Comparison

The best cocktail recipe apps in 2026, tested with your own recipes

Six iOS cocktail apps, four tests each: getting your recipe in, whether edits stick, whether you can get it out, and whether anyone still maintains it.

By Travis Rudisill · September 7, 2026

Every “best cocktail app” list ranks apps by how many recipes they ship with. That’s the wrong question for most people reading this site. If you’ve been making drinks for more than a year, you have your own recipes, and the thing you need an app for is those: getting them in, keeping them, changing them, and getting them back out.

So this comparison runs the same four tests on every app, and ranks by those. The catalog size is listed, because it matters to some people, but it isn’t the score.

The four tests

1. Getting your recipe in. How fast can you add a recipe you already have, and does the app help (from a photo, a paste, a link) or do you retype it field by field?
2. Do edits stick. Enter three recipes, edit one, force-quit the app, reopen. The single most common complaint from paying users of the big apps is custom content that vanishes. It’s the whole trust question.
3. Getting it out. Is there an export, in a format something else can read? If the app died tomorrow, what would you have?
4. Is anyone home. Date of the last update, from the App Store page. An unmaintained app works until an iOS update breaks it, and then your recipes are inside a thing that won’t open.

Facts below (prices, ratings, version dates) are from each app’s US App Store page on 7 September 2026, linked so you can check them. Reviews are quoted from those pages.

At a glance

The apps, by test

Mixed Spirits

I make this one; see the disclosure at the top. It’s a searchable notebook for your own recipes, on iOS and the web, with no catalog at all. Launched August 2026, so it has almost no reviews yet, which you should weigh.

• Getting in: paste text, a URL, or a photo (including the screenshots already on your phone), and it builds the card: ingredients, method, glass, garnish. The free tier allows three photo or link imports a day; typing is unlimited.
• Edits stick: this is the whole design, and the thing I’d most want you to test yourself, because a new app has no track record. Each edit is a version on the card.
• Getting out: the full library exports as JSON, CSV, or Markdown from Settings, and any card as PDF. Export is on the free tier on purpose.
• Is anyone home: yes, but “yes, and it’s one person” is the honest answer, and it’s why export isn’t paid.

Where it’s weak: no catalog, so if you want to discover drinks this isn’t it. No Android. Ten free cards, then $4.99 a month, which is the same price people complain about in Cocktail Flow’s reviews; the difference I’d argue for is that it’s your library rather than theirs, but you’ll decide whether that’s worth it.

Cocktail Party

$3.99, once, and the store page says it plainly: “No in-app purchases — you buy it once, you get updates and new drinks forever.” That sentence puts it ahead of most of the category on trust.

• Getting in: typed, with tags, notes, and multiple ingredients with measurements. No import from photo or link.
• Edits stick: reviews don’t complain about it, which for this category is a good sign. Feature requests are about ratings and garnish detail, not lost data.
• Getting out: sync across devices with an Apple or Google login. No file export described.
• Is anyone home: version 3.0.10, July 2025. Maintained.

Where it’s strong: the inventory. “The user interface for adding my home bar inventory was definitely a step above the rest” is a representative review, and the “what can I make, and what’s one bottle away” feature is genuinely good. If you want a catalog with a good custom-recipe section and you don’t want a subscription, this is the pick.

Mixel

The polished catalog. 4.8 stars from 1,500 ratings, actively updated, and a very large recipe library, most of which sits behind Premium (from $1.99, with a $49.99 lifetime option).

• Getting in: typed. Personal recipes with detailed notes are supported.
• Edits stick: here’s the caution. A subscriber, who describes the app as “an easy choice to subscribe given the app’s value,” also reports that custom ingredients “almost all disappeared moments after saving them” and a custom recipe “mysteriously disappeared.” That’s one review, from a paying user, about the exact feature this comparison cares about. Test it before you rely on it.
• Getting out: menus export as PDF; the library syncs between iPhone and iPad.
• Is anyone home: version 1.19.15, August 2026. Very much maintained.

The honest read: if you want the biggest well-maintained catalog, this is it. For your own recipes, verify the save-and-reopen test yourself.

My Bar

A catalog with ingredient-based filtering, favourites lists, and tutorials. Several IAP tiers (Premium, All Access, Pro+) from $1.99 to $49.99.

• Getting in / edits stick: the store page doesn’t describe user-created recipes, so I can’t score it on the tests this comparison is about. It may exist; it isn’t the pitch.
• Getting out: not described.
• Is anyone home: version 4.0.9, December 2024.

One review captures the pricing sensitivity in this category: the monthly subscription is “not worth” it for a catalog, with “aggressive review prompts” early on. If you want a free catalog to browse, it’s fine. It isn’t a notebook.

Cocktail Flow

The veteran, with 21,000 ratings at 4.7. It’s also the clearest example of the maintenance question: the App Store lists version 3.4, December 2019 as the current release. It has not been updated in more than six years, and it still sells a $4.99/month subscription.

• Getting in: creating your own cocktails and adding notes are Premium features.
• Edits stick: unknown; reviews focus elsewhere.
• Getting out: not described anywhere on the page.
• Is anyone home: no, on the evidence.

The reviews say two things worth repeating. On pricing: “$20 a year or $4 dollars a month just to use this app that’s just doing what dozens of other apps and websites do for free.” On accuracy: “some recipes were changed from original” and “improperly transcribed cocktail recipes,” forcing users to check specs against other sources. Putting your recipes behind a subscription in an app that isn’t being maintained and has no described export is the scenario this whole comparison is trying to help you avoid.

Highball

Highball is the app that this site’s cards owe the most to: beautifully designed recipe cards, your own recipes only, free. A lot of people love it. It was last updated on 6 October 2018.

• Getting in: typed, into a lovely card.
• Edits stick: yes, locally.
• Getting out: cards export as images. A review from 2018 already asked for cloud backup and called the app “a novelty way to make pretty recipe cards” without it. A 2023 review from a working bartender describes organising 30+ cards at a time as tedious.
• Is anyone home: no, for eight years.

If you use Highball, keep using it, and screenshot every card into somewhere else. It will keep working until an iOS release breaks it, and nobody will fix it when that happens. The app-death guide is about exactly this.

What to pick

• You have your own recipes and want a place for them: Mixed Spirits (mine; test the exit) or Cocktail Party (buy once; no file export, but maintained and honest).
• You want to discover drinks from a big, maintained catalog: Mixel, and test the custom-recipe save before you trust it with anything you’d miss.
• You want a catalog and an inventory without a subscription: Cocktail Party.
• You already love Highball: keep it, and back it up by hand.
• You’re considering Cocktail Flow: look at the version date first.

And whichever you choose, print the ten drinks you actually make. A card on the bar survives every app on this list.