Is AteMate Free? AteMate Pricing, Trial and Refund Rules
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The US App Store lists AteMate at $9.99 a month, $19.99 a quarter and $49.99 a year, with a separate "AteMate Coach" tier at $19.99 a month. The app itself downloads for free. The journal inside it does not stay free.
That surprises a lot of people, because this app used to be free. It launched in February 2017 as Ate, a photo food journal with no calorie counting, and the Android package is still named com.youate.android. Somewhere between then and the AteMate relaunch, the free version stopped being offered to new users. I read AteMate's terms of service, both store listings, the coach pricing page and the 150 most recent US App Store reviews on 5 October 2026 while covering app pricing for NutriScan. This guide covers what AteMate costs, what the three tiers differ on, how the 7-day trial works, what the refund rules say, and how to cancel so the charge stops.
Is AteMate free? No. New users get a 7-day trial and then pay $9.99 a month, $19.99 a quarter or $49.99 a year on the US App Store. Only a small group of legacy accounts still has the old free version.
TL;DR - AteMate Pricing
No free tier for new users: The download is free, the journal sits behind a subscription after a 7-day trial
US App Store prices: $9.99 monthly, $19.99 quarterly, $49.99 yearly, and AteMate Coach at $19.99 monthly
The trial is once per Apple ID: If you tried Ate or AteMate before, expect a charge on day one
Refunds go through Apple or Google: AteMate's terms promise no money-back window of their own
Deleting the app does not cancel: Neither does closing your account, so cancel in the store where you subscribed
IMPORTANT
Your AteMate pricing plan at a glance.
A quick roadmap so you can decide before the trial clock starts.
⏱️ Progress 0/4 • ~0 minutes in • Keep going
⏳ Step 1: What AteMate costs and what the tiers buy
⏳ Step 2: The trial and refund rules
⏳ Step 3: How to cancel, and who should pay
🔍 The one route to a seat you do not pay for (revealed near the end)
Who makes AteMate
AteMate is published by Piqniq, Inc. The terms of service, last updated 1 July 2026, give a registered office at 2000 S Colorado Blvd, Bldg 1-2000 #188, Denver, CO 80222, and a Colorado Entity ID of 20241021582. The imprint page adds a Delaware registration, EIN 47-1240649, and names Tom Kiss as CEO.
The iOS app, AteMate Food Journal & Coach, carries App Store ID 1164976477 and was first released on 16 February 2017. Apple's public lookup API shows version 5.1.1 shipped on 29 September 2026, with an average of 4.79 stars across 10,342 US ratings, and the listing page shows an 18+ age rating. On Android, the Google Play listing shows 4.1 stars from 587 reviews, 100K+ downloads and a 29 September 2026 update. The package ID, com.youate.android, is a leftover from the app's earlier name.
The homepage says the app is "trusted by 600,000+ people" and lists partnerships with the YMCA, the American Council on Exercise and the U.S. Air Force. AteMate also sells a separate product to coaches, which matters later.
Is AteMate free?
No. There is no free tier for new users, and the terms say so in plain language. Section 5.3 describes three paid tiers and then adds the sentence behind most of the angry reviews: "A limited number of legacy Users retain access to an older free version of the Application. That version is no longer offered to new Users and its continued availability is not guaranteed."
So the free app people remember still exists on some old accounts. If you install AteMate today, you get a 7-day trial and then a bill. Reviewers keep running into the paywall only after they finish onboarding. One recent one-star review reads: "Doesn't tell you you have to pay until after you've already gone through submitting all your information." A three-star review: "Used to love this app before they made you pay for a subscription."
The download is free. The journal costs money unless you are one of the grandfathered users.
Snap a photo, save the meal: that is the whole AteMate habit, and it now sits behind a subscription
What AteMate costs on the App Store
Apple shows the live in-app purchase list on the listing page. As of 5 October 2026, the US prices are:
| Plan | Price | Cost per month |
|---|---|---|
| AteMate Monthly | $9.99 | $9.99 |
| AteMate Quarterly | $19.99 | $6.66 |
| AteMate Yearly | $49.99 | $4.17 |
| AteMate Coach Monthly | $19.99 | $19.99 |
Twelve monthly renewals cost $119.88, so the yearly plan saves $69.89, or 58 percent, if you stay a full year. The quarterly plan is the middle option at $79.96 a year. Section 9.2 of the terms confirms the structure: "Yearly billing is offered at a discount to monthly."
Figure 1: Twelve months of AteMate on each US App Store plan. Paying monthly costs 2.4 times the yearly price for the same journal.
The listing shows no price for the higher AteMate Coach Plus tier, and promotional price points do not appear there either. Section 9.4 of the terms reserves the right to run discounts that are "limited in time, limited to certain users, or applied manually," which is how one person sees $49.99 and another sees a countdown offer. Check the price inside the app before you tap, because the terms only promise that a promotional price applies "for the stated period, after which your Subscription renews at the standard price."
Prices outside the US follow Apple's regional tiers and your local tax rules. Section 9.7 says prices shown may not include tax. For a sense of where $49.99 sits against calorie trackers, the cheapest nutrition app comparison lists the yearly prices side by side.
The three AteMate tiers and what separates them
All three tiers include the same journal. Section 5.3 is explicit that "All tiers include the full journal and insights. The tiers differ in the level of AI Coach access included, which we call the coaching allowance."
- AteMate: full journal, insights, and a preview level of AI Coach access.
- AteMate Coach: full journal, insights, and standard AI Coach access.
- AteMate Coach Plus: full journal, insights, and extended AI Coach access.
The extra money buys chat volume with an AI. It adds no tracking features. The terms also say the company "may set, change, or limit coaching allowances and tier features," so the allowance you buy in October is not contractually the allowance you keep in March.
Two settings control the food side. Section 5.5 says AteMate AI handles meal photo recognition and pattern spotting, and a sub-option called Detailed Nutritional Analysis controls whether estimated macros and calories appear at all. Turn AteMate AI off and both stop. The AI Coach still answers questions using what you log, with fewer food insights behind it. That toggle is the reason the app can market itself to people who want nothing to do with calorie numbers, which is a real gap in the photo logging category.
IMPORTANT
Checkpoint: here is where you are right now.
Prices are settled, the rules that cost people money come next.
⏱️ Progress 1/4 • ~2 minutes in • Keep going
✅ Step 1: What AteMate costs and what the tiers buy (done)
👉 Step 2: The trial and refund rules (you are here)
⏳ Step 3: How to cancel, and who should pay
🧩 The one route to a seat you do not pay for (coming soon)
The AteMate free trial, and the rule that costs people money
Section 9.1 of the terms reads: "We offer a free trial (currently 7 days) for most Subscriptions after you set up a payment method. Some special offers do not include a trial. Unless you cancel before the trial ends, your Subscription begins and we charge your payment method automatically when the trial ends. We may not send a separate reminder that your trial is ending unless required by law."
Three things are worth pulling out of that paragraph. The trial needs a payment method up front, so the charge happens automatically. There may be no reminder email. And "most Subscriptions" means a discounted offer can arrive with no trial attached at all.
Apple's own rule decides the rest: a free trial is granted once per subscription group per Apple ID, and reinstalling does not reset it. A four-star reviewer wrote: "I was charged for the trial period because I signed up a year ago and forgot, so you can only get the free trial once. Apple refunded my money since the company couldn't do it."
Tried Ate or AteMate before?
Assume today's install bills you on day one. Open your App Store subscription screen and read the first charge date before you log a single meal.
The same rule catches people on Cal AI's trial.
AteMate refunds: what the terms promise, and what they leave out
Section 9.5 is short and worth quoting in full, because it draws a hard line between store purchases and website purchases: "Purchases made through a Webstore are subject to that Webstore's refund policies. If you purchased directly through the Website and you are a consumer in the European Union or the United Kingdom, you may have a statutory right to withdraw from your purchase within 14 days, subject to the conditions of that right. Other refunds are at our discretion except where the law requires otherwise."
Consumers subscribe to AteMate inside the app, which means the refund request goes to Apple at reportaproblem.apple.com or to Google Play. Piqniq cannot refund an Apple charge for you, and it promises no money-back window of its own.
Section 9.6 adds a detail most apps do not disclose. If you ask Apple for a refund, AteMate may hand Apple data to help judge the request, including "time since installation, total app usage time, an anonymous account identifier, whether the purchase was consumed, whether it included a trial, the total amount spent, and the total amount refunded." You can withdraw consent to that sharing by writing to [email protected], though doing so after you have already asked for a refund is unlikely to help your case.
IMPORTANT
Checkpoint: midway progress update.
You are halfway, and the cancel steps are short.
⏱️ Progress 2/4 • ~4 minutes in • Keep going
✅ Step 1: What AteMate costs and what the tiers buy (done)
✅ Step 2: The trial and refund rules (done)
👉 Step 3: How to cancel, and who should pay (current)
⏳ The one route to a seat you do not pay for (next)
How to cancel AteMate
Cancellation follows the billing channel, and section 9.3 spells out two things people get wrong.
- If you subscribed in the app on iPhone, open Settings, tap your name, tap Subscriptions, select AteMate, then Cancel Subscription. Do it at least a day before the renewal date.
- On Android, open the Play Store, tap your profile icon, then Payments and subscriptions, then Subscriptions, select AteMate and cancel.
- If you subscribed through the AteMate website (this applies to coaches, who are billed by Stripe), cancel in your account settings or by contacting support.
Deleting the app does nothing: "Managing or deleting the Application does not cancel your Subscription." Closing your AteMate account does nothing either, and the terms make that point twice, in section 9.3 and again near the end: "closing your account does not by itself cancel a Subscription purchased through a Webstore."
Cancelling takes effect at the end of the paid period, so you keep access until the date you already paid for. That is standard, and it is the same pattern as Yuka's yearly membership.
What the research says about a food journal without numbers
AteMate's pitch is that photos and feelings beat weighing and counting. The evidence is friendlier to that idea than you might expect, with limits.
On burden, a Stanford pilot by Patel et al., 2022 randomized 38 adults to detailed food logging in an app or a simplified checklist of high-calorie foods. The simplified arm logged on a median of 97 percent of days against 49 percent for the detailed arm, and both groups lost about the same weight, -3.3 kg and -3.4 kg at three months. Lower friction bought much better adherence at no measurable cost to the result.
Adherence is the part that decays. Carpenter et al., 2022 tracked 54 adults through a six-month program and found the median time to disengagement was 10 weeks for food logging against 19.5 weeks for activity tracking, and that longer consistency in food logging was associated with greater weight loss. An app you keep using for 12 weeks beats a more precise one you quit in four.
On the mindful eating angle, results are mixed. A randomized trial of 138 women with obesity by Pepe et al., 2023 found no significant weight difference between mindful eating, energy restriction and both combined, but the mindful eating group improved most on uncontrolled and emotional eating. A meta-analysis by Kao et al., 2025 found mindfulness-based interventions improved fullness awareness (g = 0.64) and reduced external eating (g = -0.62) and energy intake (g = -0.60), while the effect on emotional eating was small and not significant (g = -0.27, p = 0.070). And an intuitive eating trial in 106 young women by Casgrain et al., 2026 improved intuitive eating scores and cut disordered eating behaviors, with dietary quality unchanged.
Read together, this style of journaling changes how you eat and how you feel about eating. None of these trials shows it moving the scale faster than counting does.
The AI coach has thinner support. A systematic review by Noh et al., 2023 found only 8 studies of conversational agents for weight management, of which 3 reported weight loss of 1.3 to 2.4 kg, and the authors judged the overall study quality as low. That is early-stage evidence for the one feature the higher tiers charge for.
How accurate is AteMate's photo recognition?
This is where AteMate's own reviews get rough. A two-star reviewer wrote: "How is a bowl of beans low nutrients and little protein?" A one-star review updated in September 2026 says: "The AI feature never gets the food right and you can't tell it what's in the picture."
The terms already concede the point. Section 5.6 warns that "AI generated content, including meal photo recognition, macro and calorie estimates, the weekly journal review, and AI Coach responses, may be inaccurate, incomplete, or out of date," and puts the job of checking on you.
Independent testing agrees that images alone are the hard case. Rodríguez-Jiménez et al., 2025 evaluated a vision language model on 195 dishes and found accuracy improved step by step as context was added to the photo, first standardized descriptors, then ingredient lists with amounts. Removing the image while keeping the ingredients made accuracy worse again. The picture helps, and the picture on its own is the weakest input. Any app that lets you correct the guess will beat one that does not, which is worth checking against how different scan types work.
NutriScan publishes this post, and we make a competing app. NutriScan takes the opposite position on numbers. It shows calories and macros from the photo by default, and when the estimate is off you can change the portion, edit the macros or ask it to re-check the meal. Premium runs about $59 a year. If you want a journal with the numbers switched off, AteMate is built for that. If you want the numbers and want to fix them when they are wrong, a scanner fits better.
Who should pay for AteMate, and who should skip it
Pay for it if you are done with calorie counting, you want a visual record with mood, sleep, hydration and movement in one timeline, and you have found that photographing a meal changes what you put on the plate. The five-star reviews are specific about that. One long-time user writes of "using Ate for several years," another says it is the first app that helps them stay mindful "without triggering my disordered ways," and the "Why did you eat" prompt gets its own praise.
Skip it if you need macro targets, if you want a free tier, or if you mainly want the photo feature and nothing else. A four-star reviewer put that case well: "I don't use any of the features aside from the photo journal. I have no interest in an AI coach, personally. I wish there was a lower subscription tier with restricted features." There is no such tier. The cheapest way in is $49.99 a year, and the tiers above it only add AI chat. If a free tier with calorie and macro targets is what you want, Foodnoms keeps both free on iPhone.
Also skip it if you are under 18. Section 4 of the terms restricts the service to people aged 18 and over, despite the Play listing's Everyone content rating.
Reading the subscription screen before you confirm is the cheapest step in this whole guide
IMPORTANT
Checkpoint: final stretch before the reveal.
One last nudge, the reveal is next.
⏱️ Progress 3/4 • ~7 minutes in • Keep going
✅ Step 1: What AteMate costs and what the tiers buy
✅ Step 2: The trial and refund rules
✅ Step 3: How to cancel, and who should pay
✨ The one route to a seat you do not pay for (about to reveal)
AteMate for Coaches: the one route to a client seat you do not pay for
The coach product is a separate business with its own price list, billed by Stripe on the website instead of through the app stores:
| Coach plan | Clients included | Price |
|---|---|---|
| Starter | Up to 3 | $20 per month |
| Growth | Up to 10 | $50 per month |
| Practice | Up to 20 | $80 per month |
The page says "the only difference between plans is the number of client licenses included," and every plan comes with "client app licenses (based on your plan)." So if you already work with a dietitian or trainer who runs AteMate for Coaches, your seat can come out of their plan and stay off your own card. Ask them before you start a trial of your own. Coaches get a 21-day free trial, per section 9.8, against the 7 days consumers get.
Section 13 describes how the link works. A client enters the coach's invite code to approve the connection, the coach can then see that client's journal and message them, and the client can disconnect at any time, which ends the coach's access.
AteMate pricing FAQ
Is there a free version of AteMate? Not for new users. Some legacy accounts keep an older free version, and the terms say its continued availability is not guaranteed.
How much does AteMate cost? $9.99 a month, $19.99 a quarter or $49.99 a year on the US App Store. A separate AteMate Coach tier is listed at $19.99 a month.
Does AteMate have a free trial? Yes, currently 7 days, and it needs a payment method first. Apple grants a trial once per Apple ID for the subscription group, so a previous trial means an immediate charge.
Can I get a refund from AteMate? For app store purchases you have to ask Apple or Google, because store refund policies apply. Website buyers in the EU and UK may have a 14-day statutory withdrawal right. Everything else is at the company's discretion.
Does deleting the app cancel my subscription? No. Neither does closing your AteMate account. Cancel in the App Store or Play Store where you subscribed.
Is AteMate the same app as Ate? Yes. It is the same app from the same company, Piqniq, Inc. The iOS listing dates to February 2017 and the Android package is still named com.youate.android.
What does AteMate for Coaches cost? $20 a month for up to 3 clients, $50 for up to 10 and $80 for up to 20, with client app licenses included and a 21-day trial.
Is AteMate free? The short answer
AteMate is a paid app with a free download and a 7-day trial you may not qualify for. $49.99 a year is the sensible entry point, the two higher tiers only buy more AI coach access, and every store refund goes through Apple or Google. If the old free Ate is what you are looking for, it is gone unless you never left.
Prices in this piece are from the US App Store, Google Play and atemate.com, checked on 5 October 2026. Local currency prices and the terms can change.
IMPORTANT
Recap: everything you covered this round.
You finished the run, save this for the day before your renewal date.
⏱️ Progress 4/4 • ~9 minutes in • Nicely done
✅ Step 1: What AteMate costs and what the tiers buy
✅ Step 2: The trial and refund rules
✅ Step 3: How to cancel, and who should pay
✅ The one route to a seat you do not pay for (revealed)