Comparison

The best iPhone apps for saving TikTok, YouTube, and Instagram recipes

Published October 10, 2026 Last checked October 10, 2026

The short answer: pick by where the recipe lives in the video

If you save mostly from TikTok and Instagram, Pestle and ReciMe list the widest set of social sources on their own App Store pages. If you want a one-time purchase and the creators you follow write the recipe in the caption, Mela is the only app here that says plainly it reads the video description. If what you save usually needs changing before you cook it — halved, made dairy-free, adjusted to what you have — Sous Chef imports TikTok and YouTube links and then edits the recipe and its steps together.

The catch for every app on this page: a cooking video stores its recipe in up to four places — the caption or description, on-screen text, the spoken audio, and a linked blog post. An app that only reads one of them will return a confident-looking recipe with holes in it. Our companion guide, how to turn a TikTok recipe into a written recipe, covers how to fill those holes by hand.

How the apps compare

Every price and capability below comes from the company’s own site or its US App Store listing, checked October 10, 2026. Where a listing doesn’t say how an app reads a video, the table says so rather than guessing.

Pestle: the broadest list of social sources

Pestle’s App Store listing says you can “save recipes from Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, YouTube and more” by tapping Share and saving to your cookbook. Its release notes are candid that this isn’t perfect — earlier versions fixed “some TikTok’s couldn’t be imported” and “some Reels couldn’t be parsed.” Apple Intelligence gives a name to social saves that arrive without one. The listing doesn’t say whether Pestle reads the caption, the audio, or both, so expect to check quantities against the video.

Mela: honest about reading descriptions

Mela’s 2.6 release notes say its importer “now supports extracting recipes from video descriptions on YouTube, TikTok and Instagram,” and recommend briefly verifying what it extracts. That honesty is useful: if the creator typed the full recipe into the description, Mela will likely get it; if they said “two scoops of this” out loud, it can’t. Mela+ is a one-time $6.99 on iPhone and iPad, the cheapest paid unlock on this page.

ReciMe: social-first with a meal planner attached

ReciMe’s listing names five social platforms and pairs import with a meal planner, aisle-sorted grocery lists, and nutrition estimates (premium). Its own site says the free tier allows 5 imports a week. The App Store shows several ReciMe Plus prices between $29.99 and $59.99 without mapping each to a billing period, so check the price in the app before the trial ends. Some App Store reviewers say it pulls recipes from videos without a caption; the developer doesn’t claim that, so we don’t either.

Deglaze and Recipe Keeper: social import inside a fuller organizer

Deglaze names Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, and Pinterest (not YouTube) and wraps them in a library with aisle-sorted grocery lists and a cooking mode. Recipe Keeper’s release notes mention importing from Instagram and TikTok on top of its long-standing website and OCR import. Neither listing explains how the video itself is read. Both make more sense if you want one app for everything you save, with video as one source among several.

Crouton: not a video importer, but good for screenshots

Crouton doesn’t name any social platform. It’s on this list because its AI import works from a photo or plain text — so a screenshot of a recipe card in a video, or a pasted caption, can still get in. That import needs the Discover subscription on top of the free app.

Sous Chef: import the link, then make the recipe usable

Sous Chef imports from a TikTok or YouTube link, a recipe-site link, pasted text, or one or more photos — so a caption you copied or screenshots you took mid-video also work. For a video link (public, up to ten minutes), it reads the caption together with the voiceover, on-screen text, and what’s shown, and labels any amount it had to estimate. It does not yet import a video file you’ve saved to your camera roll; that’s marked “coming soon.” What it adds after import is the part video recipes usually need: say or type “make this for 2,” “I don’t have heavy cream,” or “make it vegetarian,” and the change is applied to the ingredients and the steps that mention them, each marked Edited, with the original kept underneath. There’s no meal planner or grocery list.

Why video recipes import worse than blog recipes

A recipe blog usually publishes structured recipe data that importers can read line by line, which is why importing from a website mostly just works. A short video has no such structure. The recipe might be:

• Typed in the caption — the easiest case; most importers can read it.
• Burned into on-screen text — readable only by apps that look at the frames, or by you with a screenshot and a photo import.
• Spoken — “a good glug of oil, about a cup of stock” — which needs a transcript and still leaves vague amounts.
• Behind a link — “full recipe on my site” — where the best move is to import the creator’s page instead of the video.

That last case is the most common reason a video import comes back thin. If the description says “recipe in bio” or links a blog, import the blog post.

What to check after any video import

Whatever app you use, run these four checks before you cook:

1. Every ingredient has an amount. “Garlic” without a number means the app found a list but not quantities.
2. There’s an oven temperature and pan size if anything goes in the oven.
3. Servings are stated. Without them, scaling is guesswork — see how to scale a recipe.
4. Meat, poultry, and eggs have a doneness check, not just a time. Use a thermometer and the USDA safe minimum internal temperatures — 165°F for poultry, 160°F for ground meat.

When to use something other than a recipe app

If you save a video once a month, you may not need an app at all: copy the caption into Notes, screenshot the on-screen amounts, and you’re done. If your household also needs Android, Recipe Keeper and ReciMe (per their own sites) reach beyond iPhone; Sous Chef doesn’t. And if the creator links a full written recipe, that page beats any video import every time.

For the broader landscape — organizers, meal planners, and which apps sync across devices — see the best recipe organizer apps for iPhone.

Common questions

Can any app reliably import a recipe that’s only spoken in a TikTok?

Of the apps on this page, Sous Chef is the one whose maker states it reads the voiceover: it combines the caption with what’s said, written on screen, and shown, and labels any amount it had to estimate. Mela states it reads video descriptions; the others don’t say how they read videos. Spoken amounts can still be vague (“a good glug”), so check them before you cook.

Which app is cheapest for saving video recipes?

As of October 2026, Mela+ is a one-time $6.99 on iPhone and iPad, and Pestle has a free tier with Pro at $2.99 a month or $24.99 a year. Sous Chef is free to download and try; heavier AI use may need a subscription later.

Does Sous Chef import Instagram Reels?

Sous Chef’s link import covers recipe sites, YouTube, and TikTok links. For a Reel, copy the caption and paste it as text, or screenshot the recipe and import the photos.

Can I upload a cooking video I saved to my camera roll?

Not in Sous Chef yet — importing a saved video file is “coming soon.” We didn’t find camera-roll video import described on the other developers’ listings either; they describe saving from shared links.

Why did my imported TikTok recipe come out with no quantities?

Usually because the caption listed ingredients without amounts, and the amounts were spoken or shown on screen. Check the description for a link to a full recipe first; if there isn’t one, pause the video and add the amounts by hand.

Is it okay to cook a video recipe that has no temperature?

Not for meat, poultry, or eggs without a thermometer check. Use USDA’s safe minimum internal temperatures as the real finish line, and for baked goods, start checking early and use the recipe’s doneness cues.