Ollie Is Shutting Down: The 6 Best Ollie Alternatives for Meal Planning (2026)

Updated 1 November 2026 · Reviewed across iOS, Android, and web

Ollie, the AI family assistant and the Ollie for Meals app, shuts down on 6 November 2026. If you used it to plan dinners and shop, the best alternatives are FoodiePrep for AI-planned weeks with your own recipes, eMeals for sending your list to a grocery store, Plan to Eat for families who cook from their own recipes, Cozi Max if you also want a family calendar, Eat This Much for calorie targets, and Samsung Food for a big free recipe catalogue. This guide covers what Ollie's closing notice says, what to do before 6 November, and which replacement fits the way your family used Ollie.

Disclosure: FoodiePrep (foodieprep.ai) is one of the apps compared below — we built it. The other five were reviewed using their official websites, pricing pages, App Store and Google Play listings, and published user reviews; FoodiePrep was assessed against the same criteria, including where it falls short of Ollie. Prices checked 1 November 2026 (US).

---

Is Ollie shutting down?

Yes — Ollie is sunsetting on 6 November 2026, and that includes the Ollie for Meals app. The company announced it in a farewell letter from CEO Bill Lennon. In plain terms, the letter says:

• Date: Ollie stops working on 6 November 2026.
• Your data: Ollie will text you an export of your data, which you can pass to another assistant.
• Billing: subscriptions to Ollie and Ollie for Meals will be cancelled, and you will be refunded for any partial or unused months.
• Questions: the team asks people to email hello@ollie.ai.

The Ollie for Meals listing has already gone from the US App Store, so new downloads are no longer possible.

What to do before Ollie closes on 6 November

Save the export and the handful of meals your family actually liked — those two things are all you need to rebuild.

1. Keep the export text Ollie sends you. Save it somewhere outside your messages (a note or a document), because it disappears with the thread if you clear it.
2. Write down the meals you repeated. Most families cooked a short rotation of Ollie dinners. That list is what you will rebuild first.
3. Screenshot any recipe you want to keep while the app or text thread still opens.
4. Note your family's likes, dislikes and allergies. Ollie learned these over time; your new app needs them on day one.
5. Check your refund. If you paid through the App Store or Google Play and don't see a refund, contact Ollie at hello@ollie.ai first.

---

Ollie alternatives at a glance

The best Ollie alternatives for meal planning are FoodiePrep, eMeals, Plan to Eat, Cozi Max, Eat This Much, and Samsung Food — each replaces a different part of what Ollie did.

---

1. FoodiePrep — Best Ollie alternative for AI-planned family meals

FoodiePrep does what Ollie for Meals did best — you tell it what your family eats and it plans the week and writes the grocery list — and it also keeps the recipes you already love. Ask Chef Foodie, the app's AI, for "five weeknight dinners for a family of four, nothing spicy, one vegetarian night" and it fills a calendar of up to 7 days, lets you swap any meal, and builds an aisle-sorted shopping list from the plan.

What Ollie users will recognise

• Servings, allergies, diets, ingredients to avoid and taste notes saved once in Recipe Preferences and used for every plan
• A week filled in for you, with any meal swapped for another idea, a saved recipe, or a repeat
• Batch cooking: ask for leftovers and lunches and dinners pair up as a cook day and a leftover day, with leftover days kept off the shopping list
• Grocery list generated from the plan, sorted by aisle, quantities combined across recipes
• On mobile, Guided Shopping helps you add the list to an online store such as Walmart, Instacart, Kroger or Target, in the US and in the UK, Canada, Australia and New Zealand

What is different

• Import recipes from any website, YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, a photo of a cookbook page, or pasted text — so your family's favourites sit alongside the AI's suggestions
• A pantry you fill in by typing or scanning, used to flag items you already have and to suggest recipes from what's in the kitchen
• Per-recipe nutrition, and plans that can aim at a calorie or protein number
• Chef Foodie answers substitution and technique questions while you cook, and in the step-by-step cooking view you tap a time in the method to start a timer

Where it falls short of Ollie

• It is an app, not a text thread: Ollie texted you; with FoodiePrep you open the app or website

• Ollie placed grocery orders for you; FoodiePrep helps you fill the store's cart, and you check out yourself

• It only covers food — no calendars, school emails or reminders

• No shared lists between separate accounts; a household shares one login (sign-in is a one-time code sent to the account email)

• Price: Free Taster tier (recipe saving, recipe books, basic meal planning); Nutrition Pro $59.99/year (≈$5/month) or $8.99/month in the US

• Platforms: iOS, Android, web

• Best for: Families who liked having dinner decided for them and want their own recipes in the mix

---

2. eMeals — Best Ollie alternative for sending your list to a grocery store

eMeals publishes weekly meal plans by food style and sends the shopping list to grocers including Walmart, Amazon, Kroger and Instacart. It is the closest match to the moment Ollie users liked most: picking the week's meals and having the groceries handled.

What Ollie users will recognise

• A fresh menu each week; you pick the meals you want and the list is built for you
• Store hand-off to Walmart, Instacart, Publix, Kroger, Whole Foods, Albertsons, Amazon Fresh, Meijer, ALDI, Target, Safeway and more
• Breakfast and lunch plans as well as dinners

What is different

• Menus are written by eMeals' team for a chosen plan style, not generated for your family's tastes

• No AI to text or chat with about changes

• Price: $4.99/month on a 12-month subscription, or $37.50 for 3 months, after a 14-day free trial

• Platforms: iOS, Android, web

• Best for: Families whose main need was a plan that turns into a grocery order

---

3. Plan to Eat — Best Ollie alternative for families cooking their own recipes

Plan to Eat is a calendar-first planner: save recipes from anywhere, drag them onto the week, and it builds the shopping list, shared across the household in real time.

What Ollie users will recognise

• One plan and one list for the whole family
• A consolidated grocery list for the dates you choose, with per-recipe nutrition

What is different

• It does not suggest meals — you choose every recipe

• Strong recipe clipping from websites, and lists can be split by store

• Price: $5.95/month or $49/year after a 14-day trial; no free tier

• Platforms: iOS, Android, web

• Best for: Households where more than one person plans and shops, and the recipes already exist

---

4. Cozi Max — Best Ollie alternative if you used Ollie for the family calendar too

Cozi is a shared family organiser — calendar, shopping lists, to-dos — and its Cozi Max plan adds an AI Meal Planner and AI Recipe Creator. If Ollie was your family's assistant for schedules as well as dinners, Cozi covers more of that ground than any recipe app.

What Ollie users will recognise

• One place for the family's calendar and the week's meals
• AI Event Import turns invitations in your email into calendar events
• Meal plans built around your cuisine and protein preferences and your schedule

What is different

• It is an app, not a text thread, and it does not order groceries for you

• The meal tools are one part of an organiser, not a full cooking app

• The Recipe Box adds a recipe when you paste its web address, on the free tier too

• Price: Cozi is free; Cozi Max is $79.99/year

• Platforms: iOS, Android, web

• Best for: Families who want calendar and meals together

---

5. Eat This Much — Best Ollie alternative for calorie and macro targets

Eat This Much generates meal plans from your calorie and diet targets, and its Premium tier plans a week at a time with an automatic grocery list and grocery delivery links.

What Ollie users will recognise

• Plans made for you, with a new option one click away when a meal doesn't appeal
• Grocery delivery through Instacart, Amazon Fresh, Walmart and more (Premium)
• Automatic leftovers (Premium)

What is different

• Built around hitting numbers rather than family tastes, so it suits one person's goals better than a household's

• Food tracking and barcode scanning in the same app

• Price: Free for daily plans; Premium adds weekly plans and the grocery list (the price is not shown on its pricing page)

• Platforms: iOS, Android, web

• Best for: Individuals planning around nutrition goals

---

6. Samsung Food — Best free Ollie alternative with a big recipe catalogue

Samsung Food pairs a very large free recipe catalogue with a meal planner, a pantry "Food List" and an aisle-sorted shopping list.

What Ollie users will recognise

• Recipes, plan and list in one free app
• Dietary filters for most common diets

What is different

• Planning is mostly you choosing recipes; searching recipes by what's in your Food List and shopping-list sync are Food+ features

• Smart-appliance features if you own Samsung kitchen products

• Price: Free; Food+ $6.99/month or $59.99/year

• Platforms: iOS, Android, web

• Best for: Families who enjoy browsing for recipes and want to pay nothing

---

How to move from Ollie to a new app

Ollie's export arrives as text, so the move is copy-and-paste — and it only needs to cover the meals and preferences that mattered.

• FoodiePrep: paste a recipe from your export into the Chef Foodie chat and ask it to save it, or use Paste Text in the Add Recipe menu (the Import page's Text tab on the web). Use photo import for any screenshots. Then copy your family's dislikes and allergies into Recipe Preferences and ask Chef Foodie to "plan next week with my saved recipes". Lost a recipe? Describe it — "the sheet-pan chicken with sweet potatoes we had most weeks" — and Chef Foodie can create a close version to save.
• Plan to Eat and Samsung Food: paste recipes in as new recipes, or clip them again from the web if they came from a site.
• Cozi: paste the web address of any recipe that came from a site into the Recipe Box.
• eMeals: choose your food style when you sign up; there is nothing to import.

Ollie itself pointed users to an independent benchmark of personal assistants for the non-food side of what it did.

---

Which Ollie alternative should you choose?

Match the app to the part of Ollie your family relied on.

• You liked that dinner was decided for you → FoodiePrep (AI plans plus your own recipes) or Eat This Much (plans built to targets)
• The grocery order was the best part → eMeals
• Two or more people plan and shop from their own recipes → Plan to Eat
• Ollie also ran the family calendar → Cozi Max
• You want it free → Samsung Food, or FoodiePrep's free Taster tier

For the wider field, see our ranking of the 10 best meal planning apps in 2026 and the comparison of meal planning apps with built-in grocery lists. Mealime closed in October too — our Mealime alternatives guide covers that switch.

---

Frequently asked questions

Is Ollie shutting down?

Yes — Ollie is sunsetting on 6 November 2026. The company announced it in a farewell letter on ollie.ai, which covers both the Ollie assistant and the Ollie for Meals app.

When does Ollie stop working?

Ollie stops working on 6 November 2026. Save the data export Ollie texts you, and any recipes you want to keep, before then.

Is Ollie for Meals shutting down too?

Yes — the farewell letter covers Ollie for Meals subscriptions as well as Ollie. Billing for both is cancelled, and the Ollie for Meals listing is no longer on the US App Store.

Will I get a refund from Ollie?

Yes — Ollie says subscribers will be refunded for any partial or unused months. If you have questions about a refund, Ollie asks you to email hello@ollie.ai.

Can I export my Ollie recipes and preferences?

Ollie says it will text you an export of your data. Keep that text; recipes and preferences in it can be pasted into another app, such as FoodiePrep's Paste Text import or its Chef Foodie chat.

What is the best Ollie alternative for meal planning?

FoodiePrep is the closest replacement for Ollie for Meals, because its AI plans the week from your family's preferences and writes the grocery list. It also imports your own recipes from websites, social media and photos. eMeals is the better pick if sending the list to a store matters most.

Is there a free alternative to Ollie?

Samsung Food is free, and FoodiePrep has a free Taster tier with basic meal planning. Cozi is free as a family organiser, but its AI meal planner needs Cozi Max at $79.99/year.

Which app orders groceries like Ollie did?

eMeals sends your shopping list to Walmart, Amazon, Kroger, Instacart and other grocers. Eat This Much Premium links to grocery delivery, and FoodiePrep's Guided Shopping (mobile) helps you fill an online store's cart — in each case you complete the checkout yourself.

Is there an AI meal planner that works by text message like Ollie?

Not among the dedicated meal planning apps here — they all work in an app or on the web. FoodiePrep is the nearest experience: you type what you want to Chef Foodie in plain words and it builds the plan and the list.

---

The bottom line

Ollie closes on 6 November 2026, so save your export and your favourite meals now, then pick the app that matches how your family used it. For most Ollie for Meals families that is FoodiePrep if you want the week planned for you with your own recipes included, eMeals if the grocery order was the point, or Cozi Max if Ollie also ran the family calendar.

FoodiePrep is free to start on iOS, Android, and the web — paste in your Ollie favourites, set your family's preferences, and let Chef Foodie plan your first week.