Help & Support

Open the Scan tab and point the camera at a barcode. Fineprint looks the number up in Open Food Facts and opens the product: ingredients, additives, allergens, Nutri-Score, NOVA group and nutrition, plus how it compares with your rules.

No camera handy? Choose a Barcode photo from your library, Type barcode to enter the number by hand, or use the Search tab to find a product by name. Every product you open is saved to History, which also works offline.

Hold the phone about 10 to 20 cm away, keep the whole barcode in the frame and avoid glare from shiny wrappers. Curved packs scan more easily if you turn them so the bars are flat to the camera. If it still won’t read, type the digits printed under the bars.

Open Food Facts is built by volunteers, so some products, especially new or local ones, aren’t in it yet. You have two options:

• Read the ingredients label. Take a photo of the ingredient list. Fineprint reads the text on your iPhone and checks it against your rules and its guide to over 370 additives. Check the text it read and fix any word it got wrong. The photo never leaves your phone.
• Add it to Open Food Facts. Tap the button to open openfoodfacts.org with the barcode filled in. It takes a few photos, and everyone who scans the product after you will find it.

Lay the pack flat, use good light and fit the whole ingredient list in the frame. Labels in English, Spanish, Portuguese, German, French, Japanese, Korean and Chinese are supported. Reading can miss or misread words on small or crumpled print, so compare the result with the pack.

Product data comes from Open Food Facts contributors, and recipes change. When something is missing, Fineprint says what it couldn’t check (for example “Partly checked”) rather than guessing. You can correct a product on openfoodfacts.org, and the fix will show up in Fineprint for everyone.

Rules are the things you choose to avoid, such as seed oils, palm oil, artificial colours, sweeteners, gluten, any of the 14 major allergens, or anything that isn’t vegan. Set them in the My rules tab. The free version lets you pick three; Pro turns on all 39 at once and adds family profiles, so each product can be checked for everyone you shop for.

A rule matches when the ingredient list, the allergen and “may contain” notes, or the additives include something you chose to avoid. Open the product and Fineprint highlights the exact words that caused the match, so you can read them in context and decide for yourself.

Matching works on the words on the label. A word can appear in more than one sense, so if a match looks odd, the highlighted text shows you why. Please let me know about anything that looks wrong.

No. It means Fineprint didn’t find a match in the information available. Data can be incomplete and recipes change. Fineprint shows facts, not medical or allergy advice; always read the pack, especially for a serious allergy.

Nutri-Score is a grade from A to E based on a product’s nutrition table, using the public Nutri-Score algorithm. The grade in Fineprint is calculated by Open Food Facts; Fineprint doesn’t compute a score of its own. If there isn’t enough data, it shows “Not computed”.

NOVA groups foods by how processed they are, from 1 to 4:

• 1Unprocessed or minimally processed
• 2Processed culinary ingredient
• 3Processed food
• 4Ultra-processed food

Open Food Facts assigns the group from the ingredient list; Fineprint shows it as given.

Fineprint labels fat, saturates, sugars and salt low, medium or high using the UK Food Standards Agency front-of-pack thresholds. The “high” level is:

You can switch on the matching rules (High sugar, High salt, High fat, High saturated fat) in My rules.

For each additive, Fineprint summarises how it’s regulated in the European Union and the United States, for example whether it’s permitted, permitted with a label warning, or not permitted. It’s a short summary of the regulations for general information, alongside what the additive does and where it comes from.

Free: unlimited scans and searches, every fact on every product, label reading, three rules and offline history. Pro adds all 39 rules, family profiles, similar products that fit your rules, comparing two products, and logging a serving to Apple Health. Pro comes monthly, yearly or as a one-time lifetime purchase; see the Terms.

In the My rules tab, tap the gear button to open Settings, then tap Restore purchases. Make sure you’re signed in to the App Store with the same Apple Account you used to buy. A lifetime purchase can also be shared with your Family Sharing group.

Subscriptions are managed by Apple. On your iPhone, open Settings › [your name] › Subscriptions, choose Fineprint and tap Cancel Subscription. You can also tap Manage subscription in Fineprint’s settings. Cancel at least 24 hours before the renewal date; Pro stays active until the end of the period you’ve paid for. Deleting the app doesn’t cancel a subscription.

Apple handles payments and refunds. You can request one at reportaproblem.apple.com.

None about you. There’s no account, no ads, no tracking and no analytics. History, saved products, rules and family profiles stay on your iPhone. To look up a product, only the barcode or search text is sent to Open Food Facts. Label photos are read on the device and never uploaded. Apple Health logging only writes the serving you choose and reads nothing. If you buy Pro, RevenueCat receives an anonymous ID and your purchase history to unlock it. The privacy policy has the details.