Sunbasket vs. Freshly vs. Trifecta vs. Hello Fresh: Comparison & Reviews 2022
Meal kit delivery services are a way to save money for the many who want fresh, home-cooked meals without having to think about recipes, quantities, and precise shopping lists. However, with so many options on the market and with so much risk involved, it can be difficult to choose the right one.
Since Blue Apron launched in 2012, there have been seemingly endless competitors — offerings ranging from vegan and plant-based meals to comfort food and Martha Stewart-approved dishes.
After years of testing a dozen dishes and cooking countless different dinners on busy weeknights, our favorite dish delivery service is Home Chef. It ditches the gimmicks in favor of consistently high-quality recipes, high-quality ingredients, and enough variety to satisfy most diets.
Quickly compare:
Home Chef vs. EveryPlate vs. Blue Apron vs. Freshly vs. HelloFresh vs. Sunbasket
Home Chef | EveryPlate | Blue Apron | Freshly | HelloFresh | Sunbasket | |
Best For | Time management | Price | Variety | Convenience | Customizable options | Quality ingredients |
Price per meal | $6.99+ | $4.99+ | $7.99+ | $8.99+ | $7.99+ | $9.99+ |
Minimum order | 2 meals / 2 plates | 3 meals / 2 plates | 2 meals / 2 plates | 4-12 individual meals | 2 meals / 2 plates | 2 meals / 2 plates |
Delivery Cost | Starts at $9.99 | $9.99 | $9.99 | Starts at $9.99 | $9.99 | $9.99 |
Vegetarian plans | Yes | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
Kid-friendly meals | No | Yes | No | No | Yes | Yes |
Promotion | Try Home Chef - Get $90 off your first 3 orders! | Try Everyplate at $1.49/meal on 1st box + 20% off next 2 boxes! | Blue Apron new customers: Enjoy $180 off across 6 orders—plus, your first order ships free! | Try Freshly - For a Limited Time Get $140 Off Your First 5 Boxes! or Try FreshlyFIT - Save $40 off your first order! | Try HelloFresh - Get 18 Free Meals + 3 Surprise Gifts + Free Shipping! | Try Sunbasket - Get $90 off + a free gift and free shipping on your first box! |
Our Score | 9.7/10 | 8/10 | 7.5/10 | 9/10 | 9/10 | 9/10 |
The Best Meal Kit Delivery Services of 2024
Best for time management: Home Chef
Pros
Several gluten-free and vegetarian meals each week
Many customization options
Cons
Excessive packaging
No plant-based meal plan
Try Home Chef - Get $90 off your first 3 orders!
If time management is important to you, Home Chef is a great service worth trying.
Home Chef organizes many of their dishes based on when they're made, from 15-minute meals like prosciutto and fig mini flatbreads to elaborate dinners in their cooking series, like a bacon-jalapeno steak sandwich.
Home Chef's reasonably priced $6.99+ per serving (including shipping) is attractive because they offer 20 or more meal options per week, with a wide variety to meet dietary needs. You can choose from the traditional Home Chef plan or their "Fresh and Easy" plan, which offers low- or no-prep meals.
Home Chef can also accommodate many common allergies and dietary preferences, including calorie- and carbohydrate-conscious meals, vegetarian dishes, soy- and gluten-free options, and more. You can also customize your protein, such as swapping ground pork for ground turkey, and add à la carte options, including breakfast and dessert.
Some home chef kits are even available at your local Kroger grocery store.
Best for price: EveryPlate
Pros
Lower cost than most meal kits
Minimal packaging
Cons
May receive lower quality produce
Limited variety of meals and ingredients
No plant-based meal plan and very few vegetarian and gluten-free options
Try Everyplate at $1.49/meal on 1st box + 20% off next 2 boxes!
If the cost of meal delivery kits baffles you, check out EveryPlate. The meal delivery service is much cheaper than most other services, including its parent company, HelloFresh.
EveryPlate costs between $4.99 and $5.89 per meal, plus a flat-rate shipping fee of $9.99. These meal kits are cheaper than takeout and groceries, and are half the price or less than other meal kit delivery services. To keep costs low, EveryPlate uses simpler ingredients, recipes and packaging. You can order three, four or five meals per week for two or four people.
Each week, you can choose from a menu of 18 different dishes, including about five vegetarian options. Meal plan options include Meat & Vegetable, Family Friendly, Vegetarian, and Quick & Easy. You can customize many meals for free or for a small fee by exchanging proteins or side dishes.
EveryPlate meals are simple and familiar without being fancy. If you want to take dinner up a notch, you can pay extra for premium meals. For ingredients like seafood and steak, as well as slightly more complex dishes, the cost per serving will increase by $4.99 to $6.99.
EveryPlate meal kits are as functional as they are delicious. The recipe is easy to follow and most of the ingredients look and taste great. While the dining options are more limited than other services, there are still plenty of great dishes on the menu, especially if you like comfort food and classic flavors.
It's a great cutlery for anyone looking to save money on dinner, whether you're single or cooking for a family. EveryPlate is also a great option if you don't like to cook or just don't have much time to cook, since all recipes have six steps or less and are beginner-friendly.
If you're looking for strictly healthy meals, you follow a specific diet, or you have dietary restrictions, or you like variety at dinner, then this probably isn't the meal kit service for you.
Best for variety: Blue Apron
Pros
Extensive variety of meals and ingredients
More balanced recipes than many other meal kits
Cons
Excessive packaging
No plant-based meal plan and very few vegetarian and gluten-free options
Blue Apron new customers: Enjoy $180 off across 6 orders—plus, your first order ships free!
Blue Apron is the second most popular food delivery service. The company is known for its unique dishes, which are often of a higher class than the rest.
Blue Apron offers about 19 different meals each week, including (typically) 14 meal kits, three prepared meals, and two ready-to-eat meals fresh from the oven. Meal plans are chef favorites, healthy, family friendly and quick and easy. Blue Apron's menu has more international flavors and out-of-the-box combinations than other package services.
Compared to the prices of other meal kit services, Blue Apron is on the higher end of the average. Each meal costs from $7.99 to $11.99. When setting up your account, you can choose to have two, three or four meals per week, with two or four meals per meal. You can add optional wine pairings or market items like breakfast, side dishes, and desserts to your box for $11 a bottle.
If you're looking for a colorful and fun meal every week, this is the meal delivery service for you. Blue Apron is also one of my top choices for weight-conscious people, as many meals are WeightWatchers-approved and under 600 calories. This meal kit delivery service is also great for anyone who wants to prepare or prepare meals quickly.
If you have picky eaters in your home, a tight grocery budget, or don't have a lot of time to cook (but don't want to prep), then the Blue Apron might not be for you. Also, it helps if you have more experience in the kitchen, as recipes can be a little vague and beginners can be frustrated.
Best for convenience: Freshly
Pros
Plant-based meal plan available
Several gluten-free and vegetarian meals each week
More balanced recipes than many other meal kits
Cons
Higher cost than most meal kits
Only single-portion meals
If you want to provide balanced meals each week without cooking, check out Freshly.
Healthy, delicious and convenient single-serve meals delivered fresh. So convenient, in fact, that you just pop them in the microwave for about three minutes.
Unlike its competitors, Freshly doesn't offer plan options designed for two-, three-, or four-person families. Instead, you can order between four and 12 individual meals throughout the week at lunch and dinner, like their grilled sausage macaroni or unwrapped salsa verde burritos. Because Freshly's meals are single-serving, they can accommodate a variety of dietary preferences, including gluten-free, dairy-free, peanut-free, plant-based, low-calorie, and carbohydrate-focused.
For singles, workaholics, and oven-hating people, Freshly is unbeatable. If anything, their downside is the price. At $8.99 or more per meal, plus $9.99 or more for delivery, Freshly is one of the more expensive food delivery services out there. While that might seem like a lot of money for a nice microwave meal, you're paying more to skip prep time, cooking time, and cleanup time.
Best for beginners: HelloFresh
Pros
Easy-to-follow recipe cards
Many customization options
Several gluten-free and vegetarian options each week
Cons
No plant-based meal plan
Longer cook times than some other meal kits
Try HelloFresh - Get 18 Free Meals + 3 Surprise Gifts + Free Shipping!
HelloFresh, one of the first meal kit delivery services ever, and one of the most popular today, offers meal kits. Fun and easy and educational recipes make it the best meal delivery service for beginners.
HelloFresh offers six different meal plans to choose from, including vegetarian options, family-friendly options, and pescatarian options. Each recipe includes a climate score, difficulty level, and nutritional content. Include custom combinations like swapping proteins or side dishes, and the rotating menu features more than 30 recipes.
HelloFresh is superior to many catering services in catering to different dietary needs. While most meals are allergy-free, there are plenty of options for changing ingredients so you can create a recipe that suits your needs (often for free).
You can order two to six recipes per week for two to four people—much more choice than other meal delivery services. Each serving costs between $7.99 and $11.99, plus $9.99 shipping, which is on par with Blue Apron.
I would recommend HelloFresh to beginners, people who want to reduce waste, and families who need meals for kids and adults. The recipes are easy to follow and there are several kid-friendly dishes on the menu. Plus, HelloFresh lets you customize it to your liking.
If you're after a healthy meal, you might want to choose a different meal delivery service. HelloFresh has some balanced meals, but many recipes are high in fat and calories. It's not the most affordable meal box, either. HelloFresh will save you time shopping for groceries, but it might not save you money, or it might cost you more than your current dinner.
Best for quality ingredients: Sunbasket
Pros
Gluten-free, paleo, and keto meal plans
Several vegetarian options each week
Cons
Higher cost than most meal kits
Fewer box size and frequency options than other meal kits
Try Sunbasket - Get $90 off + a free gift and free shipping on your first box!
Sunbasket is a food delivery service that caters to people who value sustainable business practices and healthy organic ingredients.
This service puts quality first. They work with select ranchers and fishermen who respect and care for their animals, and farmers who provide 100% organic produce.
Sunbasket offers a variety of meals for paleo eaters, vegetarians, gluten-free and more. You can also choose preferences like "high protein," "low calorie," or even "diabetic friendly." For families, Sunbasket offers kid-friendly dishes with recipe instructions that include advice on how children can help.
In addition to their many creative dishes—such as Moroccan-spiced salmon with gem couscous and lemon yogurt, or three-mushroom quinoa with watercress, green onions, and peas—Sunbasket also has an online marketplace, similar to Blue Apron, that you can buy at Shop there for everything from breakfast to snacks to fast food and even specialty meats.
The problem with Sunbasket is the price tag. For $9.99 each (plus shipping), you'll receive a pre-made meal that's ready in four minutes. However, if you prefer a set meal with fresh ingredients that you can cook yourself, Sunbasket is a little more expensive at $11.49 per serving.
What are the cheapest food delivery services in 2024?
Get food delivered for very little money. In fact, some of the cheapest combo plans are as low as $5 net per serving. EveryPlate and Dinnerly, the two cheapest meal plans in 2024, are scheduled to drop by about $5 per serving. It was followed by HelloFresh, Blue Apron and Home Chef, all priced around $9 or $10 each. The most expensive packages are Sunbasket, Green Chef, and Martha Stewart and Marley Spoon, which range from $11 to $15 per serving, depending on your plan.
Which meal delivery service is best for dieting and weight loss?
If you're trying to lose weight, cut carbs, or maintain a specific diet, some meal delivery services are better than others. Home Chef is the meal kit service with the most options to follow a specific diet and substitute foods that don't fit your nutritional plan. HelloFresh also has a lot of ketogenic and paleo options. If you use Weight Watchers, Blue Apron has integrated the WW points system to make it easy to reach your goals.
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