New App "Simple Basket" Uses AI to Compare Grocery Prices
Translated & summarized from Ice by baba
A new free app, "Simple Basket," uses AI to compare grocery prices across Israeli supermarket chains, available on both Android and iPhone. Developed by Gal Hadad, it allows users to scan receipts or create lists to find cheaper options, drawing data from chains like Shufersal and Rami Levy. The app aims to compete with existing services by offering a comprehensive price comparison and shopping list management tool.
The story in 6 lines · by baba
- New free app "Simple Basket" compares grocery prices across Israeli chains using AI.
- The app allows users to scan receipts or create shopping lists for price comparisons.
- It features a shared family shopping list that syncs in real-time across devices.
- "Simple Basket" includes data from over 125,000 products and 1,061 supermarket branches.
- The app was developed by Gal Hadad with AI assistance from Claude and Gemini.
- It competes with existing services like Pricez and CHP in the Israeli market.
A new free mobile application called "Simple Basket" (Sal Pashut) has been launched for Android users, approximately one month after its initial release on iPhone. Developed with the assistance of AI tools Claude and Google's Gemini, the app allows users to compare grocery prices across different supermarket chains, manage a shared family shopping list, and even scan receipts to see if the same purchase could have been made cheaper elsewhere. The app was created by developer Gal Hadad.
"Simple Basket" boasts a database of over 125,000 products and information on 1,061 supermarket branches from major chains in Israel, including Shufersal, Rami Levy, Carrefour, Osher Ad, Yohananof, Tiv Ta'am, and Keshet Taimim. Users can either prepare a shopping list in advance to find the cheapest option or upload a receipt from a completed purchase. The app identifies the items and calculates the potential cost at other stores. Online order receipts in PDF format can also be shared, though unidentifiable items are excluded from the comparison.
The app's price comparison feature can be filtered by specific branches or expanded to a radius of 5, 10, or 20 kilometers in areas with fewer supermarkets. It also displays missing items, potential alternatives, and the data's last update time. The shared shopping list function, which updates in real-time across both Android and iOS devices, allows for adding items via typing, voice dictation, or barcode scanning, and can function offline.
The service, which requires no registration or payment, sources its product prices from the price transparency files that supermarket chains are legally obligated to publish. While the data is collected automatically daily, the app notes that not all chains are included, and displayed prices may not always reflect the final cost due to factors like customer club memberships, purchase quantities, or payment methods. The app clarifies that the price at the checkout is the definitive one.
"Simple Basket" enters a market with existing price comparison services like Pricez and CHP, the latter also offering receipt scanning. The new app aims to differentiate itself by integrating price comparison, receipt verification, and family list management into a single platform. The app uses Google's AI for product recognition from receipts, with receipt images not being stored.