A tour of the window
The window has two parts: a sidebar to choose a screen, and the screen itself with its toolbar.
The sidebar
Section titled “The sidebar”| Section | Item | What it is | Shortcut |
|---|---|---|---|
| Reports | Income Statement | Income and expenses of the period, and the net profit. | ⌘1 |
| Balance Sheet | Assets, liabilities and equity at the end of the period. | ⌘2 | |
| Trial Balance | Every account with its balance. | ⌘3 | |
| Portfolio | What you hold, lot by lot. | ⌘4 | |
| Views | Your saved views | Shortcuts to a screen with filters applied. Only shown once you have saved one. | |
| Ledger | Journal | Every entry of the period. | ⌘5 |
| Editor | The text of your files. | ⌘6 | |
| History | The Git commits of the ledger. | ⌘7 | |
| Errors | What Beancount complained about, with a count badge. | ⌘8 |
The same list is in the View menu. At the bottom of the sidebar, the status dot and the ledger’s title.
The toolbar
Section titled “The toolbar”Every screen builds its toolbar from the same pieces, in the same order, so you always know where to look:
- In the middle, the period:
◀ March 2026 ▶. See Choosing the period. - On the right, a round Filter button (a funnel). See Filters.
- Then the screen’s own controls: buttons with only an icon, such as New Transaction or Expand Chart, and menus with an icon and a title, such as Chart, Columns, Types or View.
A small spinner appears on the right while the app waits for a calculation.
Under the window title there is always a subtitle with something worth knowing: the real dates of the period, “As of 31 Mar 2026” in Portfolio, “128 of 640 entries” in the Journal.
What is shared between screens
Section titled “What is shared between screens”Two things follow you as you move around:
- The period. Reports, Portfolio and Journal all look at the same period. Pick Last Year in the Income Statement, switch to the Journal, and you see last year’s entries.
- The filter. Reports and the Journal share the same filter. Portfolio ignores it on purpose: it lists positions, not transactions.
This makes a common routine very quick: notice a number in a report, press ⌘5, and read the entries behind it with the same period and filter.
Light and dark
Section titled “Light and dark”The app follows the system appearance, including the editor and the charts. Chart colours were chosen to stay distinguishable in both modes and for colour-blind readers.
Settings
Section titled “Settings”Beancount ▸ Settings… (⌘,). Every option is explained in Settings.
- Add your first transaction: saving it also records it in the history.
- Capture expenses on your iPhone and bring them in later.