A Tricount alternative: when to pick kisir, and when Tricount is enough

If you are searching for a Tricount alternative, the honest first question is whether you need one. Tricount does the central job well: a group records who paid for what, and the app works out who owes whom. At the time of writing, Tricount’s website describes it as a free bill splitting app with no ads and no daily expense cap, available on iOS and Android.

People look elsewhere for narrower reasons, and those reasons are what this page is about.

Tricount vs kisir in one table

The Tricount column below comes from what tricount.com says about itself at the time of writing. The kisir column is what kisir 1.1 does. Where we could not confirm something on Tricount’s own pages, we left it out rather than guess.

What Tricount does well

Tricount is established, free, and has features kisir deliberately does not:

• A Splitwise import. If your group lives in Splitwise today, Tricount says you can bring it over. kisir has no import.
• Payment requests and a bank link. Tricount lists payment requests, and a bunq Card option that adds expenses automatically. kisir does not connect to banks or cards, and does not move money.
• No-fuss trying. Tricount’s website says you can try it without signing up, so it is not an account-heavy app either.

If those matter to you, Tricount is a fair choice, and you do not need this page to talk you out of it.

Where kisir is different

kisir is built around a few specific choices.

No account, by design. Nobody creates an email or a password. Someone creates a group, shares a link, QR code or six-character code, and everyone else picks a name. For a one-off trip with a friend abroad or a parent who dislikes new logins, that is the whole onboarding.

People without the app are full members. Add a name and that person is in every split. If they install kisir later, they can claim that spot.

Any currency, any expense. Each expense can be in its own currency. kisir fills in today’s exchange rate and converts to the group’s currency, and you can change the rate to what your bank actually charged. The ledger shows both figures. See splitting expenses in multiple currencies for how that plays out on a trip.

Fewest transfers. The overview shows your balance, everyone’s balance and “Your plan”, your part of the settlement that needs the fewest payments. More on the idea in settling up with the fewest transfers.

Works offline, with history. Expenses can be added without a signal and sync later. Every expense keeps a history of who changed what, and only the person who added it can edit or delete it.

Flexible splits. One or several payers, split between only the people it was for, equally, by shares or by exact amounts. The editor will not save until the amounts add up.

What kisir does not do, so you can judge the fit: it does not scan receipts, itemise a bill line by line, handle recurring expenses, connect to banks or cards, send payment requests, set budgets, or run on the web.

A worked example: four people, one in a different currency

Ana, Leo, Mia and Karen spend a weekend away. Karen will not install anything, so Ana adds her by name. The group’s currency is euros, and everything is split four ways.

For the dinner, say Leo’s bank converted at €0.33 per lari: 90 × 0.33 = €29.70. Split four ways, the total of €439.80 is €109.95 each, with no cents left over.

Ana paid €320.00 and owes €109.95, so she is owed €210.05. Leo paid €29.70 and is €80.25 short. Mia paid €90.10 and is €19.85 short. Karen paid nothing and owes €109.95. Check: 80.25 + 19.85 + 109.95 = 210.05.

Three payments, whichever app does the arithmetic. What differs between apps is how easy it was to get Karen into the group and to record the lari at the rate Leo’s bank used.

Which one should you pick?

• Pick Tricount if your group already uses it, if you want a Splitwise import, payment requests, or the bunq Card link, or if everyone is comfortable with its way of joining.
• Pick kisir if you want nobody to deal with accounts at all, if some people will not install an app, if you want to set the exchange rate yourself, or if you want an app in Armenian or Russian as well as English.
• Mixed group? Pick whichever app everyone in the group can actually join. A ledger that only half the people use is the real failure. If you are comparing more apps, the same reasoning is in our Splitwise alternative without an account page.

Whatever you choose, do not move a group mid-trip. Settle the old one where it lives and start the next trip in the new app.