“It is always me who logs it. At month end we are two million off, and nobody remembers.”
One person carries the whole book, gets tired, and gives up.
Coming soon to iPhone
Money for two,
without the argument.
Emberlo is a household money notebook for couples and young families. One person keeps the book; the other joins from the lock screen. Shared money is clear, private money stays private.
- The book lives on your phone, encrypted
- Your partner needs just one tap
- Tet and family-gift jars built in
Illustrative example, not real data.
01 / Why it matters
Money is rarely about money.
It is usually about “I’ll log it later”.
“If I have to explain a coffee, I will just stop using it.”
Without a private space, every personal purchase starts to feel inspected.
“How much for his parents, how much for mine? Nobody dares to say first.”
Very Vietnamese expenses come with no rules written down.
These quotes are illustrative situations we use as hypotheses, not customer testimonials.
02 / How it works
Three steps. Nobody has to do equal work.
Sit down for a 5-minute agreement
Together you pick the shared jars, each person’s monthly private pocket and a few house rules. Sign it and the book exists.
Transfer, then share the receipt
Tap Share in your banking app and choose Emberlo. The amount is read on your phone; you only confirm it and pick a jar.
Your partner assigns from the lock screen
The companion never has to open the app. One tap on the widget, and a one-minute check on Sunday evening settles the week.
03 / Features
Enough for the whole household.
Simple enough to understand at a glance.
Shared jars & private pockets
Shared jars are the household’s virtual budget: Groceries, Utilities, Baby, Buffer… both of you see them. A private pocket is the allowance you agreed on for each person; what you spend from it never leaves the owner’s phone.
- Jars are not real accounts, so there is no money to move around
- Your partner only knows the pocket limit you both agreed on, not each purchase
Primary and Companion
The primary partner keeps the structure of the book in the app. The companion joins lightly through a widget and one-tap notifications. “Tick it once and stop being nagged all week.”
- At most one reminder per evening, at a time you choose
- No location, no “remind my partner” button
Log expenses from the receipt you already have
No bank link needed. You transfer money as usual and add one tap on Share. Emberlo always shows the amount it read so you can confirm it, and never logs on its own.
- Cash: quick entry from the widget
- A shared shopping list; tick an item and it becomes an expense
Sunday evening check
Per the book12,480,000 đ
Real balance12,330,000 đ
Difference → Unclear150,000 đ
Nobody is blamed. This week is settled.
Illustrative figures.
A one-minute check; the gap goes to “Unclear”
The book does not need to be right to the last đồng. Once a week you compare with the real balance; the difference goes to Unclear and is not blamed on anyone.
- No red text for ordinary things
- “Household suggestions” are based on the rules you signed, and always say why
04 / Privacy
Your household book lives
on your household’s phones.
Emberlo stores data on the phone first and syncs between two people with end-to-end encryption. The relay server holds ciphertext only and cannot read the content.
- End-to-end encryptionOnly the two paired phones can open the shared part of the book.
- Private pockets never leave the owner’s phoneYour partner only knows the pocket limit you both agreed on.
- Encrypted backup + 16 recovery wordsChange phones and the book is still there. To be straight: if you lose both the phone and the 16 words, nobody can recover it, including us.
- No account, no ads, no data salesYou never need to give an email or phone number to use the app.
Packets are encrypted on your device; the relay server only holds ciphertext, deleted as soon as it is delivered or after 14 days at most, and it logs neither content nor identifiers.
05 / The first 30 seconds
Open it and you know how.
The hard parts come later.
On day one you see a single number: how much is left this week. Features unlock as you need them, like learning a new habit.
- 0–10 secondsChoose “Our home” or “Just me first”. No account, no bank.
- 10–20 secondsPick 3 common jars. You can change them later.
- 20–30 secondsLog your first expense. Hồng cheers, and you are done.
- The following daysWidgets, the weekly check, the Tet jar and the agreement session unlock one by one.
Next to this is an interactive demo that runs right in your browser. Press “Try it” to open it.
IllustrationThe demo runs in your browserThe demo is in Vietnamese only.
06 / Very Vietnamese
The expenses no app
has written rules for.
Vietnamese household jar templates, with agreement lines that the two of you write and sign yourselves. Emberlo never suggests an amount and never compares the two sides.
His parents“Every month we give his parents the same amount, on the 5th.”
Her parents“Same for hers, so nobody has to ask.”
Weddings & funerals“A close friend’s wedding over 1 million: we talk first.”
TetSaving up: 7,500,000 / 15,000,000 đ
The agreement lines above are examples for the two of you to adapt, not suggested amounts.
07 / Every household is different
Emberlo is for households like these.
The characters and stories below are illustrative situations that describe how it is used, not reviews from real users.
Mai & Hoàng
Newlyweds · renting in Hanoi
Mai keeps the book; Hoàng hates data entry. He just ticks the widget each time he is back from the market. On Sunday evening Mai spends one minute on the check, 150 thousand goes to “Unclear” and nobody has to ask anybody.
Illustration
Trung & Phương
Toddler, 2 years old · Ho Chi Minh City
The Baby & milk jar runs dry mid-month. A “household suggestion” recalls the line the two of them signed: move a little from Buffer, note it, and top it up next month.
Illustration
An & Chi
Freelance income, up and down
A weak month has no red text. They already signed the line “when income is under the threshold, each private pocket drops by half”. The Tet jar keeps filling steadily.
Illustration08 / Preview
One screen, one job.
09 / Plans
The core is free.
Priced per household, not per person.
Exporting your data and restoring your book are always free. Buy one Pro plan and both of you in the household use it.
Free
The core, always
- Shared jars, private pockets, Vietnamese jar templates, the agreement session
- Warranty vault, Tet plan, income split by ratio
- Receipt sharing, widget, evening reminder, shopping list, weekly check
- Two people, one phone each, end-to-end encrypted sync
- Encrypted text-and-numbers backup, restore, CSV export
Family Pro
For the whole household · in progress
- Everything in Free
- Backup that includes your warranty and receipt photos, encrypted with your 16 recovery words
- Warranty reminders on your phone (30, 7 or 1 day before expiry)
Pro pricing will be announced before launch; payment goes through the app store. Pro items may change before release.
10 / Straight answers
The hardest questions,
answered honestly.
What is Emberlo?
Emberlo is a shared-expense notebook for two people on iPhone: shared jars you both see, private pockets that stay on the owner’s phone, and quick logging from the lock-screen widget. It is made by Haikotek and coming soon.
Does Emberlo need an account?
No. Emberlo asks for no email or phone number. You choose a display name, pair the two phones with a QR code, and both confirm the 6 digits shown on the two screens.
With no bank link, who enters everything? By week two I will quit.
Emberlo does not rely on typing. You share the receipt right after a transfer, get one evening reminder, keep a shopping list and enter quickly from the widget. We will adjust if that does not work well for you.
My partner will never install an app.
The companion only needs the widget and one-tap notifications. They benefit too: a private pocket nobody inspects, no more reminders once the week is settled, and warranties that are quick to find. Meanwhile you can use it solo.
Is this an app to inspect my partner’s spending?
No. The details of a private pocket never leave the owner’s phone. Emberlo does not use location, has no “remind my partner” button, and keeps everything private by default.
The numbers in the app never match my bank.
Jars are a virtual budget. Once a week you take a minute to compare, and the gap goes to “Unclear”, with no blame on anyone.
If I lose my phone, do I lose the whole book?
Encrypted backup lets you restore the book on a new phone with your 16 recovery words. To be straight: if you lose both the phone and the 16 words, nobody can get it back, including us.
Can your server read my book?
It cannot read the content. Packets are encrypted on your device; the relay server only holds ciphertext, deleted as soon as it is delivered or after 14 days at most, and it logs neither content nor identifiers. See what we store, and where.
Giving to both sets of parents is sensitive. Leave it alone.
Those templates are optional. Emberlo suggests no amounts and never compares the two sides. The agreement lines are written and signed by the two of you.
How do “household suggestions” work?
A suggestion is based only on the lines you both signed in the agreement and the numbers in the book. Each one says why, and Emberlo never does anything on your behalf.
We have one iPhone and one Android.
iPhone first. Android: we will let you know. Meanwhile the iPhone user can use it solo.
If you remind me too much I will delete the app.
At most one reminder per evening, at a time you choose. When “This week is settled” shows, reminders stop for the week. One tap turns them off.
If we break up, what happens to the data?
Either of you can “Leave the shared home” to stop syncing. Whatever data is on a phone stays on that phone, and your private pocket only ever lived on your phone.
What if the app reads a receipt amount wrong?
Emberlo always shows the amount it read so you can confirm it, and never logs on its own. Reading text runs on your phone.
Is Emberlo free?
The core is free; exporting your data is always free. Pro pricing will be announced before launch; payment goes through the app store.
Get the app
Coming soon to iPhone.
Emberlo is not on the App Store yet. When it is ready, the download button will appear here. To ask a question or hear when it launches, write to us directly.
- iPhoneComing soon
- AndroidWe will let you know
Requires an iPhone running iOS 15.1 or later.
We do not collect emails on this page. A message you send is only used to reply to you.