Vertex42 vs Tiller vs sheetfolk: Which Budget Spreadsheet Fits You?

Vertex42, Tiller and sheetfolk are the three answers you'll actually run into when you search for a budget spreadsheet: a free general template with a huge download count, a paid subscription that automates your bank feed, and a paid one-time template built for a specific situation. Pick based on whether you want free and general, automated and ongoing, or specific and paid-once. This guide lays out the real prices, formats and trade-offs for all three, verified against each maker's own site in August 2026.

TL;DR: Vertex42's Personal Budget Spreadsheet is free and has been downloaded over 1.3 million times, per its own page. Tiller is $99/year and automatically pulls your bank transactions into the sheet every day. sheetfolk is $9-$29 one-time for templates built around a specific situation, like a couples split or sinking funds, with no bank connection at all. None of the three is "better" outright; they solve different problems.

What is Vertex42's budget spreadsheet?

Vertex42 publishes a free Personal Budget Spreadsheet Template that opens in Excel, Google Sheets or OpenOffice. Its own product page states it has been downloaded over 1.3 million times (vertex42.com/ExcelTemplates/personal-budget-spreadsheet.html, verified August 2026), which makes it one of the most-used free budget templates on the internet. It's licensed for personal use only, not for distribution or resale, and it's manual entry: you type your income and spending in yourself. There's no dedicated support channel for the free download beyond Vertex42's general site-wide support page.

What is Tiller's Foundation Template?

Tiller is a $99/year subscription (30-day free trial, per tiller.com, verified August 2026) that connects to your bank accounts and pulls transactions into Google Sheets or Excel automatically, every day. Tiller says it connects to 21,000+ banks. Its Foundation Template then builds budgets, spending trends, a debt payoff planner and savings goals on top of that live transaction feed, and AutoCat auto-categorizes the transactions as they arrive. You're linking real bank credentials through Tiller's connection layer to get that automation.

What is sheetfolk?

sheetfolk sells one-time paid templates ($9-$29) built around a specific budgeting situation rather than one general system: a Couples Budget Spreadsheet with an income-proportional split calculator, a Sinking Funds Tracker with a monthly funding calendar, and the 2026 Ultimate Budget Bundle that links budget, debt payoff, net worth and savings rate on one dashboard. Every template is a plain .xlsx file that opens in Excel, LibreOffice or Google Sheets, entered manually, no bank connection, with email support if you get stuck.

Vertex42 vs Tiller vs sheetfolk: side-by-side comparison

Prices and features verified against each maker's own site in August 2026. Confirm current details there before you buy or download, since prices and features change.

The real trade-off: free and general vs automated vs specific

These three products don't actually compete for the same buyer. Vertex42 wins on price and track record: it costs nothing and its own download count says a huge number of people have already used exactly this template. Tiller wins on effort: once it's connected, you never manually type a transaction again, and that automation is the entire reason its $99/year exists. sheetfolk doesn't try to compete on either of those axes. It's paid, it's manual, and its only argument is fit: a workbook actually built around your situation (two incomes, annual bills that ambush your budget, a linked dashboard) rather than a general sheet you adapt yourself.

If you've never tracked a budget before, start with Vertex42's free template; there's no cost to trying it, and its scale means most formula quirks have already been found by someone else. If your last three budgets died because you stopped entering transactions, Tiller's automation is solving your actual problem, and the $99/year is buying back the habit-forming step you keep skipping. If you already know your situation is more specific than "one income, one sheet" (a couples split, sinking funds for irregular bills, or wanting debt payoff and net worth linked to the same budget), sheetfolk's one-time price is the cheapest way to get a workbook built for that instead of retrofitting a general one.

Whichever one you pick, tracking spending in a spreadsheet only shows you the problem; it doesn't remove wasted subscriptions on its own. A tool like SpendCull audits recurring charges directly and cancels the ones you've forgotten about, which pairs well with any of the three budgets above.

Can you combine them?

Yes, and it's common. Some people start on Vertex42's free template, decide manual entry is the reason they keep quitting, and move to Tiller for the automated feed. Others use Tiller for the transaction feed but build their own category structure into a purpose-built layout, similar to what sheetfolk ships as a template, on top of the imported data. There's no lock-in with any of the three; each is a plain spreadsheet file, so you can copy formulas or structure between them if one solves half your problem and another solves the rest.

Frequently asked questions

Is Vertex42's 1.3 million downloads figure real? It's the number Vertex42 states on its own Personal Budget Spreadsheet page, confirmed there in August 2026. That's their own published figure, not an independent audit; check vertex42.com directly for the current count.

Which is cheapest? Vertex42, at $0. sheetfolk is next at $9-$29 one-time. Tiller is the most expensive at $99/year, and that price buys the one feature the other two don't have: automated daily bank feeds.

Do any of the three link to my bank? Only Tiller. Vertex42 and sheetfolk are both manual entry, no bank credentials involved. If automated transaction import is what you want, Tiller is the only one of the three that does it.

Which works in both Excel and Google Sheets? All three. Vertex42 also adds OpenOffice; sheetfolk ships .xlsx that opens in Excel, LibreOffice or Google Sheets; Tiller supports both Google Sheets and Excel under one subscription.

Get started

If your situation is specific, whether that's splitting shared costs between two incomes, budgeting for sinking funds, or wanting your whole financial picture linked on one dashboard, sheetfolk's templates are built around exactly that, for a one-time $9-$29. Read the full sheetfolk vs Vertex42 and sheetfolk vs Tiller comparisons for more detail on either match-up.

Legal disclaimer

This post is informational only and does not constitute financial advice. Prices and features for Vertex42 and Tiller were verified against their own public pages in August 2026 and can change; confirm current details on their sites before buying or downloading. Vertex42 and Tiller are not affiliated with sheetfolk; their names are used here for honest comparison only.