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EveryPlate Meal Kit Review (2026): Low Cost, Simplicity, Flavor
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I'll keep this simple: EveryPlate is the lowest-cost meal delivery service I've tested that offers full, balanced, hot meals (and I've tried nearly all of them). At $7 a serving, it's also the only one that wouldn't require any particular adjustment in my grocery budget. And yet, this budget meal plan from HelloFresh is somehow able to offer dinners that even your judgy mom-in-law would recognize as a balanced dinner.
The pork chop meal I tried this May is the sort of meat-and-two supper that I probably took too much for granted when I was a child. Pan-seared chops. Crispy-leafed brussels sprouts baked in the oven. Fresh mashed potatoes. But what elevated the meal from basic staple to weekday extravagance was a thoughtful shallot-garlic-cream pan sauce, cooked with fresh thyme in the juices from the pork I'd just finished searing. The sauce was rich, complex, aromatic, and just enough outside my usual repertoire that I felt like I'd learned a useful secret.
This was a work-tired Wednesday, a day I'm more prone to regrettable DoorDashes than cogent meal planning. While the dish took 45 minutes to make—longer than most EveryPlate meals—the process was straightforward. Each ingredient was pre-portioned, and the cook times were pretested so that the sprouts and fresh mashed potatoes and chops all arrived together. If I would have rather steamed or pan-seared the sprouts, it was a quibble for a different day.
In the past year with EveryPlate, I have made spring pea and zucchini risotto, Chinese-inspired dumpling soup, Tex-Mexy pork “birria” tacos, and ponzu turkey or beef bulgogi rice bowls. All were dishes I wouldn't have had the energy to plan and shop for on a weekday unless particularly inspired. Few meals were what I'd call sophisticated. But most were more healthful and much cheaper than any takeout meal I might have gotten instead.
This is the biggest benefit of EveryPlate's meal kit: a simple, hearty dinner that still fits in the budget, without requiring difficult meal planning from a life that already feels overloaded. It does not offer the complexity or variety of higher-priced meal kits. And some staples, such as eggs, are BYO. But EveryPlate slots easily into a busy life and feels more and more affordable as my grocery store squeezes me harder by the day. Here's how it works.
EveryPlate works similarly to any number of home-prepared meal delivery services. Signing up online involves choosing the number of meals and portions you want each week. Two-, four- or six-portion meals are offered. You can select three to five different meals a week, from a menu of around 35 options. Among these, about 10 can be made vegetarian.
Most plans cost $7 a portion, with an $11 shipping charge for each box. This makes EveryPlate significantly cheaper than other budget kits when cooking for two or four people—which is most households. Note that competitors Dinnerly and Home Chef become competitively priced, or even cheaper, when planning for six-portion meals.
Expect most recipes to take 20 to 45 minutes to cook: As a rule of thumb, take whatever cooking time is printed on the recipe card and add 50 percent. In part, this is because all recipe makers underestimate times. Also because you are probably not a professional cook in a commissary kitchen.
When it arrives, your EveryPlate box will contain recipe cards and a paper bag with most ingredients jumbled together. Meat is kept on the bottom, nestled against an ice pack. Many premium meal delivery plans sort ingredients into individual recipe bags, but this is a luxury you'll often give up when using budget plans. Either you'll have to organize ingredients each week as the box arrives, or just expect to do a little rummaging around, especially for the first recipe.
But while EveryPlate's costs are low, this mostly does not come at the cost of decent ingredients. EveryPlate uses the same protein purveyors as parent company HelloFresh's premium plan. The shrimp is domestic, on Eve