Why we built a calorie scanner that does not want your email

Calorie Scanner started from a small frustration: every calorie counter with a decent barcode scanner wanted an account before it would tell you how many calories were in a tin of beans. The scanning was never the hard part. The friction was deliberate.

So this is the version without the pretence. Scanning needs a Google sign-in and, after the first free scan, a subscription — because every scan is a live database lookup or an AI vision call, and those cost money. What you will not find is a "free" app that turns out to mean a seven-day countdown, a scanner with the macros removed, or an advertising business quietly built on your food diary.

Where the numbers come from

Packaged food comes from Open Food Facts, a collaborative database of roughly three million products published under the Open Database Licence. It is the same source a number of commercial apps quietly use. Because it is crowd-sourced, coverage is excellent in Europe, good in North America, and patchier elsewhere — and any given record is only as good as the person who photographed the label. Where a product is missing or a panel is incomplete, we say so on the page rather than inventing a figure.

Meals without a barcode go to an AI vision model, which estimates the portion weight of each item and derives the macros from it. That ordering is deliberate and is explained on the AI calorie scanner page. An estimate from a photograph is an estimate; we label it as one and show you the assumed portion so you can correct it.

What we do not do

• We do not sell your food log. There is no advertising business here to feed.
• We do not make health claims. A calorie figure is not a diagnosis and this site is not a substitute for a dietitian or a doctor.
• We do not pretend an estimate is a measurement. Where a number is uncertain, the page says which direction it is likely to be wrong in.

How it pays for itself

A subscription, and nothing else. $19.99 a month or $59.99 a year — which is $5.00 a month — for unlimited scanning, after one free scan to try it. There are no adverts, no affiliate commissions in the comparison pages, and your food diary is not for sale. The full breakdown is on the pricing page.

Everything written on this site stays free to read without an account: every guide, every comparison, every reference table. The subscription pays for scans, not for words.

Getting in touch

Corrections to a nutrition figure, a product that will not scan, or anything else: support@caloriescanner.io. Product data corrections are usually best made directly at Open Food Facts, since that fixes it for everyone rather than just for us — but send them here if that is easier and we will pass them on.

You can export everything we hold about you, or delete your account outright, from your account page without emailing anybody.