Honest comparison
Piggey vs Empower
Free net-worth and investment dashboard (formerly Personal Capital) — with a wealth-management sales team attached.
TL;DR
Empower's dashboard is genuinely free and genuinely good — for investments and net worth. Spending tracking is the afterthought, and the business model is upselling you to managed wealth services (with advisor calls once you link >$100k). Piggey is the inverse: spending clarity is the whole product, and nobody will ever call you.
At a glance
| Piggey | Empower | |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free, or $16/mo Pro — first month free | Dashboard: free. Wealth management: 0.49–0.89% AUM |
| Free plan | Yes — a real one, forever | Yes — the whole dashboard |
| Bank login | Never. Import a CSV — your credentials stay at your bank | Required |
| Budgeting required | None required | Basic |
| AI categorization | Automatic — AI tags your whole history at once | Basic automatic |
| Subscription detection | Yes (Pro) — flags the charges worth cancelling | No |
| AI assistant | Penny — ask anything about your money in plain English | No |
| Setup time | ~5 minutes | ~20 minutes |
| Platforms | Any browser | Web, iOS, Android |
| Privacy | No bank credentials, no data selling | Free because it feeds a wealth-management funnel |
The real differences
Different products wearing the same category
Empower answers "what am I worth and how are my investments doing?" Piggey answers "where did my money go and what's quietly recurring?" People compare them because both live in the finance-app aisle, but they barely overlap. The practical setup many people land on: Empower (or any portfolio tracker) for investments, Piggey for spending.
The cost of free
Empower's dashboard is free because it's the top of a wealth-management funnel — link your accounts, and accounts over $100k get advisory outreach. Piggey's free tier is free because the core loop is cheap to run and we'd rather you upgrade to Pro than be the product. Neither model is evil; they're just different, and you should know which one you're in.
Where Empower shines
- Best free investment and net-worth tracking, period
- Retirement planner and fee analyzer are excellent
- No subscription cost for the dashboard
Where Empower falls short
- Spending tools are rudimentary — it's an investment product
- Advisor sales calls when you link significant assets
- No subscription detection, weak categorization
- Requires linking everything for the dashboard to be useful
Pick Empower if…
Investors who want a free consolidated view of portfolios, fees, and net worth — it's the best free tool for that job, sales calls notwithstanding.
Pick Piggey if…
People whose actual question is "where does my money go each month?" — Empower barely tries to answer that. Piggey's AI answers it automatically, without bank linking, and without anyone trying to manage your wealth.
Switching is easy
Keep Empower for investments if you like it — plenty of people run both. For the spending side, export bank CSVs into Piggey and let the AI build the picture Empower never did.
Try Piggey freeFrequently asked questions
Is Piggey a replacement for Empower?
Only on the spending side. Empower is an investment/net-worth dashboard with weak spending tools; Piggey is a spending-clarity tool with no investment tracking. Many people use both.
Will Piggey try to sell me wealth management?
No. Piggey's business model is the Pro subscription ($16/mo, first month free). No advisors, no calls, no AUM fees.