· FAQ
The honest Q & A.
If something below doesn't answer your question, get in touch — we'd rather hear about it than have you wondering.
No. Only the host (the person who creates the bill) signs up. Guests open the share link, pick which slot is theirs (the host pre-populates names), and start claiming items. The host's display name is the only personal info a guest sees.
Proportionally. Each diner's tax share is
(their subtotal / total subtotal) × tax amount. So if Alex ordered $80 and Sam ordered $20 of a $100 subtotal, and tax is $10, Alex pays $8 in tax and Sam pays $2. If nobody's claimed anything yet, tax falls back to an even split so you don't divide by zero in the preview.
Because service is provided to the whole table, not to individual orders — your server doesn't work harder because someone ordered the lobster. Splitting tip evenly is the default convention in most places. If you disagree, you can adjust the tip amount before closing.
This is what makes FriendsBill different. Real group dinners have subgroups: three friends share the appetizer platter, two others split a bottle of wine, someone orders their own dessert. Most bill-splitting apps force you to share with everyone or no one — we don't.
In FriendsBill, each item can be claimed by any combination of diners. The nachos can be split between Alex, Sam, and Jordan while the sangria pitcher is just Maria and Chris. The math adjusts automatically: each person pays only for what they actually shared, and their tax is calculated proportionally from their real subtotal.
No workarounds, no manual math, no "just Venmo me the difference later." It works the way your actual dinner works.
In FriendsBill, each item can be claimed by any combination of diners. The nachos can be split between Alex, Sam, and Jordan while the sangria pitcher is just Maria and Chris. The math adjusts automatically: each person pays only for what they actually shared, and their tax is calculated proportionally from their real subtotal.
No workarounds, no manual math, no "just Venmo me the difference later." It works the way your actual dinner works.
Re-open the bill, add or edit, then close it again. When you close, every guest sees a clear banner showing how their total changed — "your total went from $24.50 to $26.10." It's logged in the bill's changelog so there's no doubt about what happened when.
We don't process payments directly, but we make paying effortless. If the host adds their Venmo username, guests see a "Pay with Venmo" button after the bill is closed. One tap opens the Venmo app with the exact amount pre-filled and the restaurant name in the description — ready to send.
No Venmo? Guests can choose alternatives like Zelle, cash, or check — it's up to the host which methods they accept. The host tracks who's paid on their dashboard regardless of payment method.
No Venmo? Guests can choose alternatives like Zelle, cash, or check — it's up to the host which methods they accept. The host tracks who's paid on their dashboard regardless of payment method.
In practice, no — the link only goes to your group chat, and slot names are just labels. It's the same trust model as splitting verbally at the table. If something's wrong, the host can unclaim and re-claim on anyone's behalf before closing.
Each bill gets a unique 22-character URL-safe token derived from 16 random bytes — that's ~10²⁴ of keyspace, so guessing one isn't viable. The public surface is also rate-limited per IP.
Hosts can use the web app at app.friendsbill.com or the native iOS and Android apps — it's the same account and the same bills on all of them. Guests never install anything: they open your share link in whatever browser they already have.
Whichever way you prefer. Create your account and sign in with a passkey (Face ID, a fingerprint, or your device PIN — nothing to remember), with your Google, Apple, or Microsoft account, or with a plain email and password. Passkeys and social sign-in work on both the web app and the mobile apps. Guests, as always, sign in with nothing at all.