Comparison

Mealyn vs grumbl.

Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.

Head to head
About

Mealyn

Read full description

Remember the meal. Keep the moment. Mealyn is a private-first food diary built around photos, not spreadsheets. Capture what you eat, save it quickly, and revisit the tastes, places, and small moments that make up your everyday life. CAPTURE A MEAL Take a photo or choose from your library. Keep multiple photos together, add a personal note, and organize meals by date and time. Optional AI-assisted descriptions help put a moment into words. REVISIT YOUR MEMORIES Browse your Moments timeline or zoom through your personal photo wall. As your journal grows, explore preset questions about your saved meals, favorite places, and recorded spending. REMEMBER PLACES AND EXPENSES Keep lists of restaurants you have visited or want to try. Attach a receipt to a meal or enter its cost manually. Save everyday shopping receipts, review recognized details, and make corrections before confirming. SHARE ON YOUR TERMS Your diary is private by default. Choose meals or restaurants to share with friends, enjoy their posts, or create a photo card to save and share elsewhere. There is no public community feed. MADE FOR IPHONE Use Home Screen widgets to revisit a meal or jump into the camera. Control Center and Lock Screen shortcuts make it easier to capture the next moment. FREE AND MEALYN PLUS Mealyn offers a Free plan and optional monthly or yearly Mealyn Plus auto-renewable subscriptions. Plus includes higher allowances for meal recording, AI descriptions, and related food tools. Current benefits, prices, and billing periods are shown before purchase. Payment is charged to your Apple Account. Subscriptions renew automatically unless canceled; manage or cancel them in your iPhone subscription settings. AI features require an internet connection. Generated descriptions and food estimates are informational, not medical or nutritional advice. Privacy Policy: https://api.mealyn.net/privacy/ Terms of Use: https://api.mealyn.net/terms/ Apple Standard EULA: https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/

About

grumbl.

This app helps you remember the meals you've eaten by letting you log them with photos. It automatically detects the date and time and allows you to add notes, making it easy to recall past dining experiences without any judgment or complex forms.

Highlights
  • Photo-based meal logging
  • Automatic date/time detection
  • On-device camera roll import
  • Searchable notes and places
  • Meal rating and grouping
  • Local data storage
Features
Read full description

grumbl. What did I eat? grumbl. is a minimal, photo-first food diary for iOS. It exists to answer one question — the one you ask when someone says "what did we eat for our anniversary?" and your mind goes blank. No calories. No macros. No judgment. No forms. Just the meals you want to remember. LOG IN ONE TAP • Camera or library — your choice • Date and time detected automatically from each photo • Add a note for context ("mom's ramen," "anniversary at Marea") • That's it. No fields to fill out. IMPORT WHAT YOU ALREADY HAVE • You've been taking food photos for years — grumbl. scans your camera roll on-device and surfaces the meals • Review and add months of memories in seconds • Nothing is uploaded; the scan happens entirely on your phone FIND ANY MEAL • Chronological photo grid with sticky day headers • Month calendar with a thumbnail for every day • Search by note text or place • Jump straight to any past date REMEMBER THE DETAILS • Rate meals one to five stars • See where you ate — place names are read from your photos, on-device • Group several photos of one meal together • Share any meal as a clean black-and-white card DESIGNED TO LAST • Pure black-and-white interface — no clutter, no gradients • Futura + Helvetica Neue typography • Photos stored locally and compressed to save space • Your data stays on your device grumbl. is free, supported by a single banner ad. Your meals, notes, and photos are private — they live on your phone and are never sent to us. Privacy Policy: https://joongsukkie.github.io/grumbl/privacy.html Terms of Service: https://joongsukkie.github.io/grumbl/terms.html

Screenshots

Mealyn4 screens
grumbl.4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is ads: Mealyn at none against grumbl.'s shown. grumbl.'s advantage is update cadence (every 2 days vs every 3 weeks) and iOS requirement (17.0 vs 26.0). On price, in-app purchases 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

CostPrice · In-app purchases · Ads · Monetization

Both are free to download. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Mealyn ships an update every 3 weeks, grumbl. every 2 days. The most recent releases landed on October 7, 2026 and October 5, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard3 real differences · 7 level
Mealyn versus grumbl.: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterMealyngrumbl.
PriceFreeFree
Rating—5.0 (3 ratings) — better
Positive reviews—100.0% of reviews
Number of ratings—3 — better
Update frequencyEvery 3 weeksEvery 2 days — better
AdsNo — betterYes
In-app purchasesNoNo
Monetization—Ad-supported
DevicesiPhoneiPhone
Requires iOS26.017.0 — better
Further details — not scored
Size40 MB4 MB
Age rating12+4+
DeveloperGUOHUA DINGAustin Shin

In-app purchases

None

Mealyn

No in-app purchases

None

grumbl.

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is Mealyn free?
Mealyn is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Is grumbl. free?
grumbl. is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Do Mealyn or grumbl. have ads?
grumbl. shows ads; Mealyn does not.
Which is updated more often, Mealyn or grumbl.?
Mealyn ships an update every 3 weeks, and grumbl. every 2 days. Most recently, Mealyn was updated on October 7, 2026 and grumbl. on October 5, 2026.

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