Terms of Use
Effective October 9, 2026
These terms apply to your use of the Mealpenny website and web app. By using Mealpenny you agree to them.
1. What Mealpenny does
Mealpenny plans a week of dinners around the budget, household and preferences you enter, creates a grocery list, and shows estimated costs. Recipes, plans and prices are general information for personal, non-commercial use.
2. Accounts
You can use the planner without an account. An account uses your email address and one-time sign-in codes. Keep access to your email secure; anyone who can read it can sign in. You can delete your account at any time in Settings.
3. Price
Mealpenny on the web is free during early access. We plan to offer Mealpenny Plus, a paid tier with extras, later. We'll tell you before anything you use becomes paid, and nothing will be charged without you choosing to subscribe.
4. Prices are estimates
Costs in Mealpenny are estimates, not quotes. They are based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics average price data for your Census region, plus documented estimates for items it does not track. Your store, brands, sales, package sizes and sales tax will change what you actually pay. Mealpenny does not guarantee that any plan will cost a particular amount or stay within your budget. Nothing in Mealpenny is financial advice.
5. Not medical, nutrition or dietary advice
Options such as vegetarian, gluten-free or dairy-free are food preferences used to filter recipes. They are not medical, nutrition or dietary advice. Talk to a qualified health professional about your diet.
6. Allergies: always check labels
Mealpenny can skip recipes that contain foods you choose to skip, based on its own ingredient list for the major food allergens. Ingredients, recipes and manufacturing vary by brand and can change, and products may contain or come into contact with allergens that are not listed. Always read product labels and check every ingredient yourself. Do not rely on Mealpenny to keep an allergy-safe kitchen.
7. AI-written answers
"Ask about this recipe" answers and the reading of your "Anything else?" note are produced by an AI model and can be wrong or incomplete. Use your own judgment, and always follow the safe cooking temperatures shown on the recipe.
8. Cooking safely
Follow the safe internal temperatures shown on recipes, use a food thermometer, and use your own judgment about food handling, storage and leftovers. You are responsible for how you prepare and store food.
9. Acceptable use and content
Mealpenny's recipes, text, price data and design belong to Mealpenny or its licensors. You may use them for your own household. Don't copy, resell, scrape or redistribute them, don't overload or attack the service, and don't use the AI features for anything other than cooking help.
10. Disclaimers and limitation of liability
To the fullest extent permitted by law, Mealpenny is provided "as is" without warranties of any kind, and we are not liable for indirect, incidental or consequential damages, or for grocery costs, food preparation outcomes or allergic reactions arising from use of Mealpenny. Some jurisdictions do not allow certain limitations, so some of these may not apply to you. Nothing here limits rights you have under applicable consumer law.
11. Changes
We may update these terms. The effective date above shows the latest version. Continuing to use Mealpenny after a change means you accept it.