Ghostfolio
Empower (Personal Capital)
| Feature | Ghostfolio | Empower (Personal Capital) |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing | Free / from $5.99/mo | Free / from $0.89/mo |
| Free Plan | ✓ Yes | ✓ Yes |
| Rating | 4.3 / 5 | 4.3 / 5 |
| Best For | privacy-focused-investors, self-hosters, passive-investors, international-portfolios | investors, high-net-worth-individuals, retirement-planners, wealth-builders |
| Founded | 2021 | 2009 |
| Portfolio Tracking | ✓ | ✗ |
| Performance Analysis | ✓ | ✗ |
| Allocation Views | ✓ | ✗ |
| Multi Currency | ✓ | ✗ |
| Dividends | ✓ | ✗ |
| Benchmarking | ✓ | ✗ |
| Self Hostable | ✓ | ✗ |
| Net Worth Tracking | ✗ | ✓ |
| Investment Checkup | ✗ | ✓ |
| Retirement Planner | ✗ | ✓ |
| Fee Analyzer | ✗ | ✓ |
| Budgeting | ✗ | ✓ |
| Cash Flow | ✗ | ✓ |
| Wealth Management | ✗ | ✓ |
✓ Ghostfolio Pros
- Open-source with self-hosting option
- Privacy-focused (no data selling or ads)
- Supports stocks, ETFs, crypto, commodities
- Beautiful portfolio allocation visualizations
✗ Ghostfolio Cons
- Limited broker integrations (manual entry mostly)
- Smaller community than commercial alternatives
- No tax-loss harvesting or advisor features
✓ Empower (Personal Capital) Pros
- Excellent free investment tracking and net worth dashboard
- Retirement planning calculator (Retirement Planner)
- Fee analyzer identifies hidden investment fees
- Comprehensive portfolio analysis tools
✗ Empower (Personal Capital) Cons
- Wealth management requires $100K minimum
- Sales calls after signing up for free tools
- Advisory fees higher than robo-advisors
The Verdict
Ghostfolio is built for privacy focused investors and self hosters, with a focus on portfolio-tracking and performance-analysis. Empower (Personal Capital) targets investors and high net worth individuals and leads with net-worth-tracking and investment-checkup.
On pricing, Empower (Personal Capital) is the clear winner for budget-conscious users — starting at $0.89/mo compared to $5.99/mo for Ghostfolio. That $5.1000000000000005/mo difference adds up quickly for growing teams.
Both offer free plans, so you can test each with your real workflow before committing to a subscription.
This is a genuinely close comparison. If you can, sign up for both free trials (where available) and run a one-week test with your actual team tasks before deciding.