Pairing engine
Grades any meal A–D by checking every combination on the plate — enhancers, inhibitors, competing transporters.
391 foods modeledFood pairing changes what you absorb.
The nutrients in a meal aren't fixed — iron, vitamins and minerals get blocked or multiplied by what shares the plate. PairIQ scores the combination, with the study behind every point.
Download on the App Store
See the science ↓
Free · no calorie counting · 289 peer-reviewed citations
75
iron available ·
one cup of spinach Boosted
Tap a pairing — same spinach, different plate
one cup of spinach Boosted
79–94%iron blocked by black tea with a meal
18 mgdaily iron, women 19–50 (men: 8 mg)
27 mgdaily iron target in pregnancy
3–8×carotenoids absorbed when egg joins a salad
2000%curcumin bioavailability with black pepper
2–20%plant iron absorption — the meal decides
One question, answered properly.
Will the nutrients on this plate actually absorb? Every feature exists to answer that — nothing else.
The receipts
Tap any score and it opens the actual paper — journal, year, DOI. Verified against the primary source before it ships.
289 citationsBarcode scanner
Point it at packaged food and the real ingredients join the plate — scored like everything else.
Open Food Facts data16 health goals
Iron, bone, heart, gut, sleep, cycle health and more — the same plate is scored against what you're actually optimizing.
Goal-aware scoring7 diet lenses
Vegan to keto — suggestions come only from foods you actually eat, with plant-specific absorption playbooks.
Vegan · keto · GF +4AI Weekly Coach
Your week's meals, read as a pattern — what quietly worked, what's blocking you, and one change worth making.
ProMost nutrition apps count.
None of them check.
PairIQ checks.
Every plate is scored against peer-reviewed absorption science in under 30 seconds — and every point on the score links to the study that earned it.
Am J Clin Nutr
Br J Nutr
Gut
Eur J Clin Nutr
Planta Med
NIH ODS
Three of the 289.
No "studies show." Journal, year, DOI — on every claim in the app.
Vitamin C converts plant iron into the form your gut can actually absorb.
Ascorbic acid reduces ferric to ferrous iron and shields it from phytates — around 50 mg per meal is where the effect gets strong.
Cook JD, Monsen ER (1977). Am J Clin Nutr. DOI 10.1093/ajcn/30.2.235
Black tea with a meal blocks 79–94% of the plant iron before it's absorbed.
Polyphenol drinks cut non-heme iron 50–90% in controlled studies. The fix costs nothing: an hour of separation, or vitamin C on the plate.
Hurrell RF, Reddy M, Cook JD (1999). Br J Nutr. DOI 10.1017/S0007114599000537
One egg on a salad multiplies carotenoid absorption 3–8×.
Vitamins A, D, E, K and carotenoids need fat to be carried. Even a drizzle is enough — a fat-free salad wastes most of its vitamin value.
Kim JE, et al. (2015). Am J Clin Nutr. DOI 10.3945/ajcn.115.111062
Free where it counts. Pro when you're hooked.
Free
$0forever
No card. No ads. Ever.
- The full pairing engine — real scores, real citations
- Meals up to 4 foods
- 2 Discover meals per day
- 3 saved meals · current-week history
Pro · 7-day free trial
$2.50/month$4.99
billed $29.99 a year — 50% off monthlysave $29.89
- Everything in Free, plus
- Meals up to 10 foods
- Unlimited Discover + barcode scans
- Full history with trend explanations
- AI Weekly Coach + daily supplement plan
7 days free first · nothing charged until the trial ends
Nothing is charged until the trial ends. Cancel in two taps from Settings.
Fair questions.
What is food pairing for nutrient absorption?+
Choosing which foods to eat together so their nutrients actually absorb. The same cup of spinach delivers very different usable iron next to coffee (tannins block it), yogurt (calcium competes) or lemon (vitamin C enhances it). PairIQ scores any combination — and cites the study behind each score.
Does coffee or tea really block iron?+
Yes. In controlled studies, polyphenol drinks taken with a meal cut non-heme iron absorption 50–90%, with black tea at 79–94% (Hurrell, Reddy & Cook, 1999). Separating them from iron-rich meals — or adding vitamin C to the meal — reduces the loss substantially.
Is this a calorie counting app?+
No. PairIQ never counts calories or macros and has no streaks. It answers one question — will the nutrients on this plate absorb — and suggests the one food that improves the meal most.
Is this the same as "food combining"?+
No. Classic food-combining rules (never mix protein and starch; fruit only alone) have no supporting evidence. PairIQ models documented nutrient interactions from peer-reviewed human studies — vitamin C and iron, fat and the fat-soluble vitamins, tannins, phytates, calcium — and links every claim to its source.
Why do women need more iron than men?+
The RDA is 18 mg/day for women 19–50 — largely due to menstrual losses — versus 8 mg for men, rising to 27 mg in pregnancy (NIH ODS). Because plant iron absorbs at only 2–20% depending on the meal, pairing matters most for the people with the highest targets.
Is PairIQ free?+
Yes — the full engine, scores and citations are free for meals up to 4 foods, with no ads ever. Pro ($29.99/year — $2.50/month — or $4.99 month-to-month, 7-day free trial) raises the limit to 10 foods and adds unlimited scans, full history and the AI Weekly Coach.
What makes PairIQ different from other nutrition apps?+
Most nutrition apps measure quantity — calories, macros, grams. PairIQ measures interactions: whether the nutrients in a meal will actually absorb together. It's a nutrition app built around bioavailability science — 391 foods, 289 peer-reviewed citations with DOI links, 16 health goals, 7 diets — with no calorie counting, no ads, and no streaks.
Who is PairIQ for?+
People who already eat reasonably well and want more from the same food: vegans and vegetarians managing plant-iron absorption, women 19–50 meeting an 18 mg daily iron target, pregnant users with a 27 mg target, athletes, and anyone timing supplements with meals. PairIQ runs on iPhone and scores a meal in under 30 seconds.
Where does the science come from?+
Published, peer-reviewed human research — 289 verified citations and counting. Every claim links to its paper on doi.org, and each citation is checked against the primary source before it ships. If a number can't be sourced, it doesn't go in the app.
Ready to absorb what you already eat?
Free on the App Store · first meal scored in under 30 seconds.