Looking for a Yuka alternative? What to look for in a food scanner app

Yuka made a simple idea mainstream: scan a product's barcode and get one score that tells you how it stacks up. Plenty of apps now do the same thing, and they aren't interchangeable. If you're shopping for a Yuka alternative, these are the questions worth asking — whichever app you end up with.

What makes a food scanner app worth using

• A published method. You should be able to read exactly how a score is built, not just trust a number.
• Reasons under the score. A good app tells you what pulled a product down — sugar, salt, an additive, an ingredient — so you can decide whether it matters to you.
• Food and cosmetics in one place, if you want to check shampoo as well as snacks.
• Alternatives from the same shelf, not just a verdict.
• A way to handle missing products, because no database has everything.
• Clear privacy: what leaves your phone, and whether you need an account.
• Something that works in a store with bad signal.
• No paid placements. A brand shouldn't be able to buy a better score.

How Novaz scores products

For food, Novaz uses the same structure Yuka describes in its help pages: 60% nutritional quality based on Nutri-Score, 30% additives, 10% organic, and four color bands — Excellent, Good, Poor and Bad. If you're used to Yuka, the scores will feel familiar.

Novaz publishes its own rules in full: a product with a high-risk additive can't score above 49, and a cosmetic is scored only when at least half of its ingredients are rated. When the data isn't good enough for a fair score, you'll see why instead of a guess.

Privacy: what leaves your phone

Novaz has no account and no server of its own. To look a product up, only its barcode is sent to the open product database. Your history, favorites and diet preferences stay on your iPhone.

Where the product data comes from

Novaz reads product data from Open Food Facts and Open Beauty Facts, two open databases with millions of products built by volunteers. If something is missing, you can add it with a few photos; it's saved on your phone and ready to scan.

Try two apps side by side

1. Pick five products you buy often — a cereal, a drink, a snack, a yogurt and a shampoo.
2. Scan each one in both apps.
3. Compare the scores and, more importantly, the reasons each app gives.
4. Open the suggested alternatives and see which ones you'd actually buy.
5. Keep the app whose explanations you trust and whose suggestions fit how you shop.