What is the best meal planning app for one person?
Many planners are built for a household. Cooking for one changes the portions, the leftovers and the arithmetic of a subscription.
The answer turns on money as much as food.
The best meal planning app for one person is the one that fits the job you want done. If you want the planning, the nutrition tracking and the shopping list handled together, WhatsCook.ing writes every recipe for one serving, plans each new week from what is left in your kitchen and reads every meal you cook nutrient by nutrient, at $29.99 a month or $179.99 a year on the US App Store. If you only want to keep and cook your own recipes, Paprika 3 is $4.99 once, with 4.90 stars from 53,706 ratings on the US App Store. If you would rather spend nothing, SuperCook is free with no in-app purchases listed and finds recipes from ingredients you already have, and Samsung Food plans a whole week free, with premium at $6.99 a month.
We make one of those subscription apps, WhatsCook.ing, so read this as a competitor's comparison. Figures come from our comparison page, read on 9 September 2026.
Portions are not a division problem.
Recipe libraries are often written for four, and ingredients do not come in quarters: half an onion, a third of a tin, one thigh from a pack of six. Cooked as written, one recipe is the same dinner three nights running, which is why plans get abandoned in week two. A servings box set to one solves the arithmetic and none of the rest.
Waste costs more per head.
The coriander, the feta, the rest of the tortillas: for one person each is a small deadline, and next week should start from the half tin in the fridge. An app that builds its list from whole recipes, without knowing what is already open in your kitchen, can sell you new deadlines every week.
Nobody else is waiting for dinner.
Cooking for a household has a built-in reason to happen. Cooking for one does not, so the app that survives makes Tuesday's decision small: four dinners you can already make, not forty items on a list.
A subscription meets one grocery bill, not four.
A family can say a planner pays for itself in one avoided takeaway. For one person the same fee sits against one grocery bill instead of four, which is why paying once suits single cooks more than anyone else.
Paprika 3: the safest answer, you stop renting.
$4.99 once, 4.90 stars from 53,706 ratings, the highest in our comparison set. It stores recipes, builds grocery lists, puts them on a calendar and keeps a pantry list you update by hand. It tracks no nutrition, and the planning stays your job.
SuperCook: free, and the right question.
Free, no in-app purchases listed, 4.82 stars from 21,712 ratings. You tick your ingredients and it shows recipes needing only those, the right shape for using up what is open. It answers tonight rather than the week, with no gaps list and no nutrition.
Samsung Food: a free week from a recipe box.
Free, premium $6.99 a month or $59.99 a year, 4.78 stars from 6,333 ratings. It saves recipes from around the web, plans a week from them and turns the week into a shopping list, a good deal at zero. The free plan starts from recipes you liked rather than food you must finish; pantry management and meal plans tailored to your goals are in its paid Samsung Food+.
Mealime: good, and closing 21 October 2026.
It rates 4.81 stars from 53,992 ratings, near the top of this category, but its closing notice says the app will be discontinued as of October 21, 2026, with personal data deleted at shutdown. Members should see what to use instead and how to save recipes first.
Eat This Much: right if targets matter more than your fridge.
4.72 stars from 22,087 ratings, in-app tiers from $8.99 to $84.99. It plans from your calorie and macro targets, your budget and your schedule, and has a virtual pantry for what you already own.
Cooklist: the least typing, one blind spot.
4.73 stars from 11,292 ratings, Pro $5.99 to $9.99 a month, $49.99 or $59.99 a year. It fills a pantry from your grocery loyalty card, the least effort of any pantry here, but a receipt knows what you bought, not what is left, which matters more when you cook for one.
Cronometer and Cal AI are not planners.
Cronometer holds 4.77 stars from 97,718 ratings and Cal AI 4.80 from 361,529, but neither decides dinner nor knows your kitchen, so pair one with a planner.
WhatsCook.ing: one serving, last week's food carried forward.
Recipes are written for one serving, with nutrition computed from the ingredients, so there is no scaling step. The pantry is a running picture: you photograph the shelf, amounts come down as you cook, and next week starts from what is left.
The shopping list leaves out what your pantry covers and leads with the foods that close your nutrient gaps, then what is running low, what your daily routines use up, pantry staples, produce in season near you and recipe essentials for your cuisines. Ingredients a recipe needs that you do not have are marked "To buy" on that recipe. On a week built strictly from the shelf with a whole food group missing, it says so first and writes four days instead of seven, which is intended rather than a fault. Cooking a meal is the whole logging step: the day is scored across four pillars, which moves a BioAge estimate. BioAge is a nutrition-derived estimate with its method shown in the app, not a medical measurement and not a diagnosis.
The price is hardest to defend for this reader.
WhatsCook.ing is $29.99 a month or $179.99 a year on the US App Store, about $15 a month on the annual, the most expensive line on our own comparison table. The case for it rests on what one app does in place of three: a planner written for one serving around your goals, a nutrition tracker that never asks you to keep a food diary, and a shopping list led by your nutrient gaps. If you only need recipes, Paprika at $4.99 once or free Samsung Food is better value.
The other honest limits.
There is no free tier: the first 7 days are a free trial through your Apple Account, and nothing is free after that. It is an iPhone app, with no Android version. It does not order groceries and has no barcode scanner. The questionnaire covers diet, allergies, goals and body metrics, a pantry is required before it will plan, and the first plan takes three to four minutes. It arrived on the App Store on 22 September 2026.
Every figure above, and where it came from.
Prices, star ratings and counts are what Apple showed on the US App Store on 9 September 2026 and again on 21 September 2026. Counts rise daily.
App Store listings, all read 9 September 2026: Paprika Recipe Manager 3, SuperCook, Samsung Food, Mealime, Eat This Much, Cooklist, Cronometer and Cal AI.
Mealime's closing notice, for the 21 October 2026 date and the deletion of personal data, read 14 September 2026.
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.