Play Store helps you budget your monthly purchases to avoid excessive spending

Spending money online is becoming more commonplace. You see an article you like and the purchase is only two taps, you barely have time to think. With digital stores, the presence of apps, many entertainment options, not to mention the games and all their tempting in-app purchases is even more exacerbated. Having a mental budget is fine, but if you do not really know how much you have spent or if you are not reminded that you are approaching or have exceeded your limit, then it is useless. That's why the Play Store has started to roll out a new budgeting feature.

To set your budget, go to the side menu of the Play Store, then Account> Purchase History. (If you see Order history, the feature is not yet available to you.) You will find your monthly expenses at the top and you will be able to enter the limit that you consider fair. A progress bar will appear, showing you how close you are to your budget.

There is no real visual alert if you have already gone overboard, you will simply see the point indicating your budget and the amount you spent in a relative way. Even if you want to buy something after you have exceeded your budget, you will only see a small yellow notice, but you can still make your purchase.

So, although the idea is interesting, Google does not want to dissuade you too much from buying. This makes sense because it is not in his interest. But if you're the kind of self-confident consumer, a budget might help you keep an eye on your expenses and reconsider whether something's worth the asking price or not. You can also easily see how many of these purchases are added each month.

Until now, it is unclear whether the budget takes into account family accounts and purchases made by other members, but we hope that this is the case, or at least that it will be added in the future. It would certainly be a compromise between giving free rein to teenagers, for example, buying everything they want or having to approve each transaction.

As noted earlier, this new budget feature seems to be growing, but as a server-side change. Even if I'm on the latest v14.5.52 of the Play Store (APK Mirror), I do not have it, but our tipster and Artem have it.