Connect a bank account.

Open Accounts and tap Add

On the Accounts tab, tap the Add button at the top of the screen. A sheet titled Add Account slides up — choose Connect Bank Account. (Brand new and still on the Home tab? The welcome card's Link your bank button lands in the same place. Setting Spense up for the first time? The Link my bank choice in first-run setup opens the same Plaid screens.)

Sign in through Plaid

Pick your bank and sign in on Plaid's secure screens — Plaid is the connection service used by major finance apps, and your bank password stays with it; Spense never sees it. If your bank asks for a verification code, that happens right in the same flow.

Choose what happens to your manual accounts

This one only appears on your first bank link, and only if you already track accounts by hand. A dialog titled Bank connected! asks what to do with them:

• Keep my accounts — the bank joins what you've built; manual accounts and their transactions stay.
• Start fresh — manual accounts and their transactions are removed, and the linked bank becomes your clean slate.

No manual accounts? You'll never see this question.

Let the first sync land

What happens next depends on your budget mode, the one you picked in setup. The top of your Budget tab shows which: Classic Mode has Ready to assign there, Auto Mode doesn't.

In Auto Mode, Spense shows “Pulling 30 days of history…” while your recent transactions stream in — usually under a minute. You can close it and keep using the app; the sync finishes in the background and new rows simply appear on the Spending tab, already categorized. If it runs past a minute and a half, a Still syncing message says the rest is coming in the background. Tap OK and carry on.

In Classic Mode, your budget starts from the day you link. Spense doesn't bring in the bank's past transactions at all; each new one shows up in Review as it comes in, for you to approve into a category.