Compare · Updated · 6 min read
Recipe Keeper vs Forktales: two apps that read handwritten recipes
Recipe Keeper and Forktales both read a photo of a handwritten recipe. Recipe Keeper is a native app you buy once per device, with a planner and a shopping list. Forktales is a free web app that keeps no photo and shares recipes with friends. Here is where they differ.
Forktales wrote this page. It makes one of the apps in it, says so where it matters and names what it does not do.
Recipe Keeper is the closest app to Forktales on one feature: both read a handwritten card from a photo, which most recipe apps do not. The rest differs. Recipe Keeper is a native app with a planner, bought once. Forktales is a web app with a feed of friends’ recipes, free.
Side by side
| Recipe Keeper | Forktales | |
|---|---|---|
| Runs on | iOS, Android, Mac and Windows apps. No web app. | Any phone, tablet or computer, in a browser. Installs from the browser to the home screen. No app store listing. |
| Price | Free. Pro bought once per platform: CA$24.99 on iOS, CA$39.99 on Mac, CA$39.99 on Windows. | Free. AI actions spend credits: 5 on sign-up, 10 for CA$4.99, or Plus at CA$4.99 a month. |
| Getting recipes in | Links, pasted text, the camera, photos and PDFs; files from Paprika, Pepperplate, MasterCook, Living Cookbook, MacGourmet and BigOven. | Paste a link, send a page from the bookmarks bar or the Android share sheet, paste the recipe’s text or photograph it. No file import. |
| Photos and handwriting | Scans cookbooks, magazines and handwritten recipes, the vendor says. Photos go to a third-party OCR service and may be kept for a period. | Photos, screenshots and handwriting, up to six photos for one recipe. The photo is read by AI and not kept. One credit a scan; a failed scan is free. |
| Getting recipes out | A PDF cookbook. No general export in the vendor’s copy. | No file export yet. Every recipe is plain text on its page. |
| Sharing | One recipe by email or social apps; a shared family recipe collection. No link for people without the app. | Private by default. A recipe shared with friends shows in their feed and opens by a link for signed-in friends. Friendship is mutual. No public profiles. |
| Planner and list | Meal planner and shopping list. | None. No planner, shopping list or pantry. |
Read from Recipe Keeper and Forktales on 31 October 2026. Prices are as the vendors state them on that date; the store price in Canada can differ.
The scan, up close
Recipe Keeper’s scan takes a camera shot, a photo or a PDF and runs it through a third-party OCR service. Its privacy page says the photo and the text may be kept for a period of time. Forktales’s scan panel takes up to six photos of one recipe, reads them with AI, fills the recipe form for you to check and keeps no photo. Both say they read handwriting. We can show you Forktales doing it; we have not run Recipe Keeper’s scan on the same card, so we cannot say which reads a faded card better.
Choose Recipe Keeper if
- You plan the week and shop from the plan.
- You want a native app on a Mac or Windows PC, bought once.
- You have files from Paprika, MasterCook, Pepperplate or BigOven to import.
- You want a printed cookbook. Recipe Keeper makes a PDF of your library.
Choose Forktales if
- You do not want the photo of your mother’s card kept on someone’s server.
- You want the people you cook with to see what you cook. Shared recipes go to accepted friends and show in their feed, with a cook history and forks.
- You want nothing to buy. The core is free; scans spend credits.
- You want the same app on every device from a browser, with no store.
Forktales has no planner, no shopping list and no export to a file. Recipe Keeper has the first two; its export is a PDF.
Move your recipes from Recipe Keeper
Links first
A recipe Recipe Keeper imported from a website keeps its source. Paste that address into Forktales and the recipe is read from the page.Email yourself the rest
Recipe Keeper shares one recipe by email. Copy the text from the email and paste it into the scan panel. Forktales types it up as a recipe to check and save.Or screenshot it
A screenshot of the recipe page is a photo the scanner reads, for one credit. Up to six screenshots make one recipe.Make the PDF cookbook anyway
It is the one export Recipe Keeper offers. Keep it as your copy.
What we checked, and did not
The Recipe Keeper column is from recipekeeperonline.com, its privacy page and the Canadian App Store and Microsoft Store listings, read on 31 October 2026. We make Forktales and use it daily. We did not scan the same card in both apps for this page, so nothing here says which reads handwriting better. Prices change.