Review Unapproved
review_unapprovedRetrieve unapproved transactions grouped by status: those ready to approve and those needing a category first. Supports summary and compact modes for large budgets.
Instructions
Get all unapproved transactions grouped by status: those already categorized (ready to approve) and those still uncategorized (need category first). Each transaction includes a 'flags' array: manually_entered (not bank-imported), match_broken (matched reference is stale — the matched_transaction_id field is read-only via this API; YNAB web/iOS UI is required to clear that link. The transaction itself remains fully mutable: you CAN approve, recategorize, and edit memo via update_transaction. The broken match persists as a cosmetic flag until the user resolves it in the UI.), scheduled_transaction_realized, new_payee (no transaction history for this payee), no_prior_amount_match (novel amount for this payee), category_drift:was_X (payee categorized differently before). Never approve uncategorized transactions without explicit user instruction. For large budgets the full response can exceed 100KB; pass summary:true for counts + by-payee aggregates only, or compact:true to keep per-transaction rows (with IDs) while dropping bulky fields so the response fits inline.
Input Schema
| Name | Required | Description | Default |
|---|---|---|---|
| compact | No | If true (and summary is not set), keep per-transaction detail but return only the fields needed to act — id, date, payee_name, amount, category_name, account_name, flags — dropping bulky fields (import strings, subtransactions, matched/import ids) that push the full response past the inline size limit. Use when you need transaction IDs to approve or recategorize but the full queue would overflow. | |
| summary | No | If true, omit per-transaction details from the response and return only counts + by-payee aggregates (for both ready_to_approve and needs_category_first). Use this when the full unapproved queue is large; drill into specifics with get_transactions afterwards. | |
| budgetId | No | Budget ID (uses default if not provided) |
Output Schema
| Name | Required | Description | Default |
|---|---|---|---|
| result | Yes | Structured result returned by Review Unapproved. |