Ledgr

Self-hostable personal finance app with automatic bank sync and AI agent support.

License: AGPL v3 TypeScript Next.js Docker MCP


Ledgr connects to your bank accounts through Plaid, automatically syncs and categorizes transactions, and gives you budgets, investment tracking, bill detection, and financial reports — all running on your own server with your own data.

It also exposes an MCP server, so AI assistants like Claude can query your finances through natural conversation.

You: "How much did I spend on dining out last month?"
Claude: Based on your transactions, you spent $342.18 on dining out in April...

Features

  • Automatic bank sync — connect 12,000+ banks via Plaid, with real-time webhook sync or scheduled polling
  • Smart categorization — four-tier pipeline: your rules > merchant defaults > Plaid categories > AI fallback
  • Budgets — set monthly budgets by category, track progress in real time
  • Investment tracking — portfolio holdings, performance history, and allocation breakdowns
  • Recurring bill detection — automatically identifies subscriptions and recurring charges
  • Financial reports — spending, income, net worth, and category trends over time
  • AI agent interface (MCP) — query your finances from Claude Code, Claude Desktop, Cursor, or any MCP client
  • In-app AI chat — ask questions about your finances right from the dashboard
  • BYOK AI — bring your own API key (OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, or local models) for chat and categorization
  • CSV/OFX/QFX import & CSV export — for accounts not supported by Plaid, and for getting your data out
  • Self-hosted — Docker Compose with PostgreSQL, your data never leaves your server

Quick Start

Requires Docker and Docker Compose.

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/KenTaniguchi-R/ledgr/main/scripts/install.sh | sh

This creates a ledgr/ directory, downloads docker-compose.yml, and starts the app.

mkdir ledgr && cd ledgr
curl -O https://raw.githubusercontent.com/KenTaniguchi-R/ledgr/main/docker-compose.yml
docker compose up -d

Visit http://localhost:4200, create an account, and start exploring.

On first boot, Ledgr generates an encryption key and session secret and stores them in the app data volume. Back up that volume (or the /data/encryption-key file) along with your database — losing the key means losing access to encrypted data like Plaid tokens. Prefer to manage the key yourself? Set ENCRYPTION_KEY in a .env file (see Configuration) and it takes precedence.

Add your Plaid keys to .env to enable bank sync — see Connect Your Bank below. The app works without Plaid via CSV import.

Connect Your Bank

  1. Sign up at dashboard.plaid.com and get your client_id and secret from Developers > Keys
  2. Add them to a .env file next to your docker-compose.yml (start from .env.example if you don't have one):
    PLAID_CLIENT_ID=your_client_id
    PLAID_SECRET=your_secret
    PLAID_ENV=production      # or sandbox for fake data
    
  3. Restart: docker compose restart
  4. In the app, go to Accounts > Link Bank to connect via Plaid

Plaid's free trial plan includes 10 production connections and unlimited sandbox access. After that, the Launch plan is pay-as-you-go with no contract. Don't have Plaid keys yet? The app still works — import transactions via CSV and add Plaid later.

Connect Your AI Agent

Ledgr ships with a built-in MCP server and plugin support.

First, enable the MCP endpoint in your .env and restart:

MCP_ENABLED=true

Then pick your tool:

Claude Code

/plugin marketplace add KenTaniguchi-R/ledgr
/plugin install ledgr@ledgr

Codex CLI

codex plugin marketplace add KenTaniguchi-R/ledgr

OpenCode — add to opencode.json:

{
  "$schema": "https://opencode.ai/config.json",
  "plugin": ["ledgr"]
}

OpenClaw

openclaw plugins install ledgr --marketplace KenTaniguchi-R/ledgr

Hermes

hermes plugins install KenTaniguchi-R/ledgr

Point any MCP-compatible client to your Ledgr instance:

http://localhost:4200/api/mcp

On first connection, Ledgr redirects you through an OAuth flow to authorize access.

Available Tools

Tool Description
list_accounts Linked bank accounts and balances
get_account_summary Balance totals by account type
get_transactions Search and filter transactions
update_transaction_category Recategorize a transaction
get_budget Budget progress for a month
set_budget_category Set a category's budget amount
list_categories Spending categories
get_spending_report Spending breakdown over a date range
get_income_vs_expense Income vs. expense trends
get_net_worth_history Net worth over time
get_holdings Investment portfolio holdings
get_portfolio_summary Portfolio value and allocation
get_upcoming_bills Recurring transactions and bills
get_dashboard_summary Overview of your finances
show_financial_dashboard Interactive dashboard widget
sync_accounts Trigger a bank sync

Read, write, and sync tools are gated by OAuth scopes (ledgr:read, ledgr:write, ledgr:sync) that you grant during authorization.

Example prompts:

  • "How much did I spend on groceries this month?"
  • "Show me my budget status"
  • "What recurring bills do I have?"
  • "Generate a spending report for Q1"
  • "Sync my accounts and show my balances"

Comparison

Ledgr Actual Budget Firefly III Maybe Finance
Automatic bank sync Plaid (12,000+ banks) GoCardless (EU) Spectre/GoCardless --
AI agent (MCP) Yes -- -- --
AI categorization Yes (BYOK) -- -- --
Investment tracking Yes -- -- Yes
Self-hostable Yes Yes Yes Yes
Database PostgreSQL SQLite MySQL/Postgres Postgres
License AGPL-3.0 MIT AGPL-3.0 AGPL-3.0

Updating

docker compose pull
docker compose up -d

Migrations run automatically on container startup.

Configuration

Variable Required Default Description
ENCRYPTION_KEY No auto-generated Encrypts Plaid tokens & API keys. Generated on first boot and persisted in the app data volume; set your own with openssl rand -hex 32
BETTER_AUTH_SECRET No auto-generated Session secret, persisted in the app data volume. Set your own with openssl rand -base64 32
PORT No 4200 Host port for the app
POSTGRES_PASSWORD No ledgr Database password (change in production)
PLAID_CLIENT_ID No -- Plaid client ID
PLAID_SECRET No -- Plaid secret key
PLAID_ENV No production production or sandbox
PLAID_SYNC_MODE No poll poll (scheduled) or webhook (real-time)
PLAID_WEBHOOK_URL No -- Public URL for Plaid webhooks (webhook mode)
AI_PROVIDER No -- openai, anthropic, google, or custom
AI_API_KEY No -- Provider API key for AI chat & categorization
MCP_ENABLED No false Enable the MCP endpoint for AI agents

See .env.example for all options.

Development

If you're self-hosting Ledgr, use the Quick Start above. The instructions below are for contributors.

Prerequisites

  • Node.js 24+
  • pnpm 10+
  • PostgreSQL 18 (or pnpm dev:db to start one in Docker)

Setup

git clone https://github.com/KenTaniguchi-R/ledgr.git
cd ledgr
pnpm install
cp .env.example .env        # Fill in ENCRYPTION_KEY
pnpm dev:setup              # Start DB + migrate + dev server

To run the full app in Docker from source (instead of pulling the pre-built image):

docker compose -f docker-compose.yml -f docker-compose.dev.yml up -d

Commands

pnpm dev                    # Dev server (Turbopack)
pnpm test                   # Unit + integration tests
pnpm test:e2e               # Playwright E2E tests
pnpm lint                   # ESLint
pnpm typecheck              # Type checking
pnpm db:studio              # Drizzle Studio (DB browser)

Tech Stack

Layer Choice
Framework Next.js 16 (App Router)
Language TypeScript
UI shadcn/ui + Tailwind CSS 4
Charts Recharts 3
Database PostgreSQL 18 via Drizzle ORM
Auth Better Auth
Bank Sync Plaid Node SDK
AI Vercel AI SDK (BYOK)
MCP Model Context Protocol SDK
Testing Vitest + Playwright + Stryker

Roadmap

  • Plaid webhook support (real-time sync)
  • AI chat assistant (in-app)
  • OFX/QFX import
  • Mobile-responsive UI
  • Multi-currency support
  • Custom report builder
  • Automatic transfer detection between accounts
  • Goal tracking (savings goals, debt payoff)
  • Recurring budget templates

See Issues for what's being worked on.

Security

Security is critical for a finance app. If you discover a vulnerability, please do not open a public issue. Instead, see SECURITY.md for responsible disclosure instructions.

For details on how Ledgr handles your data, see PRIVACY.md.

Contributing

Contributions are welcome! Please open an issue first to discuss what you'd like to change. See CONTRIBUTING.md for setup and workflow details.

  1. Fork the repo
  2. Create your branch (git checkout -b feat/my-feature)
  3. Commit your changes
  4. Push and open a Pull Request

License

AGPL-3.0 — you can self-host freely. If you modify and distribute the server, you must open-source your changes.