What is BeanHub

BeanHub is a hosted accounting app. Your book (the ledger) is a Git repository of Beancount files. You browse it in the browser at https://app.beanhub.io. You can also clone it to a laptop and edit the files like any other Git repo.

BeanHub is not QuickBooks. It does not store your ledger only in a private database. The source of truth is the text files in Git. If BeanHub disappeared tomorrow, a clone of the repository would still be a valid Beancount book.

Terms

Term	Meaning
Book / repository	One Git repository that holds your Beancount files. The website calls this a repository. This site often says book.
Beancount	Open-source plain-text accounting. You write transactions in .bean files.
Entry	One Beancount directive: a transaction, an open account, a balance assertion, and so on.
Account	A named bucket such as Assets:Bank:Checking or Expenses:Food.
Commodity	A currency or other unit, such as USD or TSLA.
Access token	A secret you create in Settings. Use it as the Git HTTPS password and as the API access-token header.

How it relates to Beancount

You need a little Beancount to use BeanHub well. You do not need the whole textbook.

A transaction is a date, a description, and two or more postings (account + amount). The amounts must sum to zero. That is double-entry bookkeeping.

2026-09-01 * "Coffee"
  Assets:Cash            -4.50 USD
  Expenses:Food           4.50 USD

The first line is the date, a flag (* means cleared, ! means pending), and a narration. Each following line is a posting.

Account names start with one of Assets, Liabilities, Income, Expenses, or Equity. Colons make sub-accounts.

Two surprises for newcomers:

• Income is usually negative. Earning $50 cash is Income:... -50 USD and Assets:... +50 USD. The income account is the source. The Academy explains why with diagrams.
• BeanHub looks for a file named main.bean at the root of the repository. That file is the entry point. It can include other files. A push that cannot load main.bean is rejected.

The sample book BeanHub generates already has main.bean, accounts.bean, commodities.bean, and books/. You can start there and never write Beancount by hand if you use import, forms, and the add transaction UI.

Tip

For a slower Beancount primer, read BeanHub Academy. This docs site assumes you want to operate the product, not become an accountant in one sitting.

What BeanHub adds

• A website: journal, accounts, reports, file browser, commit history.
• Import from CSV using beanhub-import rules.
• Connect to banks through Plaid (paid plans).
• Inbox for forwarded invoices.
• Custom forms defined in YAML.
• An HTTP API.
• Automatic formatting of Beancount files after many website edits (beancount-black).

Two repository types

When you click Create Repository, BeanHub asks which type you want.

Type	Use it when
Git repository (recommended)	You want BeanHub to host the book. All features work. This is the right default.
Connect repository	You keep the Beancount files somewhere else (laptop, another Git host) and only want BeanHub to pull bank CSVs and receive inbox email. You then use beanhub-cli locally.

This first round of docs focuses on Git repositories.

What this round does not cover

• MCP (Model Context Protocol) for AI apps. It exists in account settings. These pages skip it.
• Exhaustive API reference. Use https://api.beanhub.io/redoc.
• Admin internals, Kubernetes, and workers.

Next: Quickstart.