Expense Analytics Dashboard 💸📊

A smart expense tracker that visualizes your spending with interactive charts, sends you alerts when you exceed your budget, and keeps your finances in check.

🚀 Features

• 📈 Expense analytics dashboard with charts
• 📂 Category-based budget alerts
• 📬 Email notifications on budget breaches
• 🔁 Background task processing with Celery
• 🧾 Clean UI for tracking and managing expenses

🔧 Tech Stack

• Python / Django
• Celery + Redis
• PostgreSQL
• Chart.js or Recharts (JS)
• Bootstrap / Tailwind for frontend styling

🧠 Key Concepts Covered

• Data aggregation and filtering
• Background job scheduling
• Sending emails via Django
• Real-time data visualization

⚙️ Setup Instructions

1. Clone the repo

   git clone https://github.com/yourusername/expense-analytics-dashboard.git
   cd expense-analytics-dashboard

2. Create a virtual environment

   python -m venv venv
   source venv/bin/activate  # or venv\Scripts\activate on Windows

3. Install dependencies

   pip install -r requirements.txt

4. Set up environment variables

    DEBUG=True
    SECRET_KEY=your-secret-key
    EMAIL_HOST_USER=your@email.com
   

5. Run database migrations

   python manage.py migrate

6. Start Redis server and Celery worker

   redis-server  # in another terminal
   celery -A your_project_name worker --loglevel=info

7. Start the Django server

   python manage.py runserver

Tutorial

Checking the budget breach after each expense entery(so if it's more than limit it will send the email)

install celery

pip install celery

install redis

sudo apt update
sudo apt install redis

check if it works

redis-cli
ping

if you get PONG means it works so use ctrl+c to close it

then install redis in env

pip install redis

add celery.py in your project where settings.py is

# myApp/celery.py
import os
from celery import Celery

os.environ.setdefault('DJANGO_SETTINGS_MODULE', 'personalExpenseTracker.settings')
app = Celery('personalExpenseTracker')
app.config_from_object('django.conf:settings', namespace='CELERY')
app.autodiscover_tasks()

then add this to settings.py

# personalExpenseTracker/settings.py
# ...

# Celery settings
CELERY_BROKER_URL = "redis://localhost:6379"
CELERY_RESULT_BACKEND = "redis://localhost:6379"

# Email 
EMAIL_BACKEND = 'django.core.mail.backends.smtp.EmailBackend'
EMAIL_HOST = 'smtp.gmail.com'
EMAIL_PORT = 587
EMAIL_USE_TLS = True 
EMAIL_HOST_USER = config('EMAIL_HOST_USER')
EMAIL_HOST_PASSWORD = config('EMAIL_HOST_PASSWORD')
DEFAULT_FROM_EMAIL = config('DEFAULT_FROM_EMAIL')

add the secret information in .evn file

DEBUG=True
ALLOWED_HOSTS=127.0.0.1,localhost
SECRET_KEY=<your-secret-key>
EMAIL_HOST_USER=<your-email>
EMAIL_HOST_PASSWORD=<your-email-password>
DEFAULT_FROM_EMAIL=Expense Tracker - <your-email>

then same folder __init__.py

# proj/__init__.py

from .celery import app as celery_app

__all__ = ("celery_app",)

open a terminal and run your django server

python manage.py runserver

open another terminal and run redis server

redis-server

if you get error that the server is already open do this

sudo systemctl stop redis

If still didn't work and the port is busy

# find out the port is busy by what
lsof -i :6379
# then kill it
kill -9 <PID>

open another terminal and run celery worker

python -m celery -A personalExpenseTracker worker

create a tasks.py in your app folder

# app/task.py
from celery import shared_task
from django.core.mail import send_mail

@shared_task
def send_alert_email(categ, user_email):
   '''take the breached category and user_email and send an alert email to the user.'''
    subject = f"Spend Alert!"
    message = f"Your category '{categ}' overreached the limit! "
    send_mail(subject=subject,
              message=message,
              from_email=None,
              recipient_list=[user_email])

then use this task in views.py

# myApp/views.py
from .tasks import send_alert_email


# ...
class AddExpenseView(CreateView):
    model = Expense
    form_class = ExpenseForm
    template_name = 'myApp/add_expense.html'
    success_url = reverse_lazy('home')
    
    def get_form(self):
        form = super().get_form()
        form.fields['category'].queryset = Category.objects.filter(author=self.request.user)
        return form
    
    def form_valid(self, form):
        categ = Category.objects.get(name=form.cleaned_data['category'], author=self.request.user)
        # if category has breached call the task for sending the email
        if categ.check_budget_breach():
            send_alert_email.delay(categ.name, self.request.user.email)
            messages.error(self.request, f'Your category "{categ}" has overreached the limit!')
        return super().form_valid(form)
# ...

every change you do on tasks you should restart the worker.

python -m celery -A proj worker -l info

Periodic background task (automatic checking every X minutes)

create a new task

# app/tasks.py
from celery import shared_task
from django.core.mail import send_mail
from django.contrib.auth import get_user_model
from .models import Category

@shared_task
def send_alert_email(categ, user_email):
    subject = f"Spend Alert!"
    message = f"Your category '{categ}' overreached the limit! "
    send_mail(subject=subject,
              message=message,
              from_email=None,
              recipient_list=[user_email])
    
# we added this task so it loops through users and their categories and if the the category is breached we use the task above to send them an email alert    
@shared_task
def check_all_users_budget():
    Users = get_user_model()
    users = Users.objects.all()
    
    for user in users:
        categories = Category.objects.filter(author=user)
        for categ in categories:
            if categ.check_budget_breach():
                send_alert_email(categ, user.email)

install Celery Beat

pip install django-celery-beat

add it to INSTALLED_APPS

# settings.py
INSTALLED_APPS = [
    ...
    'django_celery_beat',
]

run migrations

python manage.py migrate django_celery_beat

set the celery.py on schedule

# proj/celery.py
import os
from celery import Celery

os.environ.setdefault('DJANGO_SETTINGS_MODULE', 'personalExpenseTracker.settings')
app = Celery('personalExpenseTracker')
app.config_from_object('django.conf:settings', namespace='CELERY')
app.conf.beat_scheduler = 'django_celery_beat.schedulers:DatabaseScheduler'    # new
app.conf.timezone = 'UTC'    # new
app.autodiscover_tasks()

now go to admin panel and create a periodic task

• Go to Django Admin > Periodic Tasks > Add.
• Create a new task:
  • Name: "Check all budgets"
  • Task: yourapp.tasks.check_all_users_budget
  • be sure it's enabled
  • Interval: Create a new Interval (e.g., every 10 minutes).

FINISHED