Frequently Asked Questions

UncleMeal is a meal planner for the whole household: for families, couples, roommates and anyone who wants to plan together. You import recipes, plan the week, get a shared shopping list and see how much time and money you save.

Yes. UncleMeal is free during the beta. We're still working out the right pricing model, and your feedback helps shape it. We'll announce any change well in advance, and early beta users will always be recognized for it.

Create an account, set up your household (you can invite others directly in this step), and import your first recipe via URL or photo. The shopping list and planner are ready to use right away.

No. You can use it solo too. It works best, though, when everyone in the household is on board, since the shopping list and planner are shared in real time.

Paste the URL of any recipe page into the import field. UncleMeal reads out the ingredients, quantities, and instructions automatically. You can review and edit everything before saving.

Yes. Photograph a recipe card, a magazine page, or a handwritten note. UncleMeal extracts what it can. The result may need more cleanup than a URL import, but it works for most printed formats.

After importing, you can edit everything: ingredients, quantities, units, instructions. The import gives you a starting point, and the final version always stays under your control.

Yes. Use "Add manually" to enter the recipe details yourself. The helpers for ingredient analysis and step enrichment work for manually created recipes too.

Yes. Recipes in your library are private within your household. UncleMeal never uses your personal recipes for public purposes.

The planner shows a weekly grid: breakfast, lunch, and dinner for each day. You drag recipes from your library into the slots you want. You can plan as many or as few meals as you like.

Yes. You can fill as many or as few slots as you like. The shopping list is built from what's actually planned, not from a mandatory 7-day plan.

Yes. In each recipe slot in the planner, you can set the portion count for that specific plan. Handy if you're cooking for 2 on weekdays and 6 on Sunday.

When you generate a shopping list from the planner, UncleMeal gathers the ingredients of all the week's recipes at the portion count you set. Duplicates across recipes end up in one list. You can also add items manually.

Yes. The shopping list updates in real time for every household member. One person can check off items at the store while another sees the same view at home.

Yes. There's a free-text field you can use to add anything to the list. Common non-recipe items (household basics, toiletries) can be saved so you don't have to retype them every week.

When you mark a list as complete, it's saved as done. You can optionally enter the total amount you spent; UncleMeal uses that to calculate your real savings against your household's budget target.

Owner: full control over the household, including settings, member management, and billing. Manager: can manage recipes, the planner, and shopping; can invite members; can't change billing. Member: can use all planning and shopping features; can't invite others or change household settings. Guest: read-only access; can see the planner and shopping list but not edit them.

Yes. You can belong to multiple households. Switch between them via the household selector in the header. Each household has its own recipe library, planner, and shopping list.

Go to Household Settings → Members → Invite. You can invite by email. The invited person gets a link to join; they can use an existing account or create a new one.

Their account is removed from the household. Recipes they contributed stay in the household library unless separately deleted.

During setup, you tell UncleMeal your household's monthly grocery budget, how often you shop, and how long a shopping trip takes. UncleMeal tracks your actual planning activity week by week and estimates what you've saved compared to your baseline. The Impact view explains the methodology in detail.

No. They're estimates based on your baseline and your planning activity. Once you enter your actual spend after each shopping list, the numbers switch to real values instead of estimates. UncleMeal always shows which mode is in use.

Onboarding walks you through a short setup questionnaire. If you skipped it, you'll see a reminder card on the dashboard. It takes about 90 seconds.

Only members of your household. UncleMeal staff can only access account data for support purposes, and only with your permission. We never sell your data or share it with third parties.

No. Your recipes, plans, and household data are never used to train any AI model.

Data export is on the roadmap. During the beta, you can request a data export by contacting support.

Open My Profile and scroll down to Delete Account. We remove your account and delete your personal data at once. Household data that other members still see stays, without your name, unless the owner deletes the household separately. We delete copies in backups after 30 days.

UncleMeal works in any modern browser on desktop and mobile. Chrome, Firefox, Safari, and Edge are supported. There's currently no native iOS or Android app. Until then, the web app works well in mobile browsers.

Not currently. UncleMeal requires an internet connection. Offline support is being evaluated specifically for the shopping list.

Your data stays as long as your account is active. If you delete your account, we remove your personal data at once. We delete copies in backups after 30 days.