I have been seeing a recent rise in No Spend Days on various blogs. I attempted to do this a long time ago but I was not successful.

No spend days are days when you make a conscious effort to not spend any money directly. This may involve things like leaving your credit or debit cards at home or removing all cash from your wallet. It is a tool to help you be more mindful of your spending on a day to day basis and to keep your budget in line.

Do these No Spend Days really work? If you decide to spend money as you normally do all week and then make Saturday a no spend day what happens next? Do you end up spending more the following week in order to make up for the day you did not spend any money? Do you end up spending the same amount? Do you spend less?

I think those days are not really useful unless you can be extremely strict about the allowable spending. It requires you to break down your monthly budget into a daily amount and is usually done by dividing your total budget by the number of days. If you come up with something like $8.21 per day and you spend nothing on a No Spend Day then do you spend $15.34 on another day?

I think one of the reasons the tool did not work for me is that I do not spend money on a daily basis. I buy food or household items on my shopping days and do not get the daily coffee or vending machine item that many people seem to get. I bring my lunch to work or else we have lunch provided so I do not have to buy a meal on a daily basis.

I think the No Spend Days would work for those who spend at least three days a week because they have to make an effort to not spend. It does not work for people like me but I would love to get some feedback.