As a growing number of scientific studies find questionable long-term side effects from common household products, many of us wonder what is safe to use and what to avoid.
Fortunately, there are several health apps available to determine if there are harmful ingredients in a product and can help you choose to switch to safer alternatives. Let’s take a look at how they can help you make a positive change in your life.
1. 1Source
The 1Source app is a must-have for anyone who wants to take charge of their health and avoid exposure to harmful ingredients.
You can browse through a large number of baby, personal care, beauty, pet care, and household products with ease. It allows you to easily scan barcodes or ingredient labels for a complete product profile that includes key ingredients and vital nutritional information, and whether or not they contain substances known to cause health problems.
You can save products to lists and keep track of their expiration dates within the app. It also allows you to create a personal health profile in which you can enter information about your diet and health. You will then receive alerts for potentially harmful substances that are specific to your health conditions.
Download: 1Source for Android | iOS (free)
2. EWG Healthy Living
With 120,000 products and counting, this free app from the nonprofit Environmental Working Group (EWG) helps you better understand your food, personal care, and other household products.
You can scan a barcode or look up product names to quickly identify and analyze ingredients and see their overall rating, with 1.0 being the best and 10.0 being the worst in terms of risk and toxicity.
The Food Score rating is a powerful nutrition tool that allows you to see the nutritional value of foods and avoid those that are unhealthy. It is based on three elements: nutrition, ingredient concerns, and degree of processing.
The app rates over 5,000 ingredients and 1,500 brands. Attributes such as calories, servings per container, protein, sugar, and fat are clearly displayed for each product.
Additionally, the app has an easy-to-use interface and provides research-based buyer’s guides and other helpful resources to help you eat healthier and make smarter choices for your family.
Download: EWG Healthy Living for Android | iOS (free)
3. CodeCheck
CodeCheck makes it easy to view vital nutritional information in a simple and intuitive way. You can scan barcodes or EAN numbers, or enter products manually to get a complete read of the ingredients and determine if they are vegan, vegetarian, or gluten-free.
This app, based on the nutritional traffic light system, makes it easy to make balanced food choices by highlighting the healthiest foods compared to others within the same category. It will show you where nutrition experts place products in terms of safety: red (not recommended), yellow (consumption limit), or green (no concerns identified), based on scientific evidence.
If you want to ensure that your food choices always correspond to your eating habits, you can customize the ingredient evaluation within the profile section. In this way, you can receive a color-coded rating circle tailored to your dietary needs.
The free version of the app is ad-supported. The premium version, available as a monthly or yearly subscription, offers unlimited scanning, ad removal, and priority support.
Download: CodeCheck for Android | iOS (free, subscriptions available)
4. Ingredient scanner
Ingredients Scanner is one of the simplest applications out there. It’s a perfect complement to the other apps on this list and helps you improve your health and lifestyle.
To use the app, point your smartphone’s camera at the product label. The app will then detect if each ingredient is safe to use and color-code them appropriately. You can see at a glance which substances are safe (green), have concerns (orange), or are potentially dangerous (red).
The application is free to use. You can access the ad-free version through a one-time premium upgrade.
Download: Ingredient Scanner for Android | iOS (free in-app purchases available)
5. Yuka
Yuka is a free mobile application available for iOS and Android devices. You can scan food and personal care product barcodes, receive independent ratings, and get recommendations for healthier alternatives whenever they are available.
Yuka rates more than 1.5 million food products and more than 500,000 cosmetic products in a color-coded format using the European NutriScore calculation method. It takes into account the nutritional values, the presence of additives and the organic nature of the products.
The app also lets you know the impact of the product’s ingredients, such as saturated fat, sugar, salt, and energy levels on your health.
Download: Yuka for Android | iOS (free in-app purchases available)
6. Detox Me
Detox Me is a free application that provides extensive information on a wide variety of consumer products. You can incorporate these super helpful tips into your daily routine and habits for a healthier lifestyle.
Developed by the Silent Spring Institute, the app helps you identify toxic chemicals in and around your homes, and provides research-based advice on how to reduce your exposure to these substances. To use the app, you can scan product barcodes with your smartphone camera or type product names manually.
As you progress through the Detox Me guides, you will receive badges to mark your progress. For example, you earn a “Healthy Foods” badge if you incorporate organic products into your diet or avoid the use of plastics when it comes to food, as this greatly reduces your exposure to chemicals and poisons.
Download: Detox Me for Android | iOS (free)
7. Fooducate
Whether you’re counting calories or keeping track of carbs and other helpful data, it can be difficult to know exactly where to start. Fortunately, Fooducate is here to help you with useful and pertinent information for a healthy life.
The app uses your phone’s camera to scan food labels, providing instant information on nutrition and other requirements that affect your diet. It also allows you to manually search the database for products and offers healthier alternatives, if available.
Fooducate works by first determining your caloric needs, based on your biometric data. You need to record your daily food intake. This data is used in conjunction with your weight loss diet plan to calculate how well you are managing your daily calorie intake goals.
The free version of the app consists of a complete product database and is supported by ads. The Pro versions are ad-free and packed with loads of advanced features, like specific diet training modules tailored to your health conditions, as well as better tracking of nutrient intake.
There are specific subscriptions designed to customize your fitness goals, including gluten and food allergy tracking, a “Diet Kickstart” program, as well as a pet food guide.
Download: Fooducate for Android | iOS (free, subscriptions available)
Buy the healthiest products
While it may seem overwhelming to scan every product you buy, it will only take a few minutes and will likely save you more time and money than you might imagine.
Ultimately, these apps provide features that not only your health and wallet can benefit from, but the environment in general as well. We encourage you to try these for yourself and determine which one works best for your family and lifestyle.
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