I've used Mint the last few years, and thought I would give YNAB a try as well. I've been using it the last few days, and while I'm sure I haven't learned everything, i can't really see any huge differences. I can see why it might be a revolutionary concept for folks that are in debt, or need to get a control of their financial situation. (i.e. the concept of living on last month's income) I certainly don't have perfect spending habits, but since I've already been living on a budget, and saving money, i haven't really gotten that light bulb moment that makes this software so life changing.
With that said- there are a few things that stand out, at least for me:
1) Having to input each expenditure. Obviously, you don't need to do this in Mint, and some folks might find it annoying, but I actually kind of like it so far. It seems like in Mint, there are always credit card transactions that take awhile to clear, or even duplicate entries- in YNAB, since you're in charge of inputting the data, there are no glitches. I've also noticed that having to input each expense has made me a little more cognizant of my spending. I was thinking of grabbing a coffee earlier, but i got discouraged at the thought of actually inputting the expense. Not sure why...
2) Dealing with credit cards. I actually like the YNAB approach to this a bit more than Mint. When using Mint, I always had to keep an excel spreadsheet where I maintained my credit card balances + my expected spending for the rest of the month. For me anyway, I felt like that was the only way I could make sure I wasn't "double counting" my budget items plus my credit card payments. In YNAB this isn't an issue.
3) YNAB's rainy day buckets- Mint's "goals" functionality never really appealed to me, but I'm kind of liking YNABs rainy day budget options. For instance, setting aside 10 bucks a month, to pay for the $120 renter's insurance payment that comes due in December. I had never really done this before, but YNAB makes it really easy. Once again, these types of expenses don't really bother me, but YNAB just gives me an easy way to account for them BEFORE they happen.
4) Mint can be glitchy. I've had issues all day today, and it seems like Mint can be very glitchy, slow to load, duplicate entries, etc.. It seems like these issues have always existed, and I don't have much confidence that they'll go away.
5) YNAB support. Vastly superior to Mint. I did two live training sessions yesterday on YNAB and they were very informative, and I learned alot about the software. Plus the YNAB forum is very helpful.
Anyway- that's my take. I'm sure more experienced YNAB users might have more info. Is it worth the switch and paying for the software? Honestly, i'm not sure yet. For now we're going to finish out the month with YNAB and see if we like it- i can see using YNAB for the granular level transactions, etc.. + using mint as a more macro level look at all of my account balances in one place.