, 15 or 100 bank connections by plan, and its integrations page lists Plaid, Wise, Revolut Business, PayPal and Stripe. Microsoft says Money in Excel ended on June 30, 2023 and "you can no longer connect to a new financial account". The other Microsoft pages we read describe no built-in bank connection.
• Reports already built. Every plan has Cash Flow and P&L reports, profitability by project and financial metrics, with Balance Sheet from Pro. In Excel you build them or start from Microsoft's templates, which include cash flow, profit and loss and balance sheet statements.
• Looking ahead without a model. From Pro, Finmap shows a Payment Calendar and money owed to you and by you. In Excel, you enter or import the history, then Forecast Sheet creates the forecast.
• Logging by chat. Every plan includes a Telegram bot for logging transactions, and Finmap lists iOS and Android apps. Microsoft says its paid plans also run "on PCs, Macs, phones & tablets".