Free Calorie Counter With No Ads, No Account and No Card (2026)

The short answer. Swoodie is free to start with no account, no card and no ads: calorie and macro logging and the 8,000+ recipe library are free, and you get 10 free uses of the AI features. To check any other calorie app in half a minute, look for three things: Google Play’s “Contains ads” label, a trial that wants payment before you can use the app, and an account wall before your first logged meal.

Why “free” calorie counters feel like a trap

I make Swoodie, so read this with that in mind. Before writing it, we went through 23,750 one- and two-star reviews of 44 calorie, diet and recipe apps, in English, German and Polish. The same four complaints come back again and again:

• “There is no free version.” Roughly one English review in ten is about a paywall or a free version that does almost nothing. In German reviews it is closer to one in five.
• A trial that charged the card. About one in ten is about a free trial that needed payment details up front and then renewed.
• Ads and upgrade pop-ups. Around 8% of English reviews, and nearly 15% of Polish ones, complain about ads — often an ad after every food you log.
• An account before anything else. Long questionnaires and a sign-up wall before the first logged meal.

These are keyword-matched counts, so treat them as the size of the problem, not a precise figure.

How to check any calorie app in 30 seconds

1. The ads label. Google Play shows “Contains ads” next to the name of any app that shows advertising. The App Store has no equivalent label, so check the Android listing even if you use an iPhone.
2. What the trial asks for. A free trial that needs a payment method before you see the app is a subscription with a delayed start. Store subscriptions renew automatically, so set a reminder a day before the trial ends.
3. The account wall. Can you log your first meal without typing an email address?
4. What stays free. Typing calories in and searching foods should be free forever. If only a timer or a paywall is left after the trial, it isn’t a free calorie counter.

Which popular calorie apps show ads

Google Play’s own label, read from the US listings on September 14, 2026:

The label answers one question only. No label doesn’t mean an app is free — several apps without ads keep most of their features behind a subscription — and the label covers advertising, not an app’s own upgrade prompts.

What Swoodie’s free plan includes

• No account, no card, no ads — and no ads on any paid plan either.
• Calorie and macro logging: Quick Add to type calories and macros, Food Search across 87,000+ branded foods (strongest on European brands), and Log again to repeat a meal in one tap.
• 8,000+ recipes, diet-style macro targets (keto, low-carb, high-protein), step tracking with trends and streaks, and six offline Kitchen Tools.
• 10 uses of the AI features: photo and barcode scanning, Chef AI and the AI meal planner.

What isn’t free: unlimited AI use — scanning, recipe generation and the AI meal planner — is Premium, at $9.99/month or $59.99/year, free for 7 days on the yearly plan. If you’d rather not subscribe at all, Swoodie Lite is $9.99 once and unlocks the whole app except the AI features.

When another app is the better pick

A dedicated tracker may suit you better if detailed micronutrients or one country’s supermarket barcodes matter most to you. Swoodie’s strength is the rest of the day: deciding what to cook, planning the week, and choosing dinner with someone else. See MyFitnessPal vs Yazio vs Swoodie and Carb Manager vs Cronometer vs Swoodie for the head-to-heads.

Free to start — no account, no card, no ads. Get Swoodie on iOS or Google Play, or get a free personalized calorie plan in three minutes first.