Mealie

Active

Country: United States (US)
Founded: 2020
Developer: mealie-recipes (open-source project)
Pricing: Free (open-source)
Open source: Yes
Platforms: Web, Linux, macOS, Windows, Docker

Indexes

Recipe Managers

Overview

Mealie is a self-hosted recipe manager and meal planner with a REST API backend and Vue-based reactive frontend. It enables users to import recipes from URLs via a scraper, create recipes manually or with AI assistance from images/videos, manage meal plans in a calendar view, and generate shopping lists. Designed for families or households sharing a recipe database while supporting separate meal plans and lists per group, it stands out with its API for third-party integrations and advanced features like fuzzy search with Postgres.¹²⁵

Key Features

Recipe Scraper - Imports recipes from hundreds of websites by providing a URL.
Manual Recipe Editor - Creates and edits recipes using an integrated UI with markdown support.
AI Recipe Import - Uses OCR on images or transcribes video URLs to generate recipes.
Meal Planner - Calendar view for planning meals over a week with random recipe selection.
Shopping Lists - Generates lists from meal plans, manageable per household.
Smart Search - Supports quoted literals, keywords, and fuzzy search with Postgres.
Multi-Group Support - Shares recipe pool while separating meal plans and lists by household.
REST API - Enables interactions from third-party applications.

Pricing

Plan	Price	Includes
Community	Free	Full self-hosted access to all features via Docker or source.

Platforms & Requirements

Mealie runs as a web application self-hosted via Docker on Linux, macOS, or Windows servers; no native desktop app. Requires Docker and optionally Postgres for advanced search; companion iOS app MealieSwift connects to the server but is separate. No Android native app mentioned.

Integrations & Ecosystem

REST API for third-party apps
Recipe import from website URLs
Image upload with OCR/AI parsing
Video URL transcription (e.g., YouTube)
HTML/JSON paste import
MealieSwift iOS client
Shopping list export/sync potential via API

Alternatives

App	Difference
RecipeSage	Similar self-hosted recipe manager but lacks built-in AI imports and meal planning calendar.
Tandoor Recipes	Self-hosted with strong multi-user support but no video transcription or fuzzy search.
Grocy	Focuses on inventory and pantry management alongside recipes, less specialized in scraping.
Nextcloud Recipes	Integrates into Nextcloud ecosystem, requires full Nextcloud setup unlike standalone Mealie.

Reputation

Mealie is praised for its intuitive interface, powerful recipe scraping, and family-sharing features in self-hosting communities. Users appreciate the API and AI enhancements but note setup requires Docker knowledge and occasional bugs in imports. Active development continues with recent iOS companion app support.¹⁵⁷

Sources (9)