Recipe App Free: What Each Free Tier Really Covers

For a recipe app free of caps and paywalls, RecipeSage is the closest: no recipe cap, no ads, on the web, iPhone and Android. Samsung Food's core app is free, Copy Me That is free to 40 recipes, and ReciMe is free for five imports a week.

So "free" tells you very little until you ask what is capped. This page answers a narrower question than a ranking: you have a particular device and you want a free recipe app that works on it, so what will it stop you doing? The answer is a limits table, then a short read on each app.

If you want the apps sorted by the job they do instead of by price, see recipe app: pick one for saving, finding or cooking. If your own recipe collection is the main thing, recipe keeper app free compares the keepers in more depth. If you want free apps filtered by nutrition data and diet tags, that is healthy food recipe apps free.

How did we check which recipe apps are really free?

I read each app's own site, help pages and store listings in October 2026. For every app I asked what a free account can do, what it cannot, and which devices it runs on. I count a limit whenever the vendor prints one. Where the only source for a limit is a user review, I say it is reported rather than confirmed. Prices appear only when the vendor states them, with the month.

What does each free recipe app limit? (table)

Is there a truly free recipe app?

RecipeSage is the closest. Its maker states that it is free, open source and ad-free and that he never wants to charge for it. It runs in a browser, installs from there to your home screen, has iOS and Android apps, and has desktop apps for Windows, macOS and Linux. You can import from a web link, a photo, a PDF or a document, and it works offline. (RecipeSage, About)

The fair caveats: it is a one-person hobby project, so help comes through Discord and GitHub, and the look is plainer than a funded app. If you need a recipe app that costs nothing and has no ceiling, start here.

What is the best free recipe app for Android?

Most apps in the table have an Android app. Samsung Food, Copy Me That, ReciMe, RecipeSage, Recipe Keeper and SuperCook all list one. The question is what the free tier leaves out on Android.

Samsung Food is the broadest free option. It is "available on Android, iOS, Galaxy and web" per its own app page, and the core app is free. Basic users get 3 free recipe scans from images, and the premium Food+ plan removes that limit. Food+ costs $6.99 a month or $59.99 a year as of October 2026, with a 7 day trial. (Samsung Food app, Food+ help page)

Copy Me That is the good pick on Android if you have a medium collection: free up to 40 recipes, with the Play listing noting you can export your recipes at any time. Well Stockd has no Android store app, but it runs in the Android browser and installs to the home screen.

What is the best free recipe app for iPad?

A tablet on the counter wants big text and a screen that stays awake. Paprika, Recipe Keeper, Samsung Food and SuperCook all list iPad support, and Copy Me That's listing says the screen won't sleep while you follow a recipe. Of those, only Samsung Food, SuperCook and Copy Me That are free in any useful sense, since Paprika is paid and Recipe Keeper has the reported cap.

Samsung Food is listed as free on iPhone, iPad and the web, with over 240,000 public recipes, search by ingredient and filters including 14 diets, per its App Store listing. SuperCook is free and finds recipes from the ingredients you enter, which makes it useful on an iPad on the counter, though it does not keep your own recipe collection. Well Stockd's cook mode is built for a tablet on the counter. (Samsung Food on the App Store, SuperCook)

What is the best free recipe app for iPhone?

For finding recipes: Samsung Food. For cooking from what you have: SuperCook is free and Well Stockd has a free plan. For saving your own recipes: RecipeSage has no cap, Copy Me That stops at 40, and ReciMe lets you add five a week for free.

If you save recipes from social media, the weekly limit on ReciMe is the part to watch. A free account allows 5 imports every 7 days, counted from the date you created it, and every successful import from social, a website, an image or pasted text counts. An import only counts if you actually save the recipe. (How the 5 free imports work)

What is the best free cooking app?

A cooking app answers a different question from a recipe box. It tells you what to make from the food you have, or it walks you through a recipe.

SuperCook is the simplest free answer for the first part. You tell it which ingredients you have and it lists recipes that need only those. Samsung Food has a "Use It Up" search that works from your food list, but that is part of the paid Food+ plan.

Well Stockd's free plan covers the whole kitchen loop: an inventory with estimated best-by dates, a catalog of about 3,950 recipes that each say whether you can make them now, a shopping list, and a large-type cook mode with timers and a screen that stays awake. The meal planner and shared household kitchen are on the paid plan, as is hands-free voice cooking. Free accounts also get a limited number of voice fills for stocking the fridge by talking.

Which recipe app free tier ends first?

Think about how you will use it, and the cap that matters changes.

If you save a recipe or two every few days, ReciMe's 5 imports a week will not bother you for a long time. If you are moving a big collection in one go, it will stop you on day one. If your collection is a few dozen recipes, Copy Me That's 40 is enough, and the paid plan after that is $1.00 a month per its site. If you scan paper recipes a lot, check Recipe Keeper's free cap in the app before you scan, because reviewers report 20.

Samsung Food's free limits show up in specific features: the three free image scans and the pantry features. If you never scan a cookbook, you may not hit any of them.

What happens when you outgrow a free recipe app?

A free tier is only free if you can leave it. Check the exit before you load a few hundred recipes.

RecipeSage says you can export everything or self-host it, and its site lists bulk imports from Paprika, Mela and other apps, so it is easy to arrive at and leave. Copy Me That's App Store listing says your recipes belong to you and you can export them at any time. Recipe Keeper lists a transfer feature for recipes from Paprika, BigOven, MasterCook and other apps, but the pages I read do not describe a bulk export out. ReciMe makes export and print a paid feature, and its help page describes them from each recipe's Share menu with no bulk option, so that is the one to read twice if you save a lot. Well Stockd reads Paprika and Recipe Keeper export files and has no bulk export of its own today. (RecipeSage, Copy Me That on the App Store, Recipe Keeper on the App Store, ReciMe free version, ReciMe export help)

A cheap safeguard works in any app. Keep the original link or photo of each recipe in a folder of your own, so a cap or a shutdown, like Yummly's, never costs you the recipe itself. For a method that does not depend on any app, see how to organize recipes.

Well Stockd: where it wins and where it doesn't

Where it wins: a free plan that includes the inventory, the recipe matching, the shopping list and cook mode, plus unlimited recipes of your own and two custom recipe lists. Your own recipes can come in by typing, a public recipe link, pasted text, a photo read with AI, or a Paprika or Recipe Keeper export file. You review everything before it saves. Recipes are matched against what is in your fridge.

Where it doesn't: no store app on Android or iPad, only the web app. No bulk export of your recipes today. It is not a social recipe network, and the catalog is mostly dinners for two. Hands-free voice cooking, the weekly planner and household sync need the paid plan. For anyone whose main need is a huge library of public recipes with ratings, Samsung Food is the free choice with more to browse.

See the feature list for what is in the app today, the guide to cooking with what you have, and the best app to track food expiration dates if you want expiry reminders.

How do you pick a free recipe app?

Try it free: add three foods from your fridge and see what you can cook.

FAQ

What recipe apps are free?

RecipeSage, SuperCook and the core of Samsung Food are free. Copy Me That is free up to 40 recipes, ReciMe is free for five imports a week, and Recipe Keeper is free to download with a paid Pro upgrade. Well Stockd has a free plan with unlimited recipes of your own.

What is the best free recipe app for iPhone, iPad or Android?

Samsung Food is the broadest free app across all three. RecipeSage is the one with no stated cap. For cooking from what you have, SuperCook is free on all three, and Well Stockd works on any of them as a web app.

Is Samsung Food really free?

The core app is free. Premium features, including pantry management, unlimited image scans and a full week of personalized meal plan suggestions, need Samsung Food+, which is $6.99 a month or $59.99 a year as of October 2026.

Why did Yummly disappear?

Its service was taken offline in December 2024, and yummly.com redirects to KitchenAid. Yummly alternatives lists free replacements.