Quicken Classic for Mac – A Long-time User Review
I’ve used some version of Quicken for 35 years. That puts me in a stodgy demographic that manages money in a certain “this is how I’ve always done it” way. For the uninitiated, Quicken is a personal finance software program that helps manage your checkbook and credit cards, pay your bills, keep to a budget, and track investments. It’s available on Windows and Mac, though there are differences in capabilities between the two. There are companion apps for iPhone and iPad, but they feel like afterthoughts, lacking key functionality of the desktop software. Quicken Classic is sold as an annual subscription across three offerings: Deluxe, Premier, and the recently released Business and Personal edition.
Seven years ago, I switched from Quicken Premier for Windows to the less capable Mac version. I’ve written previous blog posts about using Quicken on the Mac: in early 2018 when I switched and follow-on updates in 2019 and 2020. In large part, I was critical of the Mac version of the software, particularly its inability to export investment data.
In the intervening four years since my last post, Quicken has improved in many ways, including the ability to export all its data, including investments, to Quicken for Windows. With this critical functionality in place, I thought it was time to provide an updated and favorable review of the Mac version of Quicken and how I rely on it to manage almost every aspect of my financial life.
Why Quicken
I began my career in public accounting and held a CPA license in Washington state for over thirty years. I spent most of my career as a finance executive with a large publicly traded company, which allowed me direct experience with stock options, restricted stock units, performance shares, deferred compensation plans, and various employee benefit programs that follow that kind of employment. I’ve always tried to be disciplined when it comes to money, and I’m comfortable managing my own finances. With this background and financial situation, I have had many opportunities to evaluate and push the boundaries of Quicken as a personal finance program.
It takes time and expense to maintain a system like Quicken. Many manage their money with simpler apps or just by scanning their accounts online. For me, the effort of a system is worth it. With Quicken, I know what’s going on with my spending and income in relation to expectations every week. Every expense has a monthly budget that fits within a long-range plan. The impact of gyrations in the stock market is personalized with a press of a button. My entire financial history is accessible from Quicken’s search bar. Bills always get paid on time. Checks never bounce. I am rarely surprised at the end of a month, quarter, or year. The peace of mind I get from using Quicken far outweighs the cost.
As a disclaimer, I don’t work for Quicken or have any financial interest in the software or related services. Quicken doesn’t offer a free trial to evaluate, so unbiased reviews from actual users are helpful. I read almost everything I could find before switching to the Mac in 2018. Consider this update an act of paying it forward.
Recent Improvements
Since 2020, there have been dozens of software updates to Quicken. Unlike those early years when I first moved to the Mac, Quicken has now become a pleasure to use, and I consider it a stable, trusted system. Here are a few of the improvements that made the most significant impact on my use:
Error-free Transaction Downloading. The team at Quicken has vastly improved the technology involved in downloading transactions from banks, credit card companies, and brokerage firms. When I first used the Mac version, download errors would pop up continuously. Those days are happily behind me. I’ll go weeks and months between download errors, which seem to resolve after a day. My experience is limited to just a few institutions, so your own mileage may vary.
Investment Analysis and Dashboards. The Mac software now provides overall investment allocation between stocks, bonds, and cash, even with mutual funds that own a blend of assets. This update essentially removed the need for me to separately analyze my investments in Excel. In addition, a new dashboard provides a valuable snapshot of investment performance and holdings that rivals and, in some ways, exceeds my brokerage tools. Quicken’s investment section has become quite good.
Bill Manager. Quicken has refined its bill tracking and payment capabilities in a big way. The Premier version of Quicken offers free bill paying, but I prefer to send these occasional checks directly from my bank. I use their bill manager service, though, which does some pretty innovative things. First, it can download PDF statements automatically without having to log in to the payee’s website each month and hunt around for the statement. It also automatically schedules the payment based on the due date and records in the payment register. You can make payments directly from Quicken, but my recurring bills are paid automatically, so recording the transaction is all I need. A couple of companies I pay aren’t included in Quicken’s Bill Manager service, but these can be added manually. Second, I get a nice cash balance forecast as these future bill payments are scheduled in the register, preventing possible overdrafts or shortfalls. Bill Manager solves a problem I didn’t know I had, and I’m glad I have it.
Snappy Performance. The software runs faster thanks to performance improvements, particularly with newer Silicon Macs. I use Quicken on an M1 MacBook Air and an M2 Mac Mini. Both perform exceptionally well.
Investment Data Export. Until late last year, Quicken for Mac’s export capabilities excluded investment data. This meant I could not move back to Quicken for Windows or any other competing personal finance apps without losing all my investment history. I hated having to rely on this one particular version of software for all my precious financial data. Luckily, Quicken has now fixed this shortcoming, and Mac users of the software can breathe a collective sigh of relief.
Mac Version Still Lags Windows
Despite the many improvements to the Mac version of Quicken, it still lags behind the Windows version in a few key areas:
- Reporting in the Windows version is more robust, customizable, and allows comparisons to budget.
- Windows Investment analysis is more in-depth with Morningstar Portfolio X-Ray and performance benchmarking.
- Tax Center in Windows makes income tax planning easier by calculating estimated taxes using actual tax brackets on recorded income.
Other planning tools like Lifetime Planner, Debt Reduction, and Savings Goals haven’t made it to the Mac yet, but these tools always felt a little gimmicky. I didn’t use them on Windows, so I don’t miss them on Mac.
Quicken Risks and Alternatives
This is an interesting time for legacy software companies like Quicken. I suspect their loyal customers look a lot like me: retired or near retirement, comfortable with desktop apps, lugging along a decade or more of historical data within their app, and resistant to change.
Most new entrants into the personal finance technology space are mobile app-centric. Some don’t even offer desktop apps. Quicken has recently entered this space with its Simplify mobile app and likely believes it represents most of its future growth, which explains why it recently rebranded its desktop software to Quicken Classic.
Intuit, the former parent company of Quicken, recently announced the shutdown of its personal finance app, Mint. Mint is one of the most popular and longest-running app-based finance tools, so its demise sent shockwaves through its customer base. Indeed, this announcement caused me to look more carefully at my use of Quicken and think through what steps I would need to take if the service were similarly shuttered.
I think that the risk is relatively low. Aquiline Capital Partners acquired Quicken in 2021. Typically, private equity firms maintain ownership from five to seven years, so Quicken is in the sweet spot of ownership. Aquiline will be focused on investment and growth vs. the cost-cutting and profit harvesting that comes near the end of the investment horizon as they look to sell their asset. This is good news for Quicken’s current customers.
And yet, I can’t help but feel that users of Quicken software are on borrowed time. Highly regarded mobile apps like Monarch Money and Copilot will continue to improve and introduce more and more capabilities. Eventually, Quicken will be forced to mothball its desktop software as everything moves to the cloud and apps. This is one of the reasons I’m happy that Quicken for Mac’s export function now includes investment data. I might not need this now, but someday I will.
As a safeguard, I create and archive two export files from Quicken every quarter. One is simply the Quicken Transfer File (QFX) you can export from the file menu. I also download a CSV file of all my Quicken transactions by selecting All Transactions from the sidebar and choosing Export Register Transactions to CSV from the File menu. This yields a 60,000-row text file I can access with Excel to search and sort every transaction stored in Quicken for the past 30 years. Between these files, I’m confident I could move my history to a new finance app without too much trouble, even if Quicken stopped working altogether.
Recommendations
Quicken Classic for Mac has a lot going for it in 2024. The software is intuitive, stable, and a pleasure to use. I am pleased with Quicken’s decision to allow a complete export of my data, including investments, should I ever need it. As a Mac user, I have no desire to revert to the more capable Windows version through Parallels or some other clunky virtualization process.
Quicken’s subscription cost is fair for the value I receive, and the frequent updates are delivered almost monthly (as I write this, Quicken released Version 7.5.0, which introduced more new enhancements). Almost all personal finance apps use a subscription business model, and many are more expensive than Quicken. Buying an annual license during Black Friday sales in November can save 30-40% off the regular subscription rate.
For someone with 30 years of history with Quicken, I’m in no mood to switch platforms, given the state of the app today.
And yet, if I were just starting out, would I choose Quicken? I doubt it. From a clean slate, I would probably choose one of the more innovative mobile apps that deliver the power of personal financial management to your pocket or tablet. I plan to test drive a few of these over the coming year to better understand these next-generation tools.
Until then, Quicken for Mac will remain my everyday companion and financial advisor. If you’re a long-time Quicken for Windows user considering switching to the Mac, it’s an excellent time to make the leap.
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