Settle Up, Splitwise, Tricount and Splid compared for trips, flatshares and dinners, with offline entry and the fewest transfers to settle.
A five-day trip for four people generates dozens of crossed payments, and by day two nobody remembers who covered the petrol or whose card took the dinner bill. A shared ledger solves the arithmetic, and the best versions go further by simplifying the debts into the smallest possible set of transfers at the end. Beyond that core, the practical differences are boring but decisive: whether the free tier caps the number of entries, whether it works without signal in a mountain hut, how hard it is to convince the least technical member of the group to install it, and whether the app moves money itself. This guide reviews the strongest offline-first option, Settle Up, in depth; the FAQs compare it with the three better-known alternatives.
Settle Up caps nothing in its free version and works fully offline, syncing later, ideal for logging trip costs with no signal.
It performs the same shared-ledger job as Splitwise with a cleaner free tier: there is no artificial limit on the number of expenses recorded, splitting works by shares, percentages or exact amounts so the person who skipped dinner need not pay for it, and the strongest feature is reliable offline operation. Enter costs in a cabin or on a plane and everything syncs once a connection returns, and the final settlement still reduces the group's debts to the fewest transfers. The trade-offs are network effects: it is less well known than Tricount or Splitwise, so persuading a group to adopt it takes more effort, support is smaller, and the free version carries ads.
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Questions & answers
What is the best free app for splitting expenses?
Splid and Tricount win for different reasons. Splid is the best rated, with no advertising and no sign-up, which keeps it clean. Tricount is the easiest to impose on a not-very-technical group, because sharing a link is enough to get everyone involved. Splitwise is more powerful but its free version caps daily expense entries, while Settle Up imposes no cap and works offline, which makes it the most generous of the four on a trip.
Can an expense be split unequally?
Yes, every app here allows it, and in practice the feature is essential: whoever skipped dinner does not pay, and the single room costs more than the shared dorm. Splits can be set by shares, by percentages or by entering exact amounts per person. Splitwise and Settle Up offer the most flexible combinations, including mixed methods within one group, so uneven costs rarely require manual calculation.
Can they handle multiple currencies on a trip abroad?
Yes. Splitwise, Splid and Settle Up all accept expenses in different currencies inside the same group and convert them automatically. Set the settlement currency when creating the group, so the final balances appear in the currency everyone will actually use to transfer money; changing it afterwards is confusing and error-prone. Conversion uses the rate around the time of entry, which is good enough for group trips rather than large sums.
Do these apps actually transfer the money?
No, and the distinction matters: they keep the ledger of who owes whom, but no payment passes through them. The final settlement is done by you through Bizum, bank transfer or cash, after which the debt is marked settled inside the app. Some provide links out to payment services for convenience, but the app itself never holds the money, which also limits what can go wrong.
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