Ghostfolio vs Portfolio Performance vs Wealthfolio: a server, a file and an app

Reading the cards one after another, these look like three versions of the same idea. All three are open source, none needs an account with a vendor when you run it yourself, and all three keep your portfolio somewhere you control. They are built differently, though. Ghostfolio is a web server that runs on PostgreSQL and Redis. Portfolio Performance is a Java desktop app that writes one XML file. Wealthfolio is a desktop and mobile app on a local SQLite file. How each is built decides how your transactions get in, and that is the question that settles the choice.

How your history gets in

None of the three syncs with a broker for free. What each does instead is very different:

• Portfolio Performance reads PDFs. You download the trade confirmation your bank sends and import it. The importer handles more than 90 banks and brokers by the manual's count. Most of them are German, Austrian and Swiss, and Degiro, Trading 212, Revolut, Saxo, CommSec, Questrade and Wealthsimple are among the rest. It also reads an Interactive Brokers Flex Query file and CSV. If your bank is on the list, this is the closest any free tool gets to automatic import. If it is not, you are writing CSV or typing transactions in.
• Wealthfolio reads CSV for free, and sells sync. Connect Essentials, at $7.99 a month or $79 a year, links up to five institutions through SnapTrade. It is read-only and refreshes once a day. The brokers its page names are US ones: Fidelity, Public, Robinhood, Webull and E*TRADE. This is the only automatic import among the three, and it is a hosted service. The app keeps your data on your own machine, but the sync does not.
• Ghostfolio takes manual entry, CSV or JSON, or its REST API. There is no broker connection at any tier. The API is a real advantage for someone who will script their own import. Anyone else ends up typing.

So a reader in Germany, Austria or Switzerland whose bank's PDFs are on the importer list already has an answer. So does a US reader who will not type trades in and will pay $79 a year. Everyone else is choosing between three ways of doing the import work themselves.

The three return figures are different numbers

Load the same history into two of these and the headline percentage will differ, even though neither is wrong. Ghostfolio reports return on average investment, over periods from today out to the full history. Portfolio Performance reports a true time-weighted return and an internal rate of return. Wealthfolio reports time-weighted and money-weighted returns.

The time-weighted figure removes the effect of when you added or withdrew money, so it is the one that compares with the return an index fund publishes. Ghostfolio does not report one. If your question is "did I beat the fund I could have bought instead", Portfolio Performance and Wealthfolio can answer it and Ghostfolio cannot.

Where the prices come from

All three need a price source you choose, and the defaults differ:

• Portfolio Performance has a built-in feed that is free with a Portfolio Performance ID, an email login you renew every 90 days. It covers the major US exchanges and more than 20 European markets. Exchange rates come from the European Central Bank automatically. If you pick Yahoo instead, the manual warns that it returns only three months of history by default.
• Wealthfolio uses Yahoo Finance by default. It can also use Alpha Vantage, Finnhub or MarketData.app with your own API key, or a custom provider you define.
• Ghostfolio uses Yahoo Finance and CoinGecko, or the vendor's own professional provider, which needs a Premium key at $48 a year. That key also works from a self-hosted instance, so $48 buys better data without moving your portfolio to the vendor's cloud. On a self-hosted instance you also have to collect historical exchange rates yourself before cross-currency returns will compute.

For a portfolio held in more than one currency, Portfolio Performance is the one that documents its exchange rates loading on their own.

Running it, and reading it on a phone

Self-hosted Ghostfolio is a server you operate. It runs on Docker with PostgreSQL and Redis. You bump the image version by hand and take your own database backups. In return, every device in the house opens it in a browser, and it supports more than one user: the first account created becomes the admin. Releases come several times a week. The Android app works with the hosted service only.

Portfolio Performance and Wealthfolio are applications, not servers. Portfolio Performance's file can be password-encrypted and synced through a cloud drive to a mobile app, but the app is read-only. Adding transactions still happens on the desktop, and the phone dashboards cost EUR 3 a month. Wealthfolio has a native iOS app and, since v3.9.1 (27 September 2026), an Android APK on GitHub with no Play Store listing; device sync is Connect Basic at $2.99 a month. Its Docker image gives self-hosters a browser version as well.

Two more differences may matter. Wealthfolio is the only one of the three that tracks option contracts. And none of the three produces a tax report shaped for filing in any country.

The recommendation

Choose Portfolio Performance if your bank or broker is on its PDF importer list, which covers most German, Austrian and Swiss banks, or if you want a time-weighted return and exchange rates that load on their own, for no money at all. What it lacks is any way to work on the portfolio away from your desktop.

Choose Wealthfolio if you are with a US broker and want the import done for you: Connect Essentials at $79 a year is the only automatic sync among these three. Also choose it if you hold options or want to edit the portfolio on an iPhone. Without Connect it is still a good CSV-fed desktop tracker.

Choose Ghostfolio only if you actually want a server: one portfolio that several people or devices reach through a browser, and an API to script imports into. Accept that you will run PostgreSQL and Redis and supply exchange rates, or pay $48 a year to let the vendor run it. If the reason you want self-hosting is privacy rather than access from anywhere, the other two give you that with less to maintain.

The hosted trackers, with broker sync and tax reports, are on the portfolio trackers page.