Hiatus App Review [2024]: Save on Subscriptions + Bills

What is Hiatus?

Hiatus App is the product of Hiatus, Inc., a company founded in 2016 by David Callis and Todd Gower that has offices in New York and North Carolina. The app is designed to help users increase their financial wellness by keeping track of their recurring bills and subscriptions.

The app’s key features help you stay organized by keeping multiple accounts in one place, reviewing your transactions and significant expenses, and offering analytics about changes in your spending habits.

The main dashboard keeps track of all your subscriptions and monthly payments and, similar to apps like Rocket Money, lets you cancel any unnecessary subscriptions from the app. Hiatus also provides suggestions for how to negotiate and lower your internet bills, utility bills, and phone bills.

Like other money management apps, such as Simplifi, the Hiatus app will also track your net worth and spending based on the bank accounts and credit cards you link and the transaction data it pulls. However, I didn’t love this dashboard and probably wouldn’t use it.

The budgeting feature uses data analytics to help users adjust their spending habits and work toward their financial goals. You could use the app to build up your savings by setting monthly budgets and goals for yourself and letting Hiatus App watch your spending habits. Hiatus App will even categorize your largest purchases over a searchable time frame to help you track high costs.

Who is Hiatus best for?

Hiatus App monitors your linked accounts in real-time and provides analysis and advice on how to manage your money and progress in your financial journey. Here are the types of people I think would benefit from using Hiatus.

Budgeters looking for a free way to track everything in one place

Some of the most appealing features, such as bill negotiation and subscription cancellation, are only available through the premium subscription. However, the free service could still help you keep track of your accounts in one place. It offers a clean interface without ads cluttering the space so you can see all of your banking accounts, bills, and net worth at a glance.

Forgetful spenders wasting money on subscriptions and auto billings

Hiatus’ premium service might be useful for people who sign up for subscriptions and then forget about them or need help tracking potential rate changes for their utilities, loans, or other forms of auto billings. The Hiatus App team could help you cancel subscriptions you don’t use. If the vendor requires the user to reach out to them directly, a team member will provide step-by-step instructions to make canceling as easy as possible and alert you to any potential issues.

People who want help negotiating their monthly bills

Although budgeting and money management services are available in many popular financial apps, negotiating lower interest rates with lenders and lower subscriptions with service providers is not a common feature. Hiatus App might be worth the monthly subscription fee considering that these negotiating conversations could be intimidating for some people. For this fee, you’d have someone who could handle these conversations and possibly remove you from the cancellation process altogether.

How does the Hiatus app work?

Hiatus App is available on iOS and Android. Users could also access the app via a web-based browser.

The app offers a free version with basic budgeting, net worth calculations, and subscription tracking. You could upgrade to the premium version directly from the app to help you take advantage of potential savings.

Track spending and account balances

Hiatus uses Plaid to connect to your financial institutions, keeping your bank, loans, and mortgage balances in one place while tracking your spending in real time. I found the app's spending insights to be a useful free feature — you can see a bar graph of how much you've earned and spent each month, and you can get a breakdown of how much you've spent by category over time.

The premium version provides suggestions for how to cut your spending and balance alerts to help you prevent overdraft fees.

Create a budget

The app will help you build a budget and set limits for how much you can spend at specific merchants and on various spending categories. As it tracks your income and purchases, you'll see how much you have left to spend in each category and how long you have left until your budget is replenished.

As someone who frequents my neighborhood coffee shop and Taco Bell far too often, I appreciated the unique ability to set spending limits for specific vendors.

Monitor your bills

The free version lists your bills and subscriptions and provides helpful analytics, such as how long you've been paying and how much you pay versus the average user. You can also sign up for notifications about upcoming renewals/fees and potential rate increases.

However, though I connected all my accounts, the app only identified two of my subscriptions when I have close to a dozen. The others were listed below under "Recurring Transactions," but that section doesn't offer analytics.

Cancel subscriptions and negotiate bills

One of the app's primary features is to help you cancel unwanted subscription services and potentially find ways to reduce the rates on existing bills.

You'll need to upgrade to premium if you want to cancel your subscriptions using the app. Premium also gives you access to a team of people to help you contact vendors for cancellations and fee reductions. The premium service costs $9.99 per month.

Track your net worth

Hiatus App will use your connected accounts, which can include investment and retirement accounts and debt accounts, to automatically calculate your total assets and liabilities at any given time — the difference of which amounts to your net worth. It also provides net worth predictions for up to 30 days in the future and offers suggestions for accounts that can help you earn more interest.

I prefer to use apps like Hiatus App to track my spending and build my savings rather than track my overall net worth, as my investment accounts offer more robust features. I don't connect my investment accounts to budgeting apps like Hiatus because I don't plan on touching that money until retirement, and I only want to see cash I have available to me right now.

Customer support

Hiatus App offers support through a contact form on its website. It also provides help through email support and has a help center with articles that walk users through common issues. These articles cover subjects such as linking bank or subscription accounts, login difficulties, and the process of negotiating bills or canceling subscriptions when using the premium features.

These options are standard for support for a budgeting app. I did love that the Hiatus site offered live chat, which I don’t always see for an app. What I didn’t love is that the tool said it was closed when I tried to use the feature at around 4:00 p.m. ET. I couldn’t find information about the hours for any support options.

Plans and pricing

Hiatus App premium service — $9.99 per month — offers access to a team of people who could negotiate your bills for better rates. It also provides personalized financial services that might help you save additional money.

Hiatus App could quickly compare and offer a list of competitive rates on various services using machine learning and behavioral design. This includes your mortgage, insurance, student loans, and utilities.

Although you have to pay to access these features, I can see this being worth the money if you have a ton of subscriptions and would rather have someone else negotiate your rates or cancel a service. However, I probably wouldn’t pay for the app myself because I have a good idea of what services I pay for and don’t think I’d save any money with this.

FAQs

Hiatus alternatives

You might try Hiatus app and decide that it doesn’t fit your needs. Luckily, there are a variety of financial assistants available, and there is bound to be one that could help you make the most of managing your finances.

Rocket Money

If you like the idea of an app that helps you cancel unwanted subscriptions and negotiate your bills, Rocket Money is another option. It offers a similarly-priced premium subscription that allows you to cancel your subscriptions within the app. Unlike Hiatus, Rocket Money premium also offers access to your credit report and automates your savings according to various goals you set.

I found the Hiatus App interface cleaner and easier to use, but Rocket Money's came with a more detailed breakdown and more helpful insights, even as a free user. It also identified more of my subscriptions than Hiatus did, but it seemed harder to navigate the bill negotiation process.

For more details, read our Rocket Money review.

Simplifi

Simplifi is a personal finance app by Quicken that helps you track your income and expenses in real time. It also offers goal creation, spending plans, and watch lists. Simplifi costs $5.99 per month, billed annually, and while there's no free version, it does have a 30-day free trial.

This app is more focused on budgeting and money management, so it doesn't offer the features that Hiatus is known for, such as subscription cancellation and bill negotiation. It's better for users who want a general budgeting app and are willing to pay a relatively low monthly fee.

For more details, read our Simplifi review.

Oportun

Oportun (formerly known as Digit) is a savings app that helps you focus on budgeting, saving, and investing. It allows you to allocate your paycheck by moving money into a secure account so you don’t accidentally spend what you have before you pay your bills or invest. Digit offers a 30-day free trial and costs $5 per month after that.

Like Simplifi, Oportun is a better choice if you want a budgeting app and don't need the subscription cancellation and bill negotiation features Hiatus offers.

For more details, read our Oportun (formerly known as Digit) review.