Put FWF Ledger on your Android phone

It takes about twenty seconds, costs nothing, and nothing is downloaded from the Play Store. You end up with an icon in your app list that opens FWF Ledger full screen, like any other app.

Do this in Chrome

You don't need an account yet — this works signed out, and you can sign in afterwards from the icon.

  1. Open Chrome and go to app.financewithoutfluff.com.
  2. Tap More — the three dots to the right of the address bar.
  3. Tap Install and create shortcut, then tap Install.Chrome renamed this recently. If your phone hasn't updated, the same menu says Install app or Add to Home screen instead. All three are the same thing — tap whichever one you have.
  4. Confirm when Chrome asks. It may offer to place the icon for you, or let you drag it where you want.

Chrome often offers this without the menu at all — as a bar along the bottom of the page, or, once you're signed in, as an Install button on your dashboard. Those do exactly the same thing, so take whichever you're offered.

You'll know it worked when

A red F icon named FWF appears in your app list, and usually on your home screen too. Open it and FWF Ledger fills the screen — no Chrome address bar along the top. That missing address bar is the difference between an installed app and a bookmark.

It behaves like a normal app from then on: it shows up under Settings → Apps, and you uninstall it the same way you would anything else. Nothing about your account changes when you do.

If you can't find the option

Check you're on the right address. It has to be app.financewithoutfluff.com — the app — rather than the main financewithoutfluff.com site, which is a website and isn't installable.

Not in an Incognito tab. Private browsing doesn't offer installing. Open the page in a normal tab and try again.

It may already be installed. Chrome hides the option once it is. Search your app list for FWF before trying again.

A different browser. Edge, Firefox, Opera and Samsung Internet can all do this, but each words it differently. In Firefox, the menu item is Install. In Samsung Internet, a + appears in the address bar when a page can be added. In the others, look through the menu for anything saying install or home screen. If none of that turns up, Chrome always has it.

What you get out of it

Nice, not needed

An icon you can reach without typing, a full screen instead of one shared with browser buttons, and balances you type in a dead spot held safely until your signal comes back. Worth doing — but nothing in FWF Ledger is locked behind it.

Notifications are the one place Android is easier than an iPhone: your weekly check-in can arrive as a notification whether or not you install, from Settings. It's off until you turn it on, and it's per device.

Why an iPhone is different — tap to read

Apple only delivers notifications from a website to an icon that has been added to the Home Screen — an open browser tab never gets them. Android has no such rule, so on Android installing is a convenience rather than a requirement. If you also carry an iPhone, that page spells it out.

Tablets, and other phones

An Android tablet works exactly the same way. For an iPhone or iPad, the steps are on their own page and are worth reading, because notifications there depend on it. Installing on one device doesn't affect the others; your numbers sync regardless.