Free budget templates in Excel

Budgeting is an essential part of money management, whether it’s for personal or business-related purposes. And when it comes to planning, aggregating, and analyzing budgets, Excel is still the go-to tool for many people from different lifestyles and professions.

Having a budget template in Excel is a more accessible, affordable, and familiar option for many users. What’s more, you can easily customize your templates to suit your exact needs. Whether you need to budget for your new startup business, control annual department spending, or save up for your first car, there is a template out there for everyone.

Let’s go over some of our favorite free Excel budget templates that you can customize to fit your own needs.

Free excel budgeting templates for 2026

1. Expense tracker by Sheetgo

The Sheetgo Expense tracker template is ideal for anyone looking for a simple way to monitor expenses and automate financial management. You could use it for your business or implement it in your team. You could even use it at home with your family, to track how much each person is spending.

It is an ideal income and expense spreadsheet for small business and large enterprises alike. 

The Expenses tracker template is easy to use, and gives you a comprehensive view of your expenses.

2. Student Budget template by Microsoft

Managing finances can be a challenge for students, especially for those who’ve just started college and are experiencing the huge responsibility of living on your own.

Microsoft’s Student Budget template is the perfect budgeting tool for those who want to track and control their allowance and part-time job incomes. Add your college-related spending into one tab, and your personal spending in the other. The template will calculate the budget of your personal spending so you never have to worry about going over your income. The best thing is that you can use this Microsoft budget template both as a downloadable file, but also as an online version.

3. Household Expense Budget by Smartsheet

This financial management tool is made for budget-conscious families. With the Household Expense Budget planner by Smartsheet, you track the income and spending of your entire household. 

Each sheet in the template is dedicated to a single month of the year, giving you more insight into your family’s monthly cash flow. Track continuous outgoings such as the mortgage, utility bills, and internet. Then, track one-off expenses such as restaurant bills, cinema tickets, and airfare. With this template, you can even create an emergency fund budget and assign income to your savings account, for a more reliable and secure budgeting solution.

4. Zero-based Budget Spreadsheet by Smartsheet

The idea behind this Excel sheet budget template is to allocate every dollar of your income to a specific part or aspect of your budget, so the total of both equals zero.

The Zero-based budget Spreadsheet has two sections – one side for your monthly income and another for your expenses. Once you finish filling out both areas, the difference should be zero. If not, you should adjust either side. This method allows you to track where your money is going.

5. Money Manager template by Smartsheet

Do you need a tool that allows you to track your budget and expenses in one place?

The Money Manager template is then an option to consider. This budget tracking spreadsheet records and tracks all your financial transactions, and even balances your checkbook.

6. Small business budget template by Capterra

If you are starting to explore the world of business, you will be interested in the Small Business Budget template. Capterra has developed a budgeting spreadsheet that startup owners can use for both long-term and short-term budget planning. The template also features an overview sheet. This sheet provides analytical insight into the efficiency of your business budgeting strategy.

Add your operational and non-operating income, then input your fixed and variable costs. This template will then calculate your gross profit, with a breakdown and analysis of where your money is going.

What are budget templates?

Budgeting templates are pre-built structures you can use inside a spreadsheet to organize, manage, and monitor your budgeting needs. They can save you a lot of time and manual effort by organizing and calculating your finances for you.

Although budgeting templates may differ in features, the general concept remains the same. Record and keep track of all outgoing payments on a weekly, monthl,y or yearly basis. These templates provide a clear overview of your spending, including the categories you’re spending on and your total gross income.

You can use budgeting templates both in professional and personal circumstances. Here are just a few examples:

• Startup business annual budgeting
• Monthly department budgeting
• Student budgeting
• Family household budgeting
• Event budgeting
• Personal budgeting

Why use a budget template in Excel?

As the most widely used spreadsheet tool, Excel is a popular choice for data management. Using a budgeting template within an already familiar tool is the simplest option for keeping track of your finances.

Using an Excel budgeting template has a range of benefits:

• Accessibility: Almost everyone has access to Excel. What’s more, you can open Excel online, so you can collaborate with other users or update your template from any device.
• Personalization: Adding your templates to Excel makes it easy for you to customize them to your exact needs.
• Optimization: By having your budgeting template in Excel, you can access Microsoft’s range of analytical features and functionalities. Create graphs and charts to visualize your data, or use different formulas to calculate new insights.
• Affordability: Spreadsheet templates are (for the most part) free; the same can’t be said of complex financial software. Download your copy and get budgeting! No high upfront costs. 

Free Excel budget templates

And there you have it! Excel is a versatile and valuable budgeting tool that has definitely proven its worth. However, as with most things, there is no one-size-fits-all money management tool. You’ll need a specific template for a particular budgeting task.

There are various budgeting templates available, and the best one depends on your specific needs. Although all of the templates we covered provide an immediate solution, the Sheetgo Expense tracker takes budgeting to the next level.