Microsoft Money

Microsoft's personal finance program, eighteen years against Quicken, ended when the banks went online

Shut down
19902026

Microsoft Money was a personal finance program for Windows, released in 1991 as a rival to Intuit's Quicken and sold in yearly versions, later Money Plus, with bank downloads, bill payment, investment tracking and a strong presence in Microsoft's Works Suite bundles. Microsoft announced on 10 June 2009 that sales would end on 30 June, closed the online services on 31 January 2011, and released Money Plus Sunset in 2010 so existing files could still be opened.

Timeline [edit]

  1. 1991
  2. October 1991 Launch
    Microsoft Money 1.0 for Windows
  3. 1994
  4. 13 October 1994 other
    Microsoft tries to buy Intuit

    The $1.5 billion deal collapses in 1995 under antitrust pressure.

  5. 1998
  6. 1998 Peak
    Money 98 and Works Suite

    Money in every Works Suite box.

  7. 2008
  8. 2008 Version
    Money Plus

    The last release.

  9. 2009
  10. 10 June 2009 Shutdown announced
    Microsoft to stop selling Money

    Sales end 30 June 2009.

  11. 30 June 2009 Shutdown
    Sales end
  12. 2010
  13. 17 June 2010 other
    Money Plus Sunset released free

    Opens old files; no online features.

  14. 2011
  15. 31 January 2011 Shutdown
    Online services switched off

    Quotes, downloads and bill pay end.

The site through time

Browse microsoft.com as it was, via the Internet Archive's Wayback Machine:

1991 1994 1997 2000 2003 2006 2009 Full archive →

Ownership [edit]

Microsoft 1991–2009 Founded

Why it shut down [edit]

Official line: On 10 June 2009 Microsoft announced it would stop selling Money on 30 June 2009, saying that "with banks, brokerage firms and websites now providing a range of options for managing personal finances, the consumer need for Microsoft Money Plus has changed". Online services for existing copies, quotes, bank downloads and bill pay, ran until 31 January 2011. Money Plus Sunset, a free version with the online parts removed, was released in June 2010 so people could keep opening their files.

Our analysis: Money was a good program that never beat Quicken and then lost the reason to exist. It was sold on connecting your accounts, and once every bank had a website and Mint offered the aggregation free, a boxed finance program was a hard sell to anyone but the people who already had fifteen years of data in it. Microsoft handled the ending better than most: it published a free Sunset edition that still opens .mny files today.

History [edit]

Money against Quicken

Microsoft Money 1.0 shipped in October 1991 for Windows 3.0, one of the first applications written for it, and for the next eighteen years it was the second personal finance program in America behind Intuit's Quicken. Microsoft tried to buy Intuit in 1994 for $1.5 billion; the Justice Department objected and the deal collapsed in 1995, and Money had to compete instead. It did so with yearly versions, Money 95, 97, 98, 99, 2000 and on to Money 2007 and Money Plus in 2008, with Standard, Deluxe, Premium and Home & Business editions, an investment portfolio linked to MSN Money, online bank downloads, bill payment through Checkfree and MSN Bill Pay, tax planning and, for a while, an international range that was quietly discontinued in 2005. It was in every Works Suite box and on the shelf at every computer shop.

Sunset

Quicken kept the lead, and both were losing the argument. Banks built their own online tools, Mint (2007) aggregated everything free in a browser, and Money Plus 2008 turned out to be the last release. On 10 June 2009 Microsoft said it would stop selling Money on 30 June 2009. Existing users could keep working; the online services, quotes and downloads and bill pay, were switched off on 31 January 2011. In June 2010 Microsoft released Money Plus Sunset, free versions of Money Plus Deluxe and Home & Business with no activation and no online features, so that anyone with years of records could keep them. It still runs on Windows 11 and is still the only way to open a .mny file.

The domain today

microsoft.com/money is gone; a support article and the Sunset download are all that remain.

Similar projects

Microsoft Bob A cartoon house instead of a desktop, sold for one year in 1995 1995–1996 Google Desktop Google search for your own hard drive, plus a sidebar of gadgets, retired when the cloud made it pointless 2004–2011 Microsoft FrontPage The web editor that built a generation of home pages, bought from Vermeer in 1996 and retired in 2006 1995–2006 Windows Live Writer The blog editor bloggers loved, from Onfolio to Windows Essentials 2012, abandoned by Microsoft and rescued as open source 2006–2017 Aperture Apple's professional photo manager, the first of its kind, dropped for Photos and finally unable to launch 2005–2015 Microsoft Works The cheap office suite that came with the PC, from a 1986 Macintosh program to Works 9, replaced by Office Starter 1986–2010

Sources [edit]

  1. Microsoft's Money gets early responses The New York Times 31 August 1995 [archived]
  2. Microsoft to discontinue Money PCWorld 10 June 2009 [archived]
  3. Microsoft Money discontinued FindMySoft 11 June 2009 [archived]
  4. Microsoft Money Plus Sunset Microsoft 17 June 2010 [archived]
  5. Microsoft Money Sunset WinWorld 1 January 2015 [archived]

Last verified: 16 August 2026. Spotted an error? Suggest an edit (corrections with sources are reviewed and applied).