What's Happening to Mealime and Where to Move Your Recipes

Mealime, the recipe and meal-planning app with more than a million Android installs, shuts down on 21 October 2026. All accounts will be deleted, and the app won't export your recipes—but your recipes can be saved. We'll walk you through what happens, which apps accept your data, and the quickest path to moving your collection to a new meal planner.

What Is Mealime?

Mealime is a recipe box and weekly meal planner. You save recipes from the web or the app's built-in library, plan your meals for the week, and generate a grocery list sorted by store aisle. The app has been around since at least the early 2010s and built a loyal base of home cooks who rely on it for weeknight dinners, batch cooking, and pantry organization.

Mealime's strength was its speed: five taps to add a recipe, one tap to add it to next week's plan, and the grocery list auto-populated within seconds. It also integrated shopping lists across household members—useful for families coordinating meals. Many users have hundreds or even thousands of recipes saved.

When Does Mealime Close?

Mealime ceases operations on 21 October 2026. Accounts will be deleted, and users will no longer have access to their saved recipes, grocery lists, or meal plans through the app or web interface. There is no announcement of a grace period or delay.

What Happens to Your Recipes?

Mealime does not offer an export function. When the app shuts down, you lose direct access to your saved recipes—but not the recipes themselves. Here's what you need to know:

• Recipes you added from links remain on the original website or blog. A recipe from AllRecipes.com or a food blogger's site is still there; you just need to find it again.
• Recipes you typed or pasted into Mealime are gone unless you saved them elsewhere.
• Photos you uploaded to Mealime are also lost.
• Your meal plans and grocery lists will disappear. These are working documents and are not recoverable after shutdown.

The urgency is real: if you have hundreds of recipes, re-finding them manually takes hours or days. The good news is that if you acted before the deadline, you can preserve most of your collection in a new app without that work.

The Fastest Path: The Mealime Rescue

If your favorite recipes were from Mealime's built-in recipe library (not ones you added yourself), there's a shortcut. Mealfolder, a newer recipe and meal-planner app, has indexed all 3,291 public Mealime recipes. You can paste a list of your Mealime favorites into Mealfolder's rescue tool, and it finds and saves each recipe with its original photo, ingredients, and notes—no manual copying.

This works only for recipes that were in Mealime's library at the time of indexing. Custom recipes you created or heavily edited in Mealime won't appear in the rescue. But for most users, Mealime's library made up the bulk of their collection, so this tool recovers the biggest piece of your data in minutes rather than hours.

Learn how to use the Mealime rescue here.

Moving Recipes from Other Apps

If you're in Mealime and thinking about switching, you likely use one of these other apps alongside it or are considering them as alternatives. Here's how to bring your recipes from each one:

From Paprika

Paprika exports a file in its native format (.paprikarecipes) or as HTML. Mealfolder imports Paprika files directly—photos, categories, ratings, and notes are preserved. Upload the file and your collection is live in minutes.

From AnyList

AnyList does not export recipes in a standard format that Mealfolder accepts directly. However, AnyList recipes typically live on external sites (like AllRecipes or your blog). You can share the link with Mealfolder's link-save tool and add the recipe one link at a time, or take a screenshot of the recipe and upload it as a photo. For a large collection, this is slower, but for your top 20 or 30 must-haves, it's workable.

From Plan to Eat

Plan to Eat does not offer a direct export. Recipes are often linked to external sources or stored within Plan to Eat's database. You have the same options as AnyList: re-save recipes by link or photo into your new app. If you have recipes stored as plain text notes, you can paste them into Mealfolder.

From Copy Me That

Copy Me That also lacks a public export. Copy the recipe URL from Copy Me That and paste it into your new app's link-save feature, one recipe at a time, or take a screenshot and upload the photo.

From Samsung Food (Whisk)

Samsung Food does not export. Use the same link or photo approach as above.

From Recipe Keeper, BigOven, and Yummly

These apps vary in export options. Check your app's settings for an export or backup feature. If one is available and produces a format (like JSON), Mealfolder may accept it, or you can review the file and bring in your top recipes manually. If no export is available, fall back to the link or photo method.

If your app exports to a JSON format with recipe data, Mealfolder can import a structured JSON list, so ask your current app's support team what formats they provide.

Recipe Rescue Methods: A Comparison

What to Look for in Your Next Meal-Planning App

Before you move, decide what matters most to you. Different apps prioritize different things:

• Recipe discovery: Some apps include a large built-in recipe library (like Mealime had). Others assume you'll bring your own recipes from the web.
• Household sharing: If your family or roommates plan meals together, check whether the app supports multiple users and shared meal plans.
• Grocery list sorting: This varies widely. Some apps sort by aisle (like Mealime and Mealfolder); others by category or type.
• Offline access: Do you need to see your recipes in the store without cellular data? Check the app's offline mode.
• Import flexibility: Can the app accept your existing recipe collection, or will you start from scratch?
• Price: Mealfolder is $12.99 per year for unlimited recipes, or $19.99 for a household plan of up to six people. Other apps vary; check their pricing.
• Export assurance: After Mealime, many users want guarantees they can leave an app without losing data. Some apps promise export-on-demand; others do not.

Take a moment to rank these by importance. A fancy UI matters less than whether the app exports your data or accepts imports from where you came.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can I download my recipes from Mealime before it closes?

No. Mealime does not offer an export or download function. The app will simply stop working on 21 October 2026. If you want to preserve your recipes, you must move them before that date. The Mealime rescue in Mealfolder is your fastest route for recipes from Mealime's built-in library.

What if I have recipes in Mealime that I created myself?

Handwritten or custom recipes in Mealime won't show up in the Mealime rescue because they were never part of Mealime's public library. However, if you remember the source (a blog, a cookbook, a friend's email), you can re-save them by link or photo into your new app. For recipes that are truly unique to Mealime and lost, consider writing them down from memory or reviewing your email history for any messages where you shared them.

Can I import Mealime recipes into every app?

No. Most competing apps do not have a direct Mealime importer. Mealfolder is the only app currently offering a Mealime rescue tool that matches recipes by name. For other apps, you'll need to use their individual import paths: Paprika files if they support it, JSON files if available, or link/photo import as a fallback.

What if I don't move my recipes before 21 October 2026?

Once Mealime closes, your account and recipes are deleted permanently. You will not be able to recover them from the app or retrieve them later. If you've been using Mealime for a long time, act now. The move typically takes 15 minutes to an hour, depending on how many recipes you have and which method you use.

Start free with Mealfolder here and use the Mealime rescue to recover your collection, or import from Paprika if that's where your recipes live.