Concept

Pockets.

A pocket is a self-contained financial workspace. Most people only need one. The few that need two are very glad they exist.

What a pocket contains

Inside a pocket, you get:

• Its own accounts (cash, debt, investment).
• Its own categories and budget.
• Its own transaction history.
• Its own net-worth chart.
• Its own pricing snapshot for the assets it holds.

Two pockets share nothing. A transaction in pocket A doesn't appear in pocket B. The "Ready to assign" in pocket A's budget is computed from pocket A's accounts only. The net-worth chart on the dashboard is whichever pocket you're currently viewing.

When one pocket is enough

The default. If you're tracking personal finances — paychecks, groceries, rent, savings, retirement — keep everything in a single pocket. The whole point of Pocketwatch is one ledger; splitting your own life across multiple pockets adds friction without paying for it.

When to spin up a second

The clean cases:

• A side business or freelance practice. Income and expenses you'd file separately on taxes belong in their own pocket. Your personal "groceries" category shouldn't be next to a "client billable" line.
• A shared household ledger. Roommates or a partner who wants joint visibility into rent + utilities + shared groceries, but not into each other's personal spending.
• An LLC, trust, or estate. Anything with its own tax ID and its own books. Don't mix.

How switching works

The active pocket lives in the sidebar — click the name to switch. Every page in the app re-fetches against the new pocket: accounts swap, the budget swaps, recent transactions swap. URLs that reference pocket-scoped IDs (an account, a category) follow along; everything else is the same page, different data.

One pocket is always "active" for the session. If you close the tab and come back, you land back in whichever pocket you were last using.

What pockets are not

Pockets are not envelopes. They're not budget categories with a fancy name. They're not a way to split paychecks into chunks. For all of that — "I want to set aside $200/mo for travel" — see Budgeting. Pockets are a layer above: they're whole separate books.