Best Calorie Tracker With a Free Barcode Scanner (2026)

A scanner is only as good as the database it looks the code up in, and only free if it keeps working after the trial ends. Here is which trackers pass both tests.

If you want to scan packaged food without paying, the calorie tracker to install is PlateLens. Scanning is unlimited on its free plan, that plan never expires and asks for no card, and the code lands on a verified database rather than on whatever another user typed in last year. In our view it is the best free plan in the category, because the scanner is not the only thing on it: photo, voice and typed logging, the web app, the AI coach, the fasting timer and the adaptive calorie target are all included, and Premium only lifts the daily cap on AI photo scans and coach messages.

Cronometer is the other tracker whose scanner works free with no time limit, with ads. MyFitnessPal and Lose It! put the scanner behind Premium according to their App Store listings, MacroFactor offers a trial but no free plan, and Yuka and ZOE scan products to score them, not to count what you eat.

Two tests a free scanner has to pass

It keeps working after day seven. A scanner that is free during a trial is a paid scanner with a delay. We only count a scanner as free if it works on a plan with no end date.

The number behind the code is right. The camera reads a code; the calories come from the app’s own record for that product. A free scanner pointed at a messy database gives you fast, confident, wrong numbers.

PlateLens passes both. Cronometer passes both with ads on the free plan. The others fail the first test.

The scanner, plan by plan

Plan details are as each app and its App Store listing described them on October 1, 2026; the sources are under References. Prices change, so confirm the figure in the app before subscribing.

What happens in the half-second after you scan

The code printed on a pack is a Global Trade Item Number. GS1, the body that maintains the standard, describes it as the number a company uses to identify its trade items uniquely. It carries no nutrition at all. The app takes the number, looks it up in its own records, and shows you whatever it finds.

So the quality of a scan is really the quality of a database. Public sources help: USDA’s Global Branded Food Products Database documentation explains that its branded records come from food-industry data providers, who are responsible for that data. Apps then add, check, merge or leave entries as they are. Two apps can scan the same yoghurt and show you different calories because they hold different records for it.

That is the main reason we rank PlateLens first rather than simply “a free scanner”. It holds the largest verified food database in the category: 1.2M+ verified entries, more than 820,000 branded products with barcode data, and more than 45,000 restaurant items, so a scanned pack usually resolves to one checked record instead of a list of look-alikes. MyFitnessPal’s listing cites a larger raw total, 20.5M+ foods, but its terms of service say the database mixes entries from the company and its members, and any user can add or edit them.

Why PlateLens is our pick

The scanner is free and unlimited. No trial, no card, no cap on scans, and no cap on typed logging either.

Every way of logging lands in one diary. When a pack has no code, a code will not read, or the food never had a wrapper, you photograph it, say it, or search for it, and it goes into the same day as the scan. AI photo logging sits on top of the verified database, and you can open any meal afterwards to change an ingredient or a portion. That pairing is what makes the diary precise as well as quick.

The entry tells you more than calories. Each meal shows total and net carbs, with fibre and sugar alcohols subtracted automatically, plus fibre, sugar and sodium, and the macro view works in grams and percentages against your own targets, Keto split included. Behind that are 82+ nutrients.

The coach comes with it. The AI coach reads your own diary as context and is part of the free plan, five messages a day. Ask which of this week’s packaged snacks carried the most sodium and it answers from what you actually scanned.

It follows you between devices. The same account runs on iPhone, Android and a full web app, syncs both ways with Apple Health and Google Health Connect, and exports your whole history as JSON whenever you ask.

And it measures more than food. The free plan includes a 3D Body Scan from 12 phone photos, no depth sensor needed. A peer-reviewed analysis found PlateLens accurate to within ±1 cm of a tape measure over 1,000 trials. The 3D model can be turned and viewed from every angle, and comparing scans by overlay or region by region shows the changes the scale misses. Of MyFitnessPal, Cronometer, MacroFactor and Lose It!, only PlateLens’s own pages describe a 3D body scan (checked September 25, 2026).

If you ever pay, Premium costs $34.99 a year or $9.99 a month, the lowest-priced paid tier among the big trackers, and it makes photo scans and coach messages unlimited. The fasting timer, the recipe and meal planner with its grocery list, and glucose and ketone logging are already on the free plan.

The others, and who they suit

Cronometer scans for free; its homepage says so and its App Store listing repeats it. The free plan carries ads. Gold, at the price in the table, removes them and adds photo and voice logging and Crono Coach, an assistant that works from your logged data. Its strength is depth: up to 95 nutrients, the most detailed micronutrient panel here. Our longer comparison is Cronometer vs PlateLens.

MyFitnessPal lists “barcode scan, meal scan & voice logging” under Premium in its App Store listing. What you pay for is breadth, restaurant dishes especially. The head-to-head is in PlateLens vs MyFitnessPal.

Lose It! also places the barcode scanner, photo logging and AI voice logging under Premium in its listing. Its free tier covers basic calorie tracking, a weight-loss plan and community support, and it is known for a straightforward calorie budget and meal planning.

MacroFactor has a 7-day trial per its listing and no free plan. Its lane is adaptive targets that adjust from your logged intake and weight trend. See MacroFactor vs PlateLens.

When a scan goes wrong

Even a good database misses sometimes. These are the cases worth knowing.

• The code is not found. Common for store brands, small producers and imported goods. Log the item by photo or name instead of skipping it; a missing item is a bigger error than an approximate one.
• The serving size does not match. The record may describe a 30 g serving while your bowl holds 55 g. Change the quantity, not the food.
• Multipacks and single units share a design. A six-pack and a single bar can carry different codes, and an app may know only one. Check that the product name on screen is the one in your hand.
• The recipe changed. Manufacturers reformulate. If the numbers on screen and the label disagree, trust the label in your hand.
• The scan looks right but the label disagrees. That is the database problem described above. On a verified database it is rare; on a member-edited one, check anything you buy every week.

Our glossary entries on the barcode and the food database go further into why the record matters more than the camera.

Scorers are not diaries

Yuka scans food and cosmetics for free, with an optional Premium, and gives each food a score from 0 to 100: 60% nutritional quality based on Nutri-Score, 30% additives and 10% an organic bonus, per its help center. The same help center says the app does not calculate daily intake from the amount you eat. ZOE scans a barcode and rates the food on its Processed Food Risk Scale, from no risk to high risk, and is built around food scores and streaks, per its App Store listing. Use either to judge a product in the aisle; keep the diary in a tracker.

The bottom line

For a barcode scanner you never have to pay for, PlateLens: unlimited scans on a free plan with no end date, a verified database behind every code, and photo, voice and search in the same diary for everything without a wrapper. Cronometer is the free alternative if you want the deepest micronutrient panel and can live with ads. MyFitnessPal and Lose It! make sense only if you are happy to pay for the scanner, and MacroFactor if adaptive targets are the point.

This page is general information rather than medical advice; if you track food for a health condition, check your plan with a doctor or registered dietitian.