Track your stock portfolio in Google Sheets

How do I track my stock portfolio in Google Sheets?

Keep one row per transaction: date, type, ticker, quantity, price, fee, currency, and account. Buys, sells, dividends, deposits, withdrawals, and fees each get their own row. Calculate holdings, cash, and returns from those rows, so every total can be traced back to the trades behind it. A sheet where you overwrite current balances by hand cannot show where a difference came from.

Portle sets up this kind of sheet for you. When you sign in with Google, it creates the ledger as a Google Sheet in your Drive and calculates your portfolio from its Transactions tab. You can record trades in the app, import a broker file, or type rows in Google Sheets yourself.

What is the best Google Sheets template for tracking investments?

Choose a template that records transactions, not only current holdings. It should keep cash movements as their own rows, store the trade currency on each row, and have a place to compare your quantities with the broker. Without those, the totals cannot be checked.

Portle’s ledger sheet is built that way. It has a Transactions tab for everything you bought, sold, or received, an Accounts tab, a Settings tab for your base currency, a Reconciliation tab for broker quantities, a Rules tab, and a Guide tab that explains each column. Portle creates it in your Drive when you sign in with Google, so you start from a sheet the app can read instead of copying a template by hand. Portle asks Google only for the drive.file permission, so it cannot open the rest of your Drive.

How can I see my Google Sheets stock portfolio on my phone?

The Google Sheets app opens any sheet on a phone. That works for checking a row, but it shows cells, not a portfolio.

If your ledger is a Portle ledger sheet, the Portle app on iPhone or Android reads it and shows account value, daily change, holdings, allocation, returns, dividends, and cash. Tap a number to see how it was calculated. Portle reads the sheet again when you come back to the app or pull down to refresh, so a row you change in Google Sheets on a computer shows up on the phone. The same ledger also opens on your other devices.

Portle reads only ledger sheets it created. A tracker in your own layout does not appear in the app until you import its trades.

Can I use a spreadsheet as the source of truth for my investment portfolio?

Yes, if every number comes from transaction rows and you check those rows against your broker. A spreadsheet is easy to inspect and stays yours, but nothing in it tells you when a row is missing.

With a Portle Drive ledger, the Google Sheet is the record. The app has a button that opens it in Google Sheets, and Portle calculates from what the sheet says, so a row you correct on the web changes the numbers the next time the app reads the ledger. Transactions you record without a connection are kept on the phone until they can be written to the sheet. The file stays in your Drive if you stop using Portle.

Keep the column headers as they are. If Portle cannot read a row, it lists it with the tab and row number instead of guessing, so you can fix the cell in the sheet. To check that the rows are complete, enter your broker’s quantities in Reconcile and review what Ledger check on Home lists.

What is a good portfolio tracker that doesn't require linking my brokerage account?

A good one calculates from trades you enter or import, lets you open that record yourself, and lets you compare its totals with your broker. The trade-off is that new trades do not arrive by themselves, so you add them after you trade.

Portle works this way. The Portle app has no live connection to any broker and does not ask for your broker login. You can enter a trade in the app, type a row in Google Sheets, or import a broker screenshot, pasted text, or a CSV or Excel file. Portle shows what it read from an import, and you save the rows you choose. It then calculates returns, allocation, drawdown, dividends, and cash from those trades and delayed market prices.

To record in a sheet and check the results on your phone, sign in with Google in the Portle app so it creates the ledger sheet in your Drive, then add trades in any of those ways. You can also start on the phone without an account and move to a sheet later. If you do want a link, Portle Bridge is a separate desktop app. Today it works with Toss Securities on macOS and adds trades to the same sheet, and your broker credentials stay on your computer.

Can I connect a spreadsheet I already keep?

Not directly. Portle reads a ledger sheet it created, because its Google permission only reaches files Portle made. A tracker you built yourself stays where it is, and nothing in it changes.

To bring its history in, copy the table of trades from Google Sheets, or export a CSV or Excel file from your broker, and import it in Portle. Portle reads columns such as date, type, ticker, quantity, price, fee, currency, and account, shows the rows it read, and saves only the rows you choose.

Do I need a Google account to start?

No. You can keep the ledger on your phone without signing in and move it to a Google Sheet in your Drive later. Moving it keeps the same transactions.

Choose Google Drive when you want to open the ledger on another device or edit it in Google Sheets. Choose the device when you want to start without an account.

Which columns should a broker CSV have before import?

Each imported row should include the trade date, transaction type, ticker or company name, quantity, price, fee, currency, account, and source note. Mark a missing field as unresolved instead of guessing.

Keep cash rows separate from security rows. Deposits, withdrawals, dividends, interest, tax withholding, and fees need their own action types because they change the audit trail in different ways.

How should I resolve security names before calculating positions?

Broker exports often mix ticker, local code, ISIN, company name, and translated names. Pick one display name, keep the original broker text in a note column, and resolve ambiguous rows before they enter totals.

For Korea and Japan, ticker-only rows are hard to review later. Use both code and company name when the broker provides them.

What should I check right after an import?

After importing, compare position quantity, cash balance, realized proceeds, and dividend totals against the broker screen. A mismatch at this stage is easier to fix than a mismatch after months of edits.

Portle shows these comparisons in the app, and lists possible duplicates and missing records for you to review, so you can correct the source rows before relying on the portfolio totals.