Who it is for
Someone standing in an aisle, shopping for more than one person. A parent whose child reacts to peanuts while they themselves are avoiding seed oils. A couple with different sweeteners, different allergens, and no interest in reading a forty-item label twice.
It is also for the shopper who wants a plain explanation of an additive, or a way to put two similar products next to each other before one of them goes in the cart.
The situation
A packaged-food label is a long list, and the aisle is a bad place to parse it. Most barcode apps answer with one rating meant for everyone. That rating cannot know that one person in the house cannot eat milk and another is skipping artificial colors. The household rules become homework the shopper does by eye, under time pressure, with the package in one hand.
Food Metric separates two questions that usually get mashed together: “Is this all right for the people I shop for?” and “What kind of food is this, on its own?”
What you actually do
You start by describing the household. Each profile has a name and a list: allergens, and ingredients that person wants to avoid. There is room for eight profiles. The allergen list covers the ones people usually have to hunt for — peanuts, tree nuts, milk, eggs, fish, shellfish, wheat, soy, sesame — and others such as celery, mustard, sulphites, corn, coconut, and caffeine. Avoids are grouped so they are easy to set: additives and preservatives, sugars and sweeteners, oils and fats, and restrictions such as lactose, gelatin, alcohol, or a best-effort vegan reading.
In the store, you point the camera at the barcode. The camera reads the code on the phone. Food Metric does not upload a video of you or the aisle. It sends the barcode out to fetch the public product record — ingredients, allergen statements, nutrition — and the match against your profiles happens on the device. The allergy list itself stays on the phone. No account is required to scan.
The first answer is a verdict for the people you shop for. If every profile is clear, it says the product looks safe for everyone. If someone’s list hits the label, it says so, and you can see which person. If the label data is too thin to judge, it says that, instead of inventing a yes.
Beside the verdict is the 1–10 Food Metric score. That number is about the food, not about your allergies. Allergies do not move it. It reads the ingredient list, how processed the product looks, the additives on it, and nutrition signals such as sugar, sodium, saturated fat, and fiber. A short list of recognizable foods lands differently from a long list built around additives. The score is a shopping guide. It is not a medical grade and not a government rating.
Any matched additive can be opened. The note says what it is, why it is used in food, and whether the concern is slight or more serious, in ordinary language.
When two products are close, you scan both and put them side by side: ingredients, additive counts, processing, sugar, and the signals that mark a cleaner label. Before the trip, you can browse the catalog by shelf. After a scan, the product can go into a folder you name — snacks that work for the kids, foods one person can eat. Past scans stay on the phone, with the household result still attached.
What a person can count on
- The scanner works without an account, and without handing over a name or email.
- Profiles, scan history, and saved products stay on the device.
- A scan sends the barcode to look up public product information. The household’s allergen and avoid lists are not uploaded as part of that lookup.
- The safety check runs on the phone, using the product record that came back and the profiles saved there.
- Personal information is not sold.
- When a product is missing, incomplete, or the wrong item for that barcode, the app says so. You can flag a mismatch so the catalog can be corrected. That report is the barcode and an optional note, not the household’s allergy list.
What it does not try to be
Food Metric is an informational shopping tool. It is not a diagnosis, and it is not a substitute for a clinician when someone is managing an allergy. The package in your hand is still the label that counts. Catalog data can change, can be incomplete, and can differ by region.
The vegan reading is a best-effort pass over the ingredient list and the tags on the product. It is not a certified vegan seal. The 1–10 score is an editorial reading of processing and quality signals. A high score does not mean “safe for your child,” and a clear household verdict does not mean the food is minimally processed. Those are different answers, on purpose.
How it feels
Fast at the shelf. Color tells you whether to stop. A sentence tells you why. The additive, the comparison, and the saved list stay one tap further in, so the first screen can stay small.
In short
- One scan, checked against everyone in the household — up to eight profiles.
- The allergy answer and the 1–10 reading stay separate, so a high score never hides a peanut.
- Preferences stay on the phone. The barcode is what goes out to find the product.
- Additives are explained, not just flagged.
- Two products can be compared before either one goes in the cart.
- When the label data is too thin to trust, it says so.