2 min readEarlier this year Samsung announced its AI Family Hub fridge which uses a camera to identify food as you put them in and take them out of the fridge. At the time these foods needed to be in the Samsung catalogue, or you could manually edit, and add fridge contents outside of this using the SmartThings app. Now with Samsung Food+ you can take the labour out. For a price.
At the time of release, the AI Family Hub could easily identify loose fruit and vegetables, but couldn't handle foods in packaging. The SmartThings app would then suggest recipes based on what you have on the fridge. Seemingly Samsung has now pivotted these features, and more to the Samsung Food and Samsung Food+ apps.
Samsung Food was released a year ago at IFA 2023, and has since added over 6 million users. This app is ultimately a meal planning and cooking app with features like Shopping Lists, and a meal planner, pulling from the food you have at home. The app doesn't require a compatible fridge, but having the AI Smart Fridge does take some of the work out of keeping a running catalogue of the food in your house.
Samsung Food+ on the other hand, is the paid subscription level of Samsung Food. For $6.99/mth (or $59.99/year) Food+ will let you snap a picture of something as you put it in the fridge, and automatically add it to your Food List. According to reporting from The Verge, this feature dubbed Vision AI can identify more than 40,000 types of ingredients, which is a big step up from the 30 or so the fridge camera can handle. From here it uses AI to create meal plans based on that Food List, prioritising what is closest to its use-by date, and catering to your individual health objectives and macronutrient intake across the week. Comparitively Samsung Food (no plus), only gives you three days of meal planning per week.
This added functionality really rounds out what Samsung put into motion earlier this year, but the paid subscription element still stings. I'm not opposed to paying for things that make your life easier, but if you're already forking out over $4,000 for the AI Family Hub, it would be nice to see Samsung throw in a Samsung Food+ subscription with it.
