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APIs · head to head

Formance vs NewsBlur

Formance logo

Formance

APIs

Open source double-entry ledger and payment orchestration for money-moving software

From
Free
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite
NewsBlur logo

NewsBlur

News

A personal news reader bringing people together

From
Free
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite

The short version

  • Each has a real cost: Formance formance holds no money and provides no regulatory cover, so it must be paired with a payments provider or bank, and buyers occasionally mistake a ledger for a treasury system and discover the gap late.; NewsBlur the free account is limited to 64 sites
  • They diverge on capability: Formance covers Double-entry ledger, NewsBlur covers Intelligence training.
  • Prices and features above were last checked on 31 August 2026.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which Formance and NewsBlur actually diverge.

Attributes where Formance and NewsBlur differ
AttributeFormanceNewsBlur
Pricing modelOpen source, no licence feefreemium
PlatformsLinux, Docker, Kubernetes, Web, APIWeb, Ios, Android
CategoryAPIsNews
FoundedUnknown2010

Identical on both: starting price (Free), free tier (Yes), user rating (Not yet rated).

What each one covers

Drawn from each product's published feature list. An absence here means we hold no record of it - not that the product lacks it.

Only in Formance

  • Double-entry ledger
  • Numscript transaction DSL
  • Multi-currency
  • Payments connectivity
  • Reconciliation
  • Self-hosted deployment
  • Cloud offering
  • API and SDKs

Only in NewsBlur

  • Intelligence training
  • Story sharing
  • Original site view
  • Text view
  • Blurblogs
  • Pocket
  • Instapaper
  • Evernote

What people use each for

The jobs each tool is most often brought in to do.

Formance

  • A marketplace splitting a single customer payment between seller, platform fee and tax that needs the split to be atomic and auditablenot NewsBlur
  • A fintech whose homegrown balances table produced numbers finance could not reconcile and now needs proper double-entry before an auditnot NewsBlur
  • A payments team that wants one normalised model across several PSPs so reconciliation is not written separately for eachnot NewsBlur
  • A company that wants its ledger under a licence it can keep running even if the vendor disappearsnot NewsBlur

NewsBlur

  • Reading RSS feeds with training that filters by author, tag or titlenot Formance
  • Archiving full article content from followed sitesnot Formance
  • Following a large number of feeds with fast refreshnot Formance

Where each one falls short

Documented limitations, not opinions. Every one is a constraint you would hit in normal use.

Formance

  • Formance holds no money and provides no regulatory cover, so it must be paired with a payments provider or bank, and buyers occasionally mistake a ledger for a treasury system and discover the gap late.
  • Numscript is a domain-specific language your team must learn, and while it makes complex splits expressible it also means transaction logic sits outside the languages your engineers already debug well.
  • Self-hosting a ledger that must never lose or duplicate a transaction is a serious operational commitment covering backups, upgrades and Postgres tuning, which is real cost the zero licence fee hides.
  • Enterprise pricing is not published, so the difference between the free path and the supported path cannot be evaluated without a sales conversation.
  • The company is much smaller than the incumbent alternatives, and while the MIT licence protects the code it does not protect the roadmap, so features on the hosted side may arrive slowly or change direction.

NewsBlur

  • The free account is limited to 64 sites
  • Search and text view extraction require Premium at $36 per year
  • Premium is capped at 1,024 sites and Premium Archive at 4,096 sites
  • Full content archiving and the Daily Briefing require Premium Archive at $99 per year
  • The fastest 5 to 15 minute feed refresh and regex training require Premium Pro at $29 per month
  • Site following is capped at 10,000 even on the top tier

Pricing, plan by plan

Formance

Free
  • Open SourceFree
    • MIT licensed core ledger
    • Numscript transaction DSL
    • Multi-currency tracking
  • Enterprise$undefined/year
    • Managed or private deployment
    • Payments connectivity and reconciliation
    • Support with response commitments

NewsBlur

Free
  • Free TierFree
    • Follow up to 64 sites
    • Real-time RSS updates
    • Train stories by author, tag, title
  • Premium$36/year
    • Follow up to 1024 sites
    • 5x more frequent updates
    • River of News, search, saved stories with tags
  • Premium Archive$99/year
    • Follow up to 4096 sites
    • Web feeds from any website
    • Story clustering, daily briefing, full archive and search
  • Premium Pro$29/month
    • All Archive features plus up to 10000 sites
    • Feeds fetched every 5 to 15 minutes
    • Regex training, priority support

Which should you pick?

Choose Formance if

  • You need double-entry ledger.
  • You want to start without paying.
  • You work on Linux, Docker, Kubernetes, Web, API.
  • You also want numscript transaction dsl.
Formance review

Choose NewsBlur if

  • You need intelligence training.
  • You want to start without paying.
  • You work on Web, Ios, Android.
  • You also want story sharing.
NewsBlur review

Questions people ask

Is Formance or NewsBlur better?
Neither clearly leads. Formance starts at Free and NewsBlur at Free, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, Formance or NewsBlur?
Formance starts at Free and NewsBlur at Free.
Does Formance or NewsBlur run on more platforms?
Formance runs on Linux, Docker, Kubernetes, Web, API. NewsBlur runs on Web, Ios, Android.
Can I use Formance for free?
Both have a free tier, so you can try either at no cost before committing.
What is Formance best used for?
Formance is most often used for a marketplace splitting a single customer payment between seller, platform fee and tax that needs the split to be atomic and auditable, a fintech whose homegrown balances table produced numbers finance could not reconcile and now needs proper double-entry before an audit, a payments team that wants one normalised model across several psps so reconciliation is not written separately for each, a company that wants its ledger under a licence it can keep running even if the vendor disappears. Of those, a marketplace splitting a single customer payment between seller, platform fee and tax that needs the split to be atomic and auditable and a fintech whose homegrown balances table produced numbers finance could not reconcile and now needs proper double-entry before an audit are not what NewsBlur is typically brought in for.
What can Formance do that NewsBlur cannot?
Formance covers Double-entry ledger, Numscript transaction DSL, Multi-currency, Payments connectivity. NewsBlur covers Intelligence training, Story sharing, Original site view, Text view.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Formance: Is Formance really open source?

Yes. The core ledger is MIT licensed with full source access and no deployment restrictions.

NewsBlur: Is NewsBlur free?

NewsBlur offers a free tier allowing users to follow up to 64 RSS feeds with real-time updates, story training, and public sharing.

Source
Formance: Does Formance move money?

No. It records and orchestrates movements; the actual payments happen at a PSP or bank you connect.

NewsBlur: What does Premium plan include?

Premium plan costs 36 dollars per year and includes following up to 1024 sites with 5x more frequent updates, River of News feature, search functionality, and saved stories with tags.

Source
Formance: What does the enterprise version cost?

Not published. It is an annual subscription quoted per customer.

NewsBlur: Is there a free trial?

Every new NewsBlur account starts with a free 30-day premium trial. No credit card is required to start.

Source
Formance: Do I have to use Numscript?

Yes for anything beyond the simplest transfers. It is how multi-party transactions are expressed atomically.

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