💰 MERN Expense Tracker

A full-stack Expense Tracker application built with the MERN stack (MongoDB, Express, React, Node). This README is optimized for clarity and contributors, especially for Hacktoberfest 2025.

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A modern, responsive expense tracker built with the MERN stack.

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Highlights ✨

• 🔐 User authentication (JWT)
• ✏️ Add, edit, delete expenses
• 📊 Visual summary with interactive charts
• 📱 Responsive UI and Tailwind-ready styles

Tech Stack 🧰

Frontend ⚛️

• React (Vite)
• Tailwind CSS
• Recharts

Backend 🧩

• Node.js & Express
• MongoDB (Mongoose)
• JWT for authentication

Quick Start 🚀

Prerequisites 🧾

• Node.js (v20+ recommended as Vite requires Node.js version 20.19+ or 22.12+)
• MongoDB (local or Atlas)
• Git

Clone the repository ⤵️

git clone https://github.com/Sathvikaeshkilla/mern-expense-tracker.git

cd mern-expense-tracker

Install server dependencies

cd server; npm install

Install client dependencies

cd ../client; npm install

Environment Variables :

Create a .env file in the server directory based on .env.example:

cp server/.env.example server/.env

Run in development (two terminals)

# Terminal 1 - server
cd server; npm start

# Terminal 2 - client
cd client; npm run dev

Contributing 🤝

Contributions are welcome. Please:

• 🐛 Open issues for bugs or feature requests
• ✨ Send a focused pull request with a clear description
• ✅ Keep changes small and test locally before opening a PR

For Hacktoberfest 2025: label your PR with hacktoberfest if it follows the project guidelines.

License 📄

MIT License

This project is licensed under the MIT License. See the LICENSE file for details.

Support 💬

If you find this project useful, consider starring the repo. For quick questions or coordination, open an issue and tag the maintainers.

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Maintainer: Assigned — coordinate via GitHub issues. 🧑‍🔧