Best cooking apps for iOS in 2023

Cooks these days have a lot on their plate, but thankfully, there are useful iOS apps to get started with meal prep, recipe organization, and more.

For busy cooks who need help with things like making a grocery list and sticking to a healthy diet, there are apps for that. Here are our favorite iOS apps for people who love to cook.

SuperCook Recipe By Ingredient

Most cooks look for a recipe first, then source the ingredients, but for busy cooks with a weeknight dinner to make, they need a quick recipe using ingredients they already have.

The SuperCook app helps you to do just that. To begin, add your ingredients from your pantry and fridge into the app, choosing from more than 2,000 ingredients in categories like meat, vegetables, and fruits.

There is also a voice dictation mode, so you can add ingredients to the app using your voice while looking in your pantry and fridge. When you run out of an ingredient, remove it from your pantry on the app, and the recipes will adjust accordingly.

After the recipe ideas have loaded based on your ingredients, you can filter them by categories like soup, appetizers, salads, entrees, desserts, and more. The SuperCook app contains over 11 million recipes in 20 languages, so you never run out of things to make.

This app is perfect for minimizing food waste as it uses leftover ingredients you already have while saving you money in the long run. With this app, you can finally finish that old container of tahini in the back of the fridge.

You can download SuperCook for free on the App Store.

Pepper: Social Cooking

For social cooks who love talking about food and sharing recipes, Pepper is a quick and easy way to connect with other cooks.

For people who use Pinterest for recipes, this could be a much better app because it's solely focused on recipe sharing, and you don't have to click on a blog post laden with ads.

This app works like familiar social media apps, using your unique profile page where you can build your own digital cookbook and share recipes with the community. You can filter food into categories by ingredient, dietary preference, course, and more.

This app is great for cooking inspiration as you see what others are making, and you can expand your skills as a cook when you try out others' recipes. You can like, save, and leave comments on a post to ask them questions about their recipe.

If you want to cook a dish that you see on a post, you can even shop for the ingredients directly via Instacart. This fun app can be downloaded for free on the App Store.

Food Network Kitchen

An article about cooking apps would not be complete without mentioning the Food Network Kitchen app.

Food Network has been the trusted source of countless recipes for years, so this would be a natural choice for cooks looking for tried-and-true recipes.

The standout feature of this app is its on-demand recipes and cooking videos by pro chefs. You'll have to sign up for a free account to stream these cooking class videos.

With the Food Network Kitchen app, not only can you learn how to cook from the pros, but there are more than 80,000 recipes to choose from. You can also find shortcuts, make-ahead tips, and substitutions for ingredients.

To keep up with modern cooks, Food Network Kitchen also has a meal planning tool built into the app.

Save your favorite recipes and access them on multiple devices. From the recipes that you want to make for the week, you can add the ingredients needed to a shopping list.

You can then take that list with you for your grocery run or add it to a virtual cart to have it delivered via Instacart or AmazonFresh. Get this popular app for free on the App Store.

Big Oven Recipes and Meal Planner

This is a popular recipe collection app where all forms of your recipes can finally be in one happy, organized place on your device.

If you have old cherished recipes on tattered scraps of paper, this app will help you digitize them so you can finally access them easily from your device. The RecipeScan tool can upload and transcribe handwritten recipes with a quick snapshot from your phone.

To help you save digital recipes in an organized way, use the BigOven Clipper tool to clip recipes from websites. You can then organize all of these recipes into folders that you can sort by category.

There are also trending recipes shown when you open the app and follow your favorite food bloggers to get inspiration for what to cook next. To take your organization up another notch, the Meal Planner tool allows you to plan daily, weekly, or even monthly meals.

The Use Up Leftovers tool is great for reducing food waste. Choose up to three ingredients that you're trying to get rid of, and the app will load recipes that you can make. Big Oven is available on iPhone, iPad, and Apple Watch.

Download this for free with a Pro Member option for $2.99 per month or $24.99 per year.

Mealime Meal Plans and Recipes

For busy cooks with specific diets, this meal planning app is perfect for staying on top of their meal prep and health goals.

To begin, select your dietary restrictions on the app. Choose from flexitarian, pescetarian, low-carb, paleo, keto, vegan, gluten-free, dairy-free, and more.

You can then build your meal plan with recipes that sound good to you. A grocery list of all the ingredients you'll need for the week will then auto-generate.

From there, you can use that list to shop in-store or online using Instacart or Thrifty Foods to get it delivered. This is free to download and use, but you can also upgrade to Mealime Meal Planner Pro for $2.99 per month.

Intent Healthy Meal Plan

Intent Healthy Meal Plan is another meal-planning app, but a notable feature is the calendar tool.

The Intent app works much like many other meal-planning apps where you can choose your dietary restrictions and allergies. To further customize to your taste, you can also choose cuisines or ingredients that you are picky about.

The calendar feature allows you to plan out your days easily, and you can compare it to your other calendars to check for days when you won't be cooking. This also allows you to see a pattern of whether you're really getting a variety of healthful meals and what you could improve on.

For adventurous eaters, the Intent app features different recipes from around the world. Each recipe is listed with nutrition information, including macros. You can also sync this with your Apple Health app to get a comprehensive view of your overall health.

Each meal plan will also generate a grocery list with all the needed ingredients, and it's integrated with services like Instacart, Amazon Fresh, and Kroger. Download and use this for free, with options to upgrade to Premium for $19.99 per month or $69.99 per year.