Over the past few years, I’ve been asked to review the Yuka app many times. It’s always interesting to see apps that claim to help people make better choices about food. That’s because these apps inevitably categorize the choices into arbitrary categories of “good” and “bad.”
How does Yuka decide whether food is “delicious” or “bad”? What are the advantages and disadvantages of using such an app? So let’s get started.
What is Yuka app?
The Yuka app was first released in France in 2017, and later in Canada and the United States in 2022. According to its website, it has more than 55 million users.
The app allows users to scan barcodes on food and cosmetics to rate how “healthy” or not they are. For products with low scores, the app will suggest alternative choices that it considers “better”.
In this Yuka app review, we will focus on the food and nutritional aspects of the Yuka app.
When you scan a product, you get an overall score and rating, which then categorizes the product’s positive and negative characteristics based on the Yuka app’s scoring system. More on this later.
The app also categorizes foods as “good” or “bad” based on their overall score.
Yuka also takes pride in being independent and not influenced by food companies. The app has a paid premium version that generates revenue.
How does the Yuka app score products?
The Yuka app scores products based on three factors. Nutritional quality is 60% of the score, the presence of additives is 30%, and whether the product is organic is 10%. According to the Yuka app website, this 10% is an automatic “bonus” given to organic products.
The nutritional quality scoring system is based on a method called Nutri-Score, which has been adopted in several European countries. Nutri-Score grades foods and the nutritional value of fruits, vegetables, legumes, and nuts based on energy (calories), carbohydrates, saturated fat, sodium, fiber, and protein. A front-of-pack labeling system is then used to classify foods into five categories based on nutritional quality. The system rates food into categories A to E. A indicates high nutritional value and E indicates low nutritional value.
Categories are colored based on traffic lights, with top categories moving down from green to yellow to red depending on their overall score.
There is research on Nutri-Score, but as I’ve said many times, just because a study exists doesn’t mean it’s good research. The study found an association (not causation) that the use of this system benefits health and reduces mortality, but these findings are weak overall and are not influenced by genetics or environmental factors. Many factors such as: This study used the notoriously inaccurate food frequency questionnaire to assess dietary patterns. They evaluated diet only at baseline and followed up several years later. We know that people can change their eating and lifestyle habits over time, so drawing conclusions based on one study at a single point in time doesn’t tell us much. yeah.
I wrote about how to interpret nutritional research here.
When you scan your food using the Yuka app, you’ll receive a numerical score out of 100 and a rating of “excellent,” “good,” “poor,” or “poor.” For example, the Goldfish crackers I scanned contained additives that Yuka says to avoid, and the app gave them a score of 7/100 (poor) because they had too much salt and calories. Ta. Positive attributes included that the crackers contained 3 g of protein and were low in saturated fat.
The natural peanut butter I scanned was given a 69/100 (good) but was deducted for being too high in calories and saturated fat.
Categorizing foods as “good” or “bad” is a terrible habit. It can create feelings of guilt and shame around food and eating, but that’s completely arbitrary. There is no good or bad food. Any food can fit into a variety of diets, and food should not be labeled based on morality.
These kinds of stories don’t help anyone become healthier (especially emotionally, and that’s just as important as physical health), and they tend to cause even more confusion when it comes to nutrition. Peanut butter is rich in healthy fats, vitamins, and minerals. This isn’t the 80’s when everyone avoided fat.
I can’t even imagine anyone deducting points from peanut butter because it’s high in calories – it’s a nut butter. It’s also rich in nutrients (and low in saturated fat!). The quality of calories is important!
Labeling foods as good or bad can create fear and anxiety about food and cause people to develop orthorexic-type habits that make them overly focused on making healthy choices. This is terrible for our mental health and takes away the fact that we don’t eat food alone. What matters is our entire diet.
If you’re eating only whole foods and minimally processed foods, you don’t need to worry about “scores” like crackers or peanut butter.
The Yuka app ranks foods with high amounts of saturated fat as “bad,” or at least lowers their score. Dairy products are particularly affected by this rating system because they are naturally high in saturated fat. The guideline for saturated fat intake is to keep it to less than 10% of your total calorie intake. When the cheese was scanned, it received a low rating for being too high in saturated fat, and points were deducted for being too high in calories and salt.
Foods contain a variety of nutrients, and although cheese contains a lot of saturated fat (compared to low-fat milk or yogurt, for example), it is a good source of protein, calcium, and other vitamins and minerals. It’s a source of supply. Research also suggests that saturated fat in dairy products is not a risk factor for inflammation or heart disease.
Lowering scores because of one aspect is problematic and only confuses people into making healthy choices when it determines the overall nutritional value of a food.
The calorie rating system is also a little strange to me. Cheese was considered “a little too high in calories” at 120 calories per serving, while 2% milk was considered “low calorie” at 130 calories per cup. One food may have more calories than another, but it may also be more filling. Again, this classification can lead to compulsive behaviors around food and calorie counting. It’s not healthy.
Yuka app and additives
Before I say anything, let me share that I found this part of their rating system completely ridiculous.
They said the monocalcium phosphate in Goldfish Crackers was “dangerous,” but their explanation didn’t prove anything. It just says that too much phosphorus can cause problems. Too much of anything is bad, but if you’re going to comment on the dangers of random additives, you should comment on the actual amount of this additive in your product and how much you use in your product. there is. It must be ingested to cause harm.
Incredibly, the app also labeled monosodium glutamate (MSG) in Daughter’s Takis as “hazardous,” something science consistently refutes. The 14 studies Yuka cites to support their claims are unconvincing and seem cherry-picked to suit their story. Rodent studies, cell studies, old studies, bad studies, even studies that found no adverse effects of MSG on humans.
Maybe Yuka thinks that normal people don’t check their quotes, but I certainly think so.
We reviewed the research on MSG. See my post on whether MSG is safe here.
This whole thing can lead to chemophobia around food, making people think what they’re eating is toxic. In fact, all foods are completely safe. Food additives are strictly regulated in Canada and the United States, and there are limits on the amount they can be used.
Does your diet have to consist entirely of Froot Loops? Of course not. But let’s approach food with nuance and science.
PS: Flute Loops scored higher than Multigrain Cheerios and Goldfish Crackers.
Organic food and Yuka app
After everything that happened with the Yuka app’s “additives”, sadly I’m not the least bit surprised by what they say about organic food.
The website lists the health benefits of eating organic and states that organic foods are rich in antioxidants. Yuka says people who eat more organic foods have a lower risk of cancer, diabetes, overweight and obesity. They cite studies that support these claims, but these studies only show associations, not causation.
That’s because there is no direct link between organic food and improved health markers. none.
In fact, I’ve written about studies they cite that show people who eat more organic food have a lower risk of cancer. The media made a fuss when this study was published, but what they didn’t say was that people who eat more organic foods have healthier diets and lifestyles overall, and have better access to health care. , those with higher socio-economic status tend to spend more time there. For physical activity. These are all factors that can affect your risk of disease much more than simply eating organic foods than conventional foods.
When the Yuka app suggests a “healthier” alternative to a product, it’s usually an organic version that will be more expensive, which can make people feel bad about their food choices, and we It doesn’t need anything more than that.
Organic foods are not nutritionally superior to conventional foods. Food prices are already so high that most people cannot afford to eat organic food. As a nutritionist, I don’t recommend organic over conventional foods, and I don’t buy organic foods myself.
There are a lot of ultra-processed organic foods like cookies, crackers, and frozen entrees. Organic or not, we should eat less of these meals.
There is absolutely no good reason for Yuka to automatically give a 10% point bonus on organic food. This is the complete fact that this app is basically evidence-based garbage.
Yuka app review: Can Yuka help you make better food choices?
For processed or packaged snack foods with low Yuca scores, the app will suggest “healthier” alternatives. Alternatives may be lower in salt and sugar, but are they really a suitable alternative based on a person’s preferences, budget, etc.?
For example, the top-rated alternative to goldish crackers was an organic gluten-free cracker that, in my opinion, tasted to die for and was much more expensive. How many kids want Mary’s crackers? Truth be told, I don’t want them either. Should parents be made to feel guilty about purchasing a more expensive alternative when the original product is completely safe?
For example, if an app suggests choosing organic cookies made with organic sugar, that might score higher, but it’s not a better choice. Your body digests that sugar the same way it digests traditional sugar, so evaluating things this way is misleading. Sugar is sugar, and organic sugar is not healthy.
Most of us know what foods are nutritious and make us feel good. The most nutritious foods usually don’t have barcodes that can be scanned, but not everything we eat has to be physically nutritious. A healthy diet includes a variety of foods and is guilt-free.
Eating more whole foods and less ultra-processed foods is always ideal, and you don’t need an app to tell you that.
The app’s scoring system lacks science, plus it can cause fear, shame, and anxiety around food, which outweighs the benefits the app provides.
I do not recommend the Yuka app to anyone.
