Technologies
4 Apps That Help Track Your Streaming Subscription Bills
Are you making payments for a streaming service you barely use? Here’s how to keep up.
Your streaming subscriptions for Netflix, Spotify, Disney Plus and other accounts are probably all on autopay. Because you don’t have to think about due dates, that may mean you’ve overlooked the monthly expense or who to contact if you want to cancel. You could be spending more money than you want by paying for a phantom streaming service.
Is Netflix billing you directly? Has your forgotten Hulu 30-day free trial turned into a paid subscription? Did you buy your Disney Plus subscription through a third party like Apple, Amazon or Verizon? With all the streaming price changes creeping in, unwatched content, and missed opportunities for deals, it’s a good idea to keep up with who’s billing you, when and for how much. Luckily, there are apps that can make keeping track of your streaming subs a lot easier.
Here’s our list of recommendations for apps that help you track payments for your streaming service subscriptions. Most of these offer a free option, but you can upgrade to a paid version if you want extra features.
Read more: Keep Up With What’s Streaming on TV Using These 5 Free Apps
Formerly known as Truebill, Rocket Money is a well-rounded budgeting app with the option to track your streaming subscriptions. There are free and paid versions available.
It uses Plaid to link your financial accounts and syncs information about automatic payments from your bank, credit card or services like PayPal. After signing up and setting up multifactor authentication, you can begin managing your recurring payments. Rocket Money provides a snapshot of your yearly spending on subscriptions like Spotify and Netflix, and you can also view upcoming payments including a countdown to the due date. A calendar icon takes you to a screen that outlines all payments for the month.
You can cancel subscriptions within the app, view your history of payments or remove them from the Rocket Money list. There is a seven-day free trial, but its recurring fee is on a sliding scale from $4 to $12 per month, billed annually. Rocket Money is easy to use, but the free account lacks some features such as having the app cancel your streaming accounts.
Hiatus is a budget- and bill-managing app that includes a subscription manager feature. When you create an account, you can track your streaming services in an organized «upcoming bills» category. The app also allows you to enter missing subscriptions manually.
Hiatus connects your financial institutions through Plaid, with options that include banks, PayPal or the Google Play Store. In addition to showing all your streaming subscriptions on autopay, the app provides insights on how much you’ve spent at different intervals — seven days, 30 days and the last 365 days. You may opt to set spending limits for your streaming services using the budget feature.
You can use the app for free, but if you sign up for a premium plan at $8 per month, Hiatus offers other features like canceling your subscriptions on your behalf. You also have the option to cancel on your own. Hiatus is available for Android, iOS and web browsers.
Like Hiatus and Rocket Money, Bobby helps you keep up with your streaming subscriptions and how much you’re spending on them. Unlike Hiatus and Rocket Money, Bobby does not require you to link your financial information to track your recurring payments.
Instead, you click through the app’s list of providers to create a list of streaming subscriptions. Then you manually enter information such as how much and how often you pay. We admit this may not be helpful if you can’t remember all of your active services. But with Bobby, you can receive notifications for upcoming due dates, organize the bills into a category and monitor your average spending on streaming. And it’s free.
Foreign currency breakdowns and security features like Touch ID and passcodes are available. Bobby can be downloaded on iOS devices only.
Trim allows you to find, track and cancel subscriptions at no charge. Like Hiatus and Rocket Money, you can connect your financial institution through Plaid, and the app will collate all your recurring subscription payments.
You can view your transaction history for each streamer and cancel a service within the app or by visiting its site directly. Trim is not available as a mobile app, but you can access it on a web browser on your phone or other device.
Streaming service bill tracker FAQs
What about privacy?
Sharing access to your financial information with a third party raises genuine concerns about security. We urge you to review the privacy policies for each service to learn how information is used and stored. With the exception of Bobby, all the services on this list use Plaid to connect your accounts. Plaid does not provide your login credentials to Rocket Money, Trim or Hiatus, so none of the apps receive or store your banking or credit card information.
Why isn’t Mint on this list?
Mint (by Intuit) is a popular user-friendly app that’s used for budgeting. There’s a feature meant to help you track bills and subscriptions, but when I clicked on the Subscriptions tab in the Bills section, none of my subscriptions or recurring payments showed up. I did receive a message saying Mint couldn’t find any subscriptions in my transaction history. Additionally, we’ve seen numerous users reporting that the subscription feature is unreliable.
Are there any other apps you considered?
In addition to Mint and the four tools on this list, we checked out other budget/subscription tracker apps, including PocketGuard, Wallet by Budgetbakers, Billbot, Petal and Everydollar. We decided to highlight the four we discussed here based on robust features, accessibility, fees and ease of use.
PocketGuard syncs with many banks but you’re unable to link PayPal and other third parties like the Google Play Store. Billbot is not available for newer versions of Android, Petal requires you to apply for an account and EveryDollar charges $13 monthly if you don’t want to manually track your financial transactions. To digitally sync Wallet with your financial institutions, you must pay for a premium account.
Technologies
Chrome Autofill Now Supports Passport, Driver’s License and Vehicle Info
Soon, you’ll never need to remember anything ever again.
Computer users are accustomed to web browsers autofilling everything from names and addresses to credit card numbers. Now, Google Chrome is adding new enhanced autofill options that allow users to automatically populate fields for passports, driver’s licenses, and their vehicle’s license plate or VIN, Google said in a blog post on Monday.
Desktop users must choose to turn on the feature, which is called enhanced autofill. Otherwise, it stays off. To turn it on, open Chrome, and at the top right of your browser, select more, then settings, then autofill and passwords. Finally, choose enhanced autofill and turn it in.
Google says Chrome now can «better understand complex forms and varied formatting requirements, improving accuracy across the web.» The company also says that enhanced autofill will be «private and secure.»
This enhanced autofill update is available in all languages, and more data options will be supported in the coming months.
A representative for Google said the company had no additional comment.
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Chrome is a critical component in Google’s business. The web browser, currently the most popular in the world with a 73% market share, according to GlobalStats, provides the company with valuable user data that it uses to sell advertising. Advertising is how Google makes the majority of its revenues. New features help keep users loyal to Chrome, making it more difficult for them to switch to other browsers, including those from companies like Perplexity and OpenAI.
Technologies
Today’s NYT Connections: Sports Edition Hints and Answers for Nov. 4, #407
Here are hints and the answers for the NYT Connections: Sports Edition puzzle for Nov. 4, No. 407.
Looking for the most recent regular Connections answers? Click here for today’s Connections hints, as well as our daily answers and hints for The New York Times Mini Crossword, Wordle and Strands puzzles.
Today’s Connections: Sports Edition is a tough one. The Connections: Sports Edition puzzle makers will never run out of categories because they have discovered they can just pick one athlete and make a connections group out of four facts about that person. They do that today with the blue category, so if you don’t know that one player, you’re out of luck. If you’re struggling but still want to solve it, read on for hints and the answers.
Connections: Sports Edition is published by The Athletic, the subscription-based sports journalism site owned by the Times. It doesn’t show up in the NYT Games app but appears in The Athletic’s own app. Or you can play it for free online.
Read more: NYT Connections: Sports Edition Puzzle Comes Out of Beta
Hints for today’s Connections: Sports Edition groups
Here are four hints for the groupings in today’s Connections: Sports Edition puzzle, ranked from the easiest yellow group to the tough (and sometimes bizarre) purple group.
Yellow group hint: Get up and go!
Green group hint: College hoops.
Blue group hint: Famous basketball player.
Purple group hint: Not fair, but…
Answers for today’s Connections: Sports Edition groups
Yellow group: Energy.
Green group: Men’s college basketball teams with the most championships.
Blue group: Associated with Damian Lillard.
Purple group: Foul ____.
Read more: Wordle Cheat Sheet: Here Are the Most Popular Letters Used in English Words
What are today’s Connections: Sports Edition answers?
The yellow words in today’s Connections
The theme is energy. The four answers are pep, verve, vigor and zip.
The green words in today’s Connections
The theme is men’s college basketball teams with the most championships. The four answers are Kentucky, UCLA, UCONN and UNC.
The blue words in today’s Connections
The theme is associated with Damian Lillard. The four answers are 0, Dame Time, Trail Blazers and Weber State.
The purple words in today’s Connections
The theme is foul ____. The four answers are out, shot, territory and tip.
Technologies
Today’s NYT Mini Crossword Answers for Tuesday, Nov. 4
Here are the answers for The New York Times Mini Crossword for Nov. 4.
Looking for the most recent Mini Crossword answer? Click here for today’s Mini Crossword hints, as well as our daily answers and hints for The New York Times Wordle, Strands, Connections and Connections: Sports Edition puzzles.
Need some help with today’s Mini Crossword? There are a few tricky clues, so read on for the answers. And if you could use some hints and guidance for daily solving, check out our Mini Crossword tips.
If you’re looking for today’s Wordle, Connections, Connections: Sports Edition and Strands answers, you can visit CNET’s NYT puzzle hints page.
Read more: Tips and Tricks for Solving The New York Times Mini Crossword
Let’s get to those Mini Crossword clues and answers.
Mini across clues and answers
1A clue: Quickly fall asleep after a long day
Answer: CRASH
6A clue: 1/16 of a pound
Answer: OUNCE
7A clue: Where chess, shampoo and the number zero were invented
Answer: INDIA
8A clue: Uproar
Answer: FUROR
9A clue: Opposite of saved
Answer: SPENT
Mini down clues and answers
1D clue: Fancy hairdos
Answer: COIFS
2D clue: Period preceding a big event
Answer: RUNUP
3D clue: Tennis great Agassi
Answer: ANDRE
4D clue: Descendant of a wealthy family
Answer: SCION
5D clue: Symbol for «like» on Instagram
Answer: HEART
