Freecost vs Ratatool
Freecost
freefoodcost.comRatatool
ratatool.comSide by side
| Figure | Freecost | Ratatool |
|---|---|---|
| Price from | Free | Free |
| Free plan | Yes | Yes |
| Free trial | — | Yes |
| Open source | — | — |
| Web | Yes | Yes |
| Android | Yes | — |
| Plans published | 1 | 3 |
| Spec score · Restaurant Recipe Costing Software | 7.8 (#12) | 7.1 (#25) |
| Headquarters | Johnson City, Texas, United States | Paris, France |
| Integrations | The pricing page states CSV and Excel import; the pages reviewed do not list other product integrations. | The maker’s pages describe CSV imports and Stripe payment processing; they do not name other software integrations. |
| Purpose | Freecost gives kitchens a shared place to track ingredient prices, recipe costs, and margins. | Ratatool helps food-service businesses manage recipes, costs, margins, production, supplies, inventory and food traceability. |
| Recipe costing | It calculates food-cost percentages for recipes and menu items automatically. | Users can build recipes from supplier ingredients, including sub-recipes, and calculate ingredient costs, food cost and margins. |
| Security | The privacy policy says data is encrypted in transit with TLS 1.2+ and at rest with Supabase AES-256 disk encryption; database row-level security is enforced. | The privacy policy says passwords are encrypted on its servers, payment pages use HTTPS with 128-bit TLS, and card data is handled by Stripe. |
| Support | The Google Play listing provides support email [email protected]. | The maker describes responsive support; the listed plans include email and chat, with phone assistance on Premium. |
Plans
In their own words
Freecost
Freecost gives restaurant kitchens a shared way to track ingredient prices, recipe costs, and menu margins through Android and web access. It calculates food-cost percentages for recipes and menu items, while the ingredient database records vendors, pack sizes, and allergens. Users can scan delivery invoices; extracted prices update ingredient costs and affected recipes. Inventory counts work offline and include dated dollar valuations, and waste logging provides weekly cost trends. The tools also include printable recipe and build cards, order guides, prep lists, and support for multiple kitchens on one account. CSV and Excel imports are included. The Android app supports full offline mode, including inventory counting. The free plan is listed at free and includes unlimited recipes, menu items, and ingredients, with no per-seat pricing or usage cap. Freecost does not include labor scheduling, purchase-order approval workflows, vendor management across several locations, or catering event and BEO management.
Ratatool
Ratatool is web software for food-service businesses managing recipes, costs, margins, production, supplies, inventory and food traceability. Users build recipes from supplier ingredients and sub-recipes, calculate ingredient costs, food cost and margins, and track supplier price history. The system can notify users when an ingredient reaches a critical threshold. Production planning turns required quantities into supplier orders, while inventory tracking, yield and portion scaling, menu profitability and ingredient price updates support daily operations. Traceability records can include allergens, nutrition labels, expiration dates and batch numbers. Ratatool says AI can scan invoices to help load initial data. Multi-site features support locations and employee permissions. Recipe documents can be printed and data exported to PDF, CSV and Excel; CSV imports and Stripe payment processing are described. The ESSAI plan is free for four recipes and 15 ingredients, with no subscription or credit card. STANDARD is billed 24 € per month annually; PREMIUM is billed 41 € per month annually.