Plate Support

Using Safari:

1. Open the recipe page in Safari.
2. Tap ⋯ then Share, and choose Plate from the list of apps.
3. If Plate isn't visible, tap More to find it.

OR

Inside Plate:

1. In the Recipes tab, tap +.
2. Choose From URL and paste the link to the recipe page.
3. Once the import finishes and you save the recipe, it will appear in the Recipes tab, marked NEW.

In the Recipes tab, tap + then From Photo. You can take up to 10 photos using the camera, or select some photos from your library.

On the free version, a photo import uses one of your 3 AI-assisted imports for the week, and the + menu shows how many are left. Plate Pro removes the limit.

In the Recipes tab, tap + then From Text, and paste the recipe text. Apple Intelligence reads it on your device and turns it into a recipe you can review before saving.

Like photo and PDF imports, this draws on the free version's weekly allowance of 3 AI-assisted imports.

Sites that publish structured recipe data (JSON-LD or microdata) work well. Most major food publishers, recipe blogs, and supermarket sites fall in this bucket.

For sites that don't do this, Plate falls back to scanning the page for the recipe name, ingredients, instructions, and notes. The result is usually good but may need a quick check for correctness before saving.

We would love to know when this happens, so we can check whether the app needs adjusting to support such sites better. You will have a Report button (or a flag button in the top-left of the recipe editor). Tap it to securely send us the details of the failed import, which helps us resolve the problem quickly.

You can also send us the details via Settings ▸ Help ▸ Report a Problem, which opens your email app.

Things you can try:

• Open the page in Safari, save it as PDF, and try + ▸ From PDF.
• Open the page in Safari, copy the recipe text, and use + ▸ From Text instead.

Photo imports work best when the recipe text is straight, well-lit, and the photo isn't too far away. Plate also tries to find a photo of the dish.

For multi-page PDFs (a cookbook scan, for example), Plate processes every page you select and tries to stitch them into a single recipe.

Yes. Share a photo or a PDF to Plate from any app, and it imports using the same recipe scan as an in-app photo import. A PDF with more than one page shows the same page picker, so you choose what to read.

Imports shared from another app draw on the same weekly allowance as the ones you start inside Plate.

Yes. Open the recipe, tap the ⋯ menu, and choose Refresh from Source. Plate fetches the page again and opens a Review Changes screen with every changed field highlighted, so you can check the update before saving.

Fields you have edited by hand are kept even when the site stops providing them. If nothing changed, Plate tells you and leaves the recipe untouched.

Use + ▸ From File to import recipes exported from Crouton, Paprika, Recipe Keeper, and Plate's own .platerecipes format.

After the import, a summary shows what was added, what was already in your library, and anything that couldn't be imported, with a list you can review.

On the free version, a bulk import stops at the 15-recipe limit. Plate adds what fits, tells you how many of the file's recipes made it in, and offers Plate Pro for the rest. A file import does not count against the weekly allowance for photo, PDF, and text imports.

In the editor, tap Add Photo and choose Take Photo, Choose from Library, or Paste (offered when you have an image copied).

Tap any photo in the editor to crop it: drag the corner handles, tap RESET to start over, and Done to apply. To pick the photo shown in lists, press and hold a photo and choose Set as main photo.

Plate gives you four ways to group recipes: the built-in Library groups, Pinned Recipes, your own Collections, and Categories. To browse them, swipe right from the Recipes tab or tap the chevron in the top-left toolbar to open the sidebar.

Library

Plate creates these groups for you automatically:

• Favorites: recipes you've marked as favorites.
• Pinned: recipes you've pinned for temporary quick access.
• Recently Added: recipes you've imported or created in the last 14 days, newest first.
• Uncategorized: recipes that don't have any categories assigned.

Favorites and Pinned are always shown; Recently Added and Uncategorized appear only while they have recipes in them.

Pinned Recipes

Pin a few recipes when you want them at your fingertips for a while. As soon as anything is pinned, a floating pin button appears above the tab bar in the Recipes tab; tap it to open your Pinned Recipes and jump between them. It's handy for cross-checking ingredients or comparing two takes on the same dish.

Collections

Use collections to group recipes however you like: by season, by event, by who they're for. Collections are yours, and recipes imported from websites are never added to a collection automatically. Recipes can be in multiple collections.

Categories

Categories are labels for recipes. When you import from a website or app that publishes categories, Plate picks them up and assigns them to the recipe. Recipes can have multiple categories assigned to them.

Open the recipe, tap the ⋯ menu in the top-right, and choose Delete. Plate asks you to confirm first. Deletion is permanent and syncs to your other devices.

You can also press and hold a recipe almost anywhere it appears to open a menu of actions, including Delete.

Times in the instructions, like "10 minutes" or "an hour", are highlighted.

1. Tap the time in the step.
2. Choose Start Timer. For a timer that's already running, the menu offers Pause Timer, Resume Timer, and Stop Timer instead.

The countdown bar at the bottom of the screen follows you to every tab. Tap it to open the Active timers panel, where timers are grouped by recipe.

In the panel you can pause or resume a timer by tapping its countdown, nudge it with + 1 min and − 1 min, swipe left to Stop one, or end everything with Stop All. Tapping a timer's step text takes you straight back to that step, even in another recipe.

Yes. Going back to your recipes, opening another recipe, or switching tabs never stops a timer; timers stop only when they finish or when you stop them.

Running timers also appear on the Lock Screen and in the Dynamic Island. With timers in more than one recipe, the Lock Screen shows the one closest to done plus how many others are running.

Tap the flame button in the top-left of a recipe to enter Cook Mode. The recipe goes full screen, the ingredients, steps, and notes get bigger so they stay readable from a step back, and accidental back-swipes are blocked. Tap the red Exit Cook Mode button to leave.

Yes. Go to Settings ▸ Cook Mode Text Size and drag the slider; a live preview shows exactly how ingredients and steps will look. You can go from one step smaller to five steps larger than your normal text size. The default is one step larger.

In the Inline layout, use the 1× and 2× buttons beside the Ingredients heading; the third button opens the Scale popover, with presets from ½× to 3× and a slider covering ¼× to 8×.

In the Tabbed layout, tap the scale chip next to the tab selector while on the Ingredients tab; it shows the current scale and opens the same Scale popover.

Every ingredient quantity and the servings count update to match, and adding ingredients to your shopping list adds the scaled quantities. The scale resets when you leave the recipe.

When a website or imported file provides nutrition, Plate keeps it. It shows as a calorie chip beside the recipe's time chips; tap the chip for a card with calories and macros, and tap All nutrients for the full list.

To add or correct nutrition by hand, edit the recipe and fill in Nutrition on the Details tab (for example, "Calories: 200").

1. Open the recipe and tap the cart button in the toolbar. You can also press and hold a recipe anywhere and choose Add to Shopping List.
2. Pick the ingredients you want. A row that's already on your list says Already on your list with its current quantity, and adding it combines the two.
3. Tap Done.

Your shopping list lives in Apple Reminders. Choose which Reminders list Plate uses under Settings ▸ Shopping List.

Because it's a normal Reminders list, you can share it with your household from the Reminders app, and checking an item off in either app checks it off in both.

Press and hold the day and open Share to print the day's recipes, export them to PDF, or share them as Text or a Plate Recipe File. The Share menu appears once the day has at least one recipe.

The same menu offers Add to Shopping List for all of the day's recipes, and Remove All to clear the day.

Open Settings ▸ Export Recipes and choose Plate Recipe File, Paprika, Recipe Keeper, or Crouton. Whatever you brought into Plate, you can take back out.

On the free version, the file holds the first 15 recipes, which is everything a free library can hold. If your library is larger than that, you will need to upgrade to Plate Pro to export it all.

Yes, via iCloud. It is on by default; the iCloud switch in Settings turns it on or off, and the Sync Status row underneath shows the details.

Recipes, collections, categories, meal plans, and your photos all sync.

Sync runs in the background, and you can use Sync Status to check whether it is working.

If you install Plate on a new device with the same iCloud account, everything will automatically start syncing when you open the app.

Usually sync is quick, and changes on one device show up on another within seconds.

However, if there are issues with the network, Apple's servers, or your Apple account, there may be some delay.

Apple sends us the photos and recipe text at different times, so we may receive photos before we have received recipes.

Give it some time, and the recipe text will appear as well.

You can monitor the progress in Settings ▸ Sync Status. When the status is Up to date, we have all your content.

Yes. Turn off the iCloud switch in Settings, and your data will not be synced.

Everything stays on the device, and if you turn syncing back on later, it resumes where it left off.

In the Recipes tab, tap the ⋯ menu in the top-right, choose Sort By, and pick an order:

• Name (A to Z) or Name (Z to A): alphabetical.
• Newest First or Oldest First: by the date the recipe was added.
• Highest Rated: by the rating you've given the recipe.

The order you pick applies everywhere recipes are listed and is remembered the next time you open Plate. Newest First is the default.

Yes. In the Search tab, tap the ⋯ button in the top-right and choose Select Recipes. Tap results to select them, or use Select All, then tap ⋯ again to favorite, pin, share, add them to a collection or the shopping list, or delete them in one go. You can also press and hold any selected recipe to get the same actions.

There are two quick ways to select while you're there: sweep a finger down the check circles to select a run of results, or start a two-finger pan anywhere on the list to begin selecting instantly. The search stays live too: keep typing to refine it, and results that fall out of the search leave the selection with it.

Plate is free to download, and the free version includes every feature: importing, cook mode, timers, scaling, nutrition, meal planning, shopping lists, and iCloud sync.

Two limits apply to it:

• Your library holds up to 15 recipes.
• You get 3 AI-assisted imports (photo, PDF, or text) in any seven days.

Plate Pro removes all limits, for a single purchase.

• Unlimited recipes. Create or import as many as you like.
• Unlimited scanning. No weekly limits for photos, PDFs or text imports.
• Unlimited export. Export a few recipes or the whole library, in one file.
• One purchase. No recurring payment.
• Family Sharing. Turn on Purchase Sharing and your family gets it too.

Open it from Settings ▸ Get Plate Pro, by tapping the app icon in Settings ▸ About, or from any message about a limit. The price is shown before you buy, and Apple handles the payment.

Plate stops accepting new recipes and offers you Plate Pro. Nothing already in your library is locked, hidden, or deleted: every recipe stays readable, editable, and syncing.

Once you are within three recipes of the limit, a quiet banner in the Recipes tab shows the count, so the wall doesn't arrive as a surprise.

Only the ones that read a recipe with on-device AI: From Photo, From PDF, and From Text, including photos and PDFs you share to Plate from another app.

These do not count:

• From URL, and sharing a link to Plate from Safari.
• From File, for Crouton, Paprika, Recipe Keeper, and .platerecipes files.
• New Recipe, and editing a recipe you already have.

The window rolls: it opens at your first AI-assisted import and clears seven days later. The + menu shows how many you have left.

Sign in with the same Apple Account and open Settings ▸ About ▸ Restore Purchases. Restoring is offered on the Plate Pro screen too.