Cost Tracker

Use the built-in Cost Tracker in MainWP Dashboard to manage recurring and one-time costs for your clients and child sites.

The Cost Tracker is a core feature of MainWP Dashboard. It gives you a centralized place to record expenses, monitor renewals, and review cost trends across your clients and child sites.

What You’ll Learn

• Review Cost Summary widgets
• Add, edit, and delete cost entries
• Import multiple cost entries from CSV
• Configure currencies, product types, and payment methods
• Understand what the Cost Tracker Assistant add-on extends
• Use Cost Tracker REST API endpoints

Prerequisites

• MainWP Dashboard installed and activated
• At least one child site, client, or tag available for cost assignment

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Cost Summary page

Cost Summary is a widgetized page that provides a visual breakdown of costs associated with clients and child sites. Widgets can be resized, rearranged, and disabled in Page Settings.

Chart-based widgets can export data in SVG, PNG, and CSV formats.

Manage Costs page

Manage Costs is the central table for reviewing, filtering, and updating all tracked costs.

You can filter by Sites, Clients, subscription type, payment method, and more, then save filters as segments for reuse.

Adding a New Cost

1. Open Add New

   Go to Costs > Add New.

2. Enter cost details

   Provide the name, pricing, type, product category, payment method, and purchase date.

3. Assign sites, clients, or tags

   From the right sidebar, select related sites, clients, or tags.

4. Save the cost entry

   Click Save Cost Tracking Item.

Import Costs (CSV)

Use CSV import to add multiple cost entries in one run.

1. Open Import Costs

   Go to Costs > Import Costs.

2. Prepare your CSV file

   Click Download Sample, then keep the same column order in your file.

3. Upload and start import

   Upload your .csv file, keep CSV file contains a header enabled if your file has a header row, then click Import Operational Costs.

4. Review results

   Watch the row-by-row import log in the modal. Use Pause and Continue during import, and use Try Again after fixing failed rows.

CSV columns and formats

Column	Required	Format
Name	Yes	Plain text
URL	No	Full URL (https://...)
Type	No	subscription or lifetime
Category	No	plugin, theme, hosting, service, other, or a custom category slug from Cost Tracker Settings
License Type	No	single_site or multi_site
Price	Yes	Number (for example 49.00)
Payment Method	No	Default method slug (paypal, stripe, apple, amazon, google, credit_debit, debit_card, cash) or a custom method slug
Renewal Type	No	weekly, monthly, quarterly, or yearly
Last Renewal Date	No	Recommended format: YYYY-MM-DD
Status	No	active, canceled, onhold, expired, or pending_cancelation
Select Sites	No	Semicolon-separated site URLs (https://site1.com;https://site2.com)

The importer skips lines that start with # and treats them as comments.

Edit or Delete an Item

1. Go to Costs > Manage Costs.
2. Find the item and open the ellipsis menu.
3. Choose Edit or Delete.

Settings page

Go to Settings > Cost Tracker Settings to configure:

1. Currency and currency symbol position
2. Thousand and decimal separators
3. Decimal places
4. Default product categories
5. Custom payment methods

Notification options for subscription expiration alerts are provided by the Cost Tracker Assistant add-on.

Widgets and table information

Cost-related widgets are available on individual site Operations and client overview pages for quick visibility.

Manage Clients and Manage Sites tables include Cost Tracker columns showing 30-day cost forecasts.

Cost Tracker Assistant add-on

Cost Tracker Assistant is the extension that adds extra functionality to the core Cost Tracker feature, including:

• Subscription expiration notifications
• Faster cost entry when installing plugins or themes from ZIP files

Learn more: Cost Tracker Assistant

Cost Tracker REST API

For automation and integrations, use the Cost Tracker endpoints in MainWP REST API:

• Costs Endpoints
• REST API Overview

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Related Resources

• Cost Tracker Assistant - Extension that adds advanced Cost Tracker workflows
• Manage Clients - Manage client records and relationships
• Client Add-ons - Browse client-focused extensions