Pantry Inventory vs Kitchen Sprout
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Pantry Inventory
Track your food inventory across your fridge, freezer, and pantry. Quickly add items by scanning barcodes or importing receipts, and receive timely reminders before food expires to help reduce waste.
- Barcode scanning for quick item addition
- Receipt import for bulk entry
- Expiry date reminders
- Food waste reduction insights
- Household inventory sharing
- Siri integration for voice commands
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Know what’s in your fridge, freezer and pantry, and eat it before it expires. FridgeBuddy keeps a food inventory for your home. Scan a barcode to add an item, get a reminder before it expires, and see what needs eating first. ADD FOOD QUICKLY • Scan a barcode. Product details come from the Open Food Facts database when the product is listed there. • Import a grocery receipt from a photo or a PDF, then check the products before saving them. • Pick fruits and vegetables from a list and get a suggested date based on USDA FoodKeeper storage times. Suggestions are indicative, and you can change any date or keeping time. • On iOS 27, with a device that supports Apple Intelligence, photograph a fridge or pantry shelf to add several items at once. • With Pro, the camera also reads the printed expiration date. KNOW WHAT TO EAT FIRST • Reminders before food expires: choose how many days ahead, and at what time, for each storage location. • Lists that show what expires soon, what has expired and what is open. • Mark an item as opened and FridgeBuddy can bring its date forward. • Add a note to any item. • Search and filter your whole inventory. SHARE WITH YOUR HOUSEHOLD • Share your inventory and shopping list through iCloud, so everyone sees the same food. • Add items to the shopping list from your inventory, then move checked items into your inventory in one step. ASK SIRI • Ask what’s expiring, add an item, mark it as consumed or thrown away, and add to or check off your shopping list. MORE • Meal ideas from what you have, on devices with Apple Intelligence. • Insights: what you eat compared with what you throw away. • Home Screen and Lock Screen widgets. • Nutri-Score and Green-Score for scanned products. • Export your data to CSV. FREE AND PRO FridgeBuddy is free to download. Barcode scanning, reminders, receipts, fruits and vegetables, Siri, widgets and insights are included. Pro adds unlimited storage locations, expiration date reading with the camera, household invitations and more than one shopping list. Pro is available as a subscription or a one-time purchase. Payment is charged to your Apple Account when you confirm the purchase. Subscriptions renew automatically unless cancelled at least 24 hours before the end of the current period. Manage or cancel them in your Apple Account settings. Terms of use: https://cafournier.com/fridgebuddy/terms Privacy policy: https://cafournier.com/fridgebuddy/privacypolicy
Kitchen Sprout
This AI-powered app helps you manage your pantry and fridge, reducing food waste by organizing ingredients and suggesting recipes based on what you have. It can scan receipts, track expiration dates, and generate shopping lists.
- AI-powered pantry and fridge organization
- Scan grocery receipts to add items
- Manual ingredient entry with details
- Sort ingredients by freshness and expiration
- AI-suggested storage and shelf life
- Recipe generation from existing ingredients
- Smart shopping list management
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Kitchen Sprout is an AI-powered pantry and fridge companion that helps you organize ingredients, reduce food waste, and turn what you already have into meals you can actually make. With Kitchen Sprout, you can: Scan grocery receipts to quickly add items to your freezer, fridge, and pantry Add and edit ingredients manually with quantity, category, perishability, and expiration details Sort ingredients by freshness, perishability, and expiration date Use AI to suggest categories, storage guidance, and shelf life Generate recipes based on the ingredients you already have Identify missing recipe ingredients and add them to your shopping list in one tap Manage your shopping list and avoid buying items you already have at home Whether you are meal planning for the week, trying to waste less food, or simply figuring out what to cook tonight, Kitchen Sprout helps you stay organized and make better use of every ingredient. Spend less time guessing, waste less food, and cook more with what you already have. Terms of Use (EULA): https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is ads: Pantry Inventory at none against Kitchen Sprout's shown. Pantry Inventory also leads on ratings volume (213 vs 1) and chart position (#166 vs unranked). Kitchen Sprout's advantage is update cadence (daily vs every 2 weeks) and rating (5.0 vs 4.6). On price, in-app purchases, monetization model and device support there is nothing between them.
Scored on Price · Rating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings · Update frequency · Ads · In-app purchases · Monetization · Best chart rank · Devices · Requires iOS
Both are free to download. Pantry Inventory sells 10 in-app purchases, starting at $1.99 per month and Kitchen Sprout sells 1 in-app purchase, starting at $2.99 per month. Whichever you choose, the download price is not the number that matters.
Kitchen Sprout holds the better App Store score, 5.0 against 4.6. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Pantry Inventory has 213 ratings behind it against 1, so its average is the more settled of the two.
Pantry Inventory ships an update every 2 weeks, Kitchen Sprout daily. The most recent releases landed on November 11, 2026 and October 31, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Pantry Inventory | Kitchen Sprout |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 4.6 (213 ratings) | 5.0 (1 ratings) — better |
| Positive reviews | 56.5% of reviews | — |
| Number of ratings | 213 — better | 1 |
| Update frequency | Every 2 weeks | Daily — better |
| Ads | No — better | Yes |
| In-app purchases | Yes | Yes |
| Monetization | Free with in-app purchases | Free with in-app purchases |
| Best chart rank | #166 — better | — |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad | iPhone, iPad, iPod — better |
| Requires iOS | 26.0 | 13.0 — better |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 42 MB | 29 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Charles-Adrien Fournier | Hongfei Xie |
Customer experience
Pantry Inventory
Kitchen Sprout
Bugs and requests
Pantry Inventory
Reported bugs
19 issues- App consistently shuts down/crashes, especially when marking items consumed
- Data loss after updates or sync issues
- Syncing issues between users, especially for family sharing
- Barcode scanning falsely detecting or failing to scan
- Canadian date format not recognized
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- Rounding of expiry dates to the nearest month
- Notifications not working
- Bug when sharing lists in premium version (app crashes)
- Consumed one functioning as consumed all
- Inability to undo consumed items or view consumed list
- Sharing is defective
- Syncing only happens on demand or is delayed
- Family sharing of premium features is inconsistent
- Inability to cancel subscriptions on app, website, or Apple Store
- Scan function does not work at all for some users
- Items are automatically removed from a list even if still usable
- Last iOS update caused all data to be lost
- Issues with importing data into Numbers/Excel
- Cannot add photos from camera roll or edit items to add photos
Requested features
18 requests- Ability to track quantity of items (e.g., grams, ml, pieces)
- Option to sort items by category (dairy, condiments, etc.)
- Auto-add items to grocery lists
- Smart grocery lists based on expiry dates
- Feature to indicate if a package has been opened
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- Track if a product needs to be consumed within X days of opening
- Recipe suggestions based on available ingredients
- Ability to keep deleted items in a library for easy re-adding
- Option to default sort lists by expiration date
- Add notes to items
- Ability to duplicate items
- Apple Watch app
- Ability to export lists
- Add custom categories
- Search bar for items
- Option to add photos from camera roll
- Track consumption by weight and volume
- More relevant notifications
Kitchen Sprout
Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.
In-app purchases
Pantry Inventory
- Fridge Buddy Pro Monthly$1.991 Month
- Fridge Buddy Pro Monthly3 Days trial$1.991 Month
- Fridge Buddy Pro Monthly$2.991 Month
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- Fridge Buddy Pro Weekly3 Days trial$2.997 Days
- Fridge Buddy Pro Monthly$3.991 Month
- Annual Fridge Buddy Pro7 Days trial$17.991 Year
- Fridge Buddy Pro Yearly7 Days trial$29.991 Year
- Fridge Buddy Pro Yearly$29.991 Year
- Fridge Buddy Pro Yearly7 Days trial$34.991 Year
- FridgeBuddy Pro Lifetime$69.99
Kitchen Sprout
- Kitchen Sprout Premium Monthly$2.991 Month
Questions
Is Pantry Inventory free?
Is Kitchen Sprout free?
Which has better reviews, Pantry Inventory or Kitchen Sprout?
Do Pantry Inventory or Kitchen Sprout have ads?
Which is updated more often, Pantry Inventory or Kitchen Sprout?
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