Creating Your First Goal

Last updated: August 13, 2026

All calculations, goals, and metrics in Threshold are for educational purposes only and should not be taken as investment or financial advice.

What a goal is

A goal tracks progress toward a target using the balances of linked accounts.

Three types of goals

When you create a goal, Threshold offers three templates:

  • Custom: Set the name, target amount, and optional target date. Use this for anything with a specific savings target: an emergency fund, a vacation, a down payment.
  • Retirement:Use a guided setup that estimates your target from your annual spending and withdrawal rate, then projects whether you're on track based on an assumed rate of return that you can set. See the Built-in retirement goal article for the full walkthrough.
  • Debt paydown: Track one credit card or loan down toward $0. Instead of watching a balance grow, you watch what you owe shrink. More on this below.

Creating a custom goal

  1. In Build mode, tap + → Goal → Custom.
  2. Give it a name (e.g., “Emergency Fund” or “Hawaii Trip”).
  3. Set a target amount.
  4. Optionally set a target date. A projection requires one.
  5. Link accounts whose balances should count toward progress. You can do this during setup or later by opening the goal, tapping its menu, and choosing Edit Goal.

Progress math (custom goals)

Custom goals use this formula:

Sum of linked account balances ÷ target amount × 100 = percent complete

If your emergency fund goal has a $15,000 target and your linked HYSA balance is $9,000, you're at 60%.

Custom goals link asset accounts. Their linked balances are added together to calculate the funded amount.

Debt paydown goal

A debt paydown goal works in the opposite direction from a custom goal. The target is always $0.You link one account tagged as a liability (a credit card or loan), and Threshold tracks how much of that balance you've paid off as it climbs toward zero.

To create one:

  1. In Build mode, tap + → Goal → Debt paydown.
  2. Give it a name (e.g., “Pay off Visa”).
  3. Select the one credit card or loan this goal tracks toward $0. Only liability accounts show up here.
  4. Review and create.

When you link a liability, Threshold records its balance as a baseline. That baseline becomes the starting point you're paying down from. Each debt paydown goal tracks one liability; create another debt goal to track a different card or loan.

How debt progress is measured

Debt progress is the inverse of the normal math. Instead of measuring what you've saved against a target, it measures what you've paid off against your baseline:

(Baseline owed − current owed) ÷ baseline owed × 100 = percent paid off

If you start with a $4,000 baseline on a card and it's now down to $1,000, you're 75% paid off. The goal reaches 100% when nothing is owed. If a balance somehow goes negative (overpaid), it counts as fully paid and never exceeds 100%.

Examples

  • Emergency fund:$15,000 target → link your HYSA → progress updates as your balance grows.
  • Hawaii trip:$5,000 target → link a “Hawaii” portion of your checking → progress tracks just that slice.
  • Pay off a credit card:link one card → Threshold snapshots what you owe today → progress climbs toward 100% as its balance shrinks toward $0.

What a goal does not do

  • It does not move money, transfer between accounts, or make payments.
  • It does not tell you how much to save or pay each month.
  • It doesn't connect to your bank directly. It reads the balance of accounts you've already connected.

Linking accounts

Both custom and debt goals track account balances. To link a whole account or one portion, see Linking accounts and portions.

Goals live across canvases

Goals are shared across all your canvases. You can show the same goal on multiple canvases, and its progress stays in sync everywhere. To add an existing goal to a new canvas, enter Build mode and tap + to open the goal library. The goal appears in the Goals section.