The best meal planning apps in 2026.
We make WhatsCook.ing, one of the apps below, so read this as you would any comparison written by a competitor. The apps that beat us are here, the places they beat us are named, and our own limits are near the bottom.
Each app is best at a different job.
No single app is best, because each starts from a different place. Paprika is best for keeping your own recipes, SuperCook for a free dinner from what you have, Cronometer for precise nutrient numbers, Cal AI for logging what you already ate from a photo, Eat This Much for plans built to macro targets, Cooklist for a pantry filled from your loyalty card, Samsung Food for a free planner (its paid Samsung Food+ adds goal-based plans, pantry management and nutrition tracking), and WhatsCook.ing, the app we make, for a week planned from your goals and your kitchen, with every meal read nutrient by nutrient.
One question decides most of it: what does the plan start from?
Every app here answers the same question, what am I eating this week, and differs in where it begins: a recipe library, your macro targets, a grocery loyalty card, a photograph of your shelf. Where it starts decides the shopping list and how much food you waste. What you pay and what happens after you cook settle the rest, because many planners stop at the plan.
Ten apps, side by side.
The table scrolls sideways on a phone.
| App | What the plan starts from | Price | Rating (ratings) | Platform | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mealime | Its own recipe library, filtered by your diet and taste | Free download. Pro listed at $2.99 a month, now being wound down | 4.81 (53,992) | iPhone, iPad | A simple weekly plan, until it closes on 21 October 2026 |
| Eat This Much | Your calorie and macro targets, budget and schedule | Free download. In-app tiers from $8.99 to $84.99 | 4.72 (22,087) | iPhone, iPad | Hitting macro targets without deciding anything yourself |
| Samsung Food | Recipes you save from around the web | Free. Premium $6.99 a month or $59.99 a year | 4.78 (6,333) | iPhone, iPad, web | A free planner with a recipe box attached |
| SuperCook | Ingredients you tick from its list | Free. Apple lists no in-app purchases | 4.82 (21,712) | iPhone, iPad, web | Tonight's dinner from what is in the cupboard |
| Cooklist | Your grocery loyalty card purchases | Free download. Pro $5.99 to $9.99 a month, $49.99 or $59.99 a year | 4.73 (11,292) | iPhone, iPad | A pantry that fills itself from your receipts |
| Paprika 3 | The recipes you save yourself, placed on a calendar by hand | $4.99 once, no subscription | 4.90 (53,706) | iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch | Owning and cooking your own recipe collection |
| ZOE | Nothing is planned. It scores the meals you log | Free download. In-app purchases listed at $15.99 and $99.99 | 4.77 (6,965) | iPhone, iPad | Eating guided by its own biology tests |
| Cronometer | Nothing is planned. You log food against a nutrient database | Free download. Gold $10.99 a month or $59.99 a year | 4.77 (97,718) | iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch | Precise nutrient numbers |
| Cal AI | Nothing is planned. A photo of the meal you already ate | Free download. In-app purchases $0.99 to $29.99 | 4.80 (361,529) | iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch | Logging what you ate from a photo |
| WhatsCook.ing | Your goals and tastes, plus a photograph of what is already in your kitchen | $29.99 a month or $179.99 a year. 7-day free trial through your Apple Account | Released 22 September 2026, not yet rated on the US App Store | iPhone | A week planned from your goals and your kitchen, tracked nutrient by nutrient |
Source: App Store, US storefront, 9 September 2026. Every source is listed again under Sources.
Two cautions. Prices are every tier Apple lists on a page, not necessarily the one you will be offered, and ratings move daily. Platform is what Apple's listing and each app's own site show, so some may have Android apps we did not check.
Left out on purpose: MyFitnessPal (4.7 from 2,356,014 ratings) and Noom (4.7 from 872,000) are built first as food and weight trackers, with meal plans in their paid tiers, and Yuka (4.8 from 99,000) scores packaged products by barcode. All three are good at their own job.
If you want this, pick that.
If you want to keep and cook your own recipes, pick Paprika.
One payment of $4.99 and the highest rating in this set, 4.90 from 53,706 ratings. Its pantry is a list you keep by hand, the planning stays yours, and it does not score what you eat.
If you want tonight's dinner from what is in the cupboard, for free, pick SuperCook.
Its own sentence is the clearest in the category: "SuperCook only shows you recipes that require the ingredients you already have." You tick ingredients by hand, and it is free with no in-app purchases listed. No week, no list of gaps, no nutrition.
If you want precise nutrient numbers, pick Cronometer.
Designed for accuracy, 4.77 stars from 97,718 ratings, Gold at $10.99 a month or $59.99 a year. It will not tell you what to cook, and it expects you to log.
If you want a planner that costs nothing, pick Samsung Food, or Mealime until 21 October.
Samsung Food's core genuinely is free, and its paid Samsung Food+, at $6.99 a month, adds meal plans tailored to your health goals. Mealime is free too and better rated, 4.81 from 53,992 ratings, but it is being discontinued on 21 October 2026.
If you want the plan built to macro targets, pick Eat This Much.
Give it goals, foods you like, a budget and a schedule and it builds a plan against your targets: 4.72 stars from 22,087 ratings, tiers from $8.99. Its virtual pantry also looks at what you own.
If you would rather your pantry filled itself, pick Cooklist.
It "connects to your grocery store loyalty cards and automatically downloads all of your food purchases into a digital pantry," at 4.73 stars from 11,292 ratings. The trade is the input: a receipt knows what you bought, not what is left three days later.
If you mostly want to log what you already ate, pick Cal AI or Cronometer.
Cal AI photographs the plate and returns a breakdown, 4.80 stars from 361,529 ratings. Cronometer is the careful one. Neither decides dinner or knows what is in your kitchen.
If you want the week planned from your own kitchen and tracked nutrient by nutrient, pick WhatsCook.ing.
It plans the week from your goals, your tastes and what is in your kitchen, reads every meal you cook nutrient by nutrient into four pillars and a BioAge estimate, and leads its shopping list with the foods that close your nutrient gaps. It is also the most expensive app here, and iPhone only.
You and your pantry first, a list led by your nutrient gaps, and a number that moves.
WhatsCook.ing starts from you and your shelf: your goals, diet and tastes from the questionnaire, and a photograph of the cupboard or the fridge, read into items and quantities. It writes the week around both, and ingredients a recipe needs that you do not have are marked "To buy" on that recipe. Ask for a pantry-only week with a whole food group missing and it writes four days instead of seven, and says so first. The shopping list leaves out what your pantry covers and leads with the foods that close your nutrient gaps. Marking a meal cooked scores the day across four pillars, calorie fit, protein adequacy, micronutrient coverage and heart health, and moves a BioAge estimate: nutrition-derived, with its method shown in the app, not a medical measurement and not a diagnosis. When the week ends, it stays on screen and one button plans the next from the pantry as it is now.
Four honest strikes against us.
- Price. $29.99 a month or $179.99 a year on the US App Store is the most expensive line in the table. Mealime is $2.99 a month, Samsung Food is free, Paprika is $4.99 once. If the deciding and the waste cost you nothing, the others are better value.
- iPhone only. There is no Android app, and no plans we can promise you here.
- No free tier. The first 7 days are a free trial through your Apple Account, and after that nothing is free. Samsung Food and SuperCook, above, cost nothing at their core today.
- New. It arrived on the App Store on 22 September 2026, so there are no ratings yet on the US App Store to weigh against Paprika's 53,706 or Cal AI's 361,529.
Mealime closes on 21 October 2026.
Mealime's own closing page says the app "will be discontinued as of October 21, 2026", that Pro subscribers will not be charged again before then, and that all personal data will be deleted at shutdown. Its recipes continue free inside Albertsons Companies store apps, in a section called Meals Hub.
If you are one of its members, the Mealime alternative page covers the closing notice, what Mealime did well and where this app is not a like-for-like replacement. Yummly, which went offline at the end of 2024, has a page on what to use now that Yummly is gone.
Source: mealime.com/closing, fetched 9 September 2026 and checked again 21 September 2026.
The longer answers, one question each.
Is there an app that makes a meal plan from what is in my fridge? How do I plan a week of meals without going to the store? What is the best meal planning app for one person? Which meal planning apps track nutrition, not just recipes? What should I use now that Mealime is shutting down? The Mealime alternative. What to use now that Yummly is gone. Twenty-five questions, answered plainly.
Every number above, and where it came from.
Prices, star ratings and rating counts are what Apple showed on the US App Store on 9 September 2026. Every listing below was opened again on 21 September 2026 and still resolves. Counts rise daily, so read them as a snapshot.
- Mealime Meal Plans and Recipes on the App Store
- Eat This Much, Meal Planner on the App Store
- Samsung Food, Meal Planner on the App Store
- SuperCook, Recipe By Ingredient on the App Store
- Cooklist, Pantry Meals Recipes on the App Store
- Paprika Recipe Manager 3 on the App Store
- ZOE Health, AI Meal Tracker on the App Store
- Cronometer, Calorie Counter on the App Store
- Cal AI, Calorie Tracker on the App Store
- MyFitnessPal, Noom and Yuka on the App Store, for the three apps left out on purpose
- Mealime's closing notice at mealime.com/closing, for the 21 October 2026 closing date, the subscription wind-down and the statement that personal data is deleted
On the App Store now.
Your week of meals planned from your goals, your tastes and your kitchen, every meal read nutrient by nutrient, and a shopping list led by your nutrient gaps.
Download on the App Store7-day free trial through your Apple Account, then $29.99 a month or $179.99 a year on the US App Store; other App Store countries show local prices. iPhone only.