Alternatives to Spoonful for a low FODMAP diet

Spoonful is a barcode scanner for packaged food. If you want another scanner, Fig checks ingredients against low FODMAP and thousands of other diets and allergies, and can list suitable foods at grocery stores and restaurants. If you would rather shop from a list of certified products and laboratory-tested foods, there’s FODMAP Friendly. And if the hard part is the meals you cook or order as well as the packets you buy, Fodmi works out a meal’s FODMAPs from a photo, scans packaged food for low FODMAP, and checks in later on how a meal sat.

We make Fodmi, so take our view with that in mind. Everything below about the other apps comes from their US App Store listings, which we read on 24 October 2026. Listings and prices change; check the current one before you decide.

Why people look for an alternative

Spoonful’s listing describes a scanner: scan a barcode or photograph a product and get a green, yellow or red result for low FODMAP, gluten free, eight common allergens or plant-based diets. It suggests alternatives when a product doesn’t fit and shows products other people have scanned and reviewed. It’s free, with in-app purchases, on iPhone and iPad.

People usually look elsewhere because a product they buy isn’t in its database, because they follow other diets or allergies as well, or because scanning packets doesn’t help with the meals they cook or eat out. Its listing doesn’t mention a diary or recording how you felt after eating. Our Fodmi vs Spoonful page goes through that difference in detail.

At a glance

App	Best for	Barcode scanner	Price on the listing
Fig	Scanning packaged food for low FODMAP plus other diets and allergies	Yes	Free, with a Fig+ subscription
FODMAP Friendly	Certified products, laboratory-tested foods and recipes	Its listing doesn’t mention one	Free
Fodmi	Meals you cook or order, and how they sat	Yes, plus label photos	Free download, full access by subscription
Spoonful	Traffic-light results for packaged food	Yes	Free, with in-app purchases

Fig: another scanner, for many diets at once

Fig’s listing describes a barcode scanner that checks a product’s ingredients against your diet in under a second. It covers low FODMAP and more than 2,800 other diets and allergies, so it suits you if you avoid gluten, a particular allergen or histamine as well. It can list foods that work for you at more than 100 grocery stores and restaurants, build shopping lists, and keep separate profiles for each person in a family. Its listing says its ratings draw on notes from a team of dietitians.

It’s free, with a Fig+ subscription for restaurants, multiple profiles, unlimited scans and more. It’s iPhone only. Fodmi vs Fig goes through the differences with Fodmi.

FODMAP Friendly: a list of certified products and tested foods

FODMAP Friendly comes from a low FODMAP certification organisation. Instead of scanning, you look things up: its listing describes certified products you can filter by country, brand and category with their maximum serve, and a food list of hundreds of laboratory-tested foods with a pass or fail rating and the percentage of FODMAPs in each. It also has more than 200 recipes, meal plans, a recipe maker that helps with FODMAPs adding up across a recipe, and a directory of FODMAP-trained dietitians.

Its listing shows it as free, on iPhone and iPad. It’s most useful when the brands you buy are certified; its listing doesn’t mention checking uncertified products from their ingredients.

Fodmi: for the meals as well as the packets

Fodmi starts from the meal on your plate. Take a photo, say what you ate, or type it. Fodmi picks out the ingredients, including hidden garlic and onion, and shows the meal across the six FODMAP groups. A few hours later it asks how the meal sat, with the Bristol stool scale, so over a few weeks you can see which foods line up with bad days. You get weekly trends and a PDF report for your doctor or dietitian, and you can look up more than 900 foods with the amount where each stays low (see the food list).

It also scans packaged food: scan the barcode, or photograph the label if the barcode isn’t found, and Fodmi rates each ingredient and tells you whether the amount you’ll eat is low.

What it doesn’t do: it covers low FODMAP only, and it’s iPhone only. How Fodmi works out its answers.

Which should you pick?

• Want a scanner that also covers gluten, allergies or other diets? Fig.
• Prefer buying certified products and checking tested foods? FODMAP Friendly.
• Low FODMAP is your only diet, and you want one app for packets and meals? Fodmi scans packaged food and logs what you eat.
• Struggling with home-cooked meals and eating out, or trying to find your triggers? Fodmi.
• Happy with Spoonful’s scans and just want a record of how meals sat? Keep Spoonful for shopping and add a meal log such as Fodmi.

If you follow several diets, a scanner that covers them all and a meal log do different jobs, so some people use one of each. For more apps, see the best low FODMAP apps for iPhone, and for diaries, alternatives to mySymptoms. The diet itself works best as a short trial followed by reintroduction, ideally with a dietitian. Our guide to the low FODMAP diet explains the three phases.