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Filtering and Searching Entries in beancount.io

The beancount.io UI provides powerful filters at the top right of the page to help you find and analyze specific entries in your reports. You can combine multiple filters to narrow down results. Below are the main filtering options:

Time Filter​

Filter entries by date or period. You can use:

  • Years: 2023
  • Quarters: 2022-Q1
  • Months: 2024-05
  • Weeks: 2025-W23
  • Days: 2024-06-04
  • Ranges: 2022 - 2023-06 (from start of 2022 to end of June 2023)

You can also use relative date variables:

  • year, quarter, month, week, day
  • Combine with math: year - day (from start of this year to today), year-1 - year (last year and this year)
  • Use parentheses to clarify: (month)-10 is the 10th of this month, month-10 is 10 months ago

Account Filter​

Filter by account name, account component, or a regular expression:

  • Full or partial account name: Assets:Cash, Expenses
  • Regex: .*Company.* (matches any account containing "Company")
  • By tag: #food
  • By link: ^receipt
  • By payee: payee:"restaurant"
  • By narration: narration:'Dinner with Joe'
  • By document type: document:"\.pdf$"
  • By any text: just type (e.g., Cash withdrawal)
  • For Notes: searches comment text

If the filter contains spaces or special characters, quote it with ' or ".

Excluding Entries​

Add a - before a filter to exclude matches:

  • -#tag (exclude tag)
  • -(^link #tag) (exclude links or tags)

Advanced: Posting Attribute Filters​

  • any(id:'12', account:"Cash$") — matches entries with at least one posting with metadata id: 12 or account ending in Cash
  • all(-account:"^Expenses:Food") — excludes all transactions with a posting to Expenses:Food

Combining Filters​

  • Separate filters with spaces for "AND" (all must match)
  • Separate with commas for "OR" (any match)
  • Use parentheses to group filters

Notes on Matching​

  • All matching is case-insensitive
  • Filters use Python's regular expression syntax
  • If not a valid regex, the filter will look for an exact match

These flexible filters make it easy to drill down into your financial data and quickly find the entries you care about in the beancount.io web UI.

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About Beancount.io

Beancount.io is a powerful, open-source double-entry accounting system trusted by finance professionals, developers, and personal finance enthusiasts alike. Designed for clarity, extensibility, and precision, Beancount helps users manage complex financial data with plain-text accounting, robust validation, and seamless integrations. Since its inception, it has empowered users to gain full control over their finances, automate reporting, and maintain transparent, auditable records—making it a favorite among those who value simplicity without compromise.