---
title: "Categories and subcategories"
description: "Group expenses into main categories and subcategories, create one while you add a bill, and see what each costs over the last 12 months."
canonical_url: "https://getfiga.com/help/categories/"
---

# Categories and subcategories

Group expenses into main categories and subcategories, create one while you add a bill, and see what each costs over the last 12 months.

Categories answer "what is this cost for?": housing, utilities, transport. Use main categories for the big groups and subcategories for detail, for example **Housing → Rent** and **Housing → Repairs**.

## Create a category while adding a bill

In the expense form, open **Category** and type a name. If it does not exist, choose **New main category**, or open an existing one and choose **Add subcategory to** it. The new category is created when you save the expense. If the name already exists, Figa uses the existing one.

## Manage categories

Open **Organize → Categories** to add, rename or delete them. For each category you can set:

-   **Name** and an optional **Description**.
-   **Color**, used in charts and lists.
-   **Parent category**: choose a main category to make it a subcategory, or **No parent (root category)**.

Categories go two levels deep: a subcategory cannot have its own subcategories.

## See what a category costs

Open a category to see its total for the last 12 months, the amount by month, its top recipients and its expenses. In [Insights](https://getfiga.com/help/insights), group costs by category to compare periods; filtering a main category includes its subcategories.

## Delete a category

A category used by expenses cannot be deleted: move those expenses to another category first. A main category with subcategories needs its subcategories moved or detached first.

**Categories, recipients or tags?**

A category says what a cost is for, a [recipient](https://getfiga.com/help/recipients) says who you pay, and [tags](https://getfiga.com/help/tags) group costs across categories, like everything for one trip.