Type your list and what you pay at two to four stores. You see the cheapest store for every item, your list split by store with a total for each, and what splitting saves compared with doing the whole shop at one place. Every price is one you typed; nothing is looked up or guessed.
Add your list above, one item per line, then type what you pay at each store.
Keep this list and your prices. Mealfolder brings this list and these prices over, remembers what you pay at each store for next time, marks the cheapest store on every new list, and reads items and prices from a photo of your receipt for you to check.
Keep this list and your prices in Mealfolder (free, no sign-up)For each item the tool takes the lowest price you typed and marks that store. If two stores charge the same, the item goes to the first one in your list and is marked as the same price elsewhere. Your list is then split into one shorter list per store, each with its own total.
The savings figure is an apples-to-apples number. It takes the store where you priced the most items (your likely one-stop shop), adds up what those items cost there, and subtracts what the very same items cost on the split trip. An item you only priced at one store cannot make splitting look better, because it costs the same either way. The "Buy everything at one store" table does the same sum for every store and says how many of your items each total covers.
A second store costs gas and time. A simple test: take the extra miles for the second stop, multiply by what a mile costs you to drive, and add a value for the time. If "Splitting saves" is bigger than that, split. If not, the one-store table tells you which single store is cheapest for what you buy. Splitting tends to pay off when the stores are on a route you already drive, when the list is long, or when a few pricey items (meat, coffee, cleaning supplies) are much cheaper at one place. Many people settle on a pattern: a weekly trip to one store and a stock-up run at another every few weeks.
Put the store brand and the name brand on separate lines ("peanut butter" and "peanut butter, store brand") and price both. The grid shows the gap at every store at once. Staples like flour, sugar, canned tomatoes, frozen vegetables and dairy are where people most often find they cannot tell the difference; you are the judge of that.
The cheapest item is the one you do not buy. Plan the week's dinners first, write the list from the plan, and cross off what is already in the pantry before you price anything. The weekly meal plan generator writes a week of dinners and the combined list, and the cost per serving calculator tells you what each dinner costs.
No. It has no price data and does not look anything up. You type what you paid, from a receipt, the shelf tag or the store's app, and the tool does the comparison. That is why the result matches your stores and your week.
Yes, in this browser only. Come back on the same device and browser and the list and prices are still there. Nothing is sent to Mealfolder unless you press the button to keep the list there, which brings the list and the prices into a free kitchen with no sign-up.
Savings are only counted on items you priced at the store being compared. If you only know the price of an item at one store, it costs the same whichever way you shop, so it is left out instead of padding the number.
Use the unit price (per ounce, per pound or per count) for that item at each store, and say so in the item name, for example "rice, per lb". Comparing a small box at one store with a big bag at another gives a wrong answer.
The grid takes up to four, which covers most people's regular stores. If you shop at more, compare the four you visit most, or run the list twice.
Each store's list has Copy and Print buttons, and "Copy all lists" puts every store's list in one message you can paste into notes or a text. In Mealfolder the list stays on your phone, sorted by store or by aisle, and checks off as you shop.
A week of dinners plus the combined grocery list, scaled to your household.
Daily calories, protein, carbs and fat from your height, weight and activity.
Paste ingredients, change the servings, get tidy kitchen fractions back.
What a recipe costs per serving, from your own receipt prices.
All tools · Printable weekly meal planner · Grocery list template
Mealfolder