Keep the Diff Download
Printable

A printable savings tracker you can fill in by hand

Thirty lines for the things you decided against, a column for what each one saved you, and a total at the bottom. Print it, or save it as a PDF from the print dialog.

Use the browser version

How to use it

Each time you talk yourself out of something, put it on a line: what it was, what you were ready to pay, and what you actually spent. The difference is the number that matters, and it is the one that adds up.

Spent less rather than nothing at all? That still counts. Ninety planned and forty spent is a fifty dollar line. A sheet that only has room for perfect days would throw that away, and for most people the partial decisions are the majority of them.

There is no streak on this sheet and nothing to break. A week with three slips and a week with none are added up the same way.

What I decided not to spend

Planned spend minus actual spend equals the Diff.

Saving for
From
What I nearly bought Ready to spend Actually spent The Diff
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Total kept

Color one box for every ten dollars, or pick your own step and write it here: ____________

Keep the Diff · keepthediff.com Planned spend − actual spend = the Diff

If paper stops being the point

A sheet is a good way to find out whether the habit sticks, because it costs nothing and there is no app to abandon. If it does stick, the same subtraction runs on a phone with the totals worked out for you, on this page without installing anything, or in the app on iPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple Watch, Windows, Android and Wear OS.

There is also a calculator for the other question a filled sheet raises, which is how long this gets you to the thing at the top of it.