How does Barcode Scanning Work?

A huge part of Pantry is that recording everything when you come back from the grocery store shouldn't be difficult! That's why we have our barcode scanning feature to quickly add items.

There are a few steps that make this work, the main one is community submitted information. When you scan a barcode, first we check our own database, if its not available, we look it up in the Open Food Facts database, which is community driven and updated. If it's not available there, then nothing will come up, and hopefully you help us by filling out the information. This gets stored in your private database table, and the next time you scan that item, it will automatically populate for you. Additionally, that data goes into a list of unverified products. A manual review process makes sure the details are correct and the image you took is appropriate. When approved, it goes into our public database, so that other people will have autofilled information when they scan the same barcode! This is how Pantry creates a community driven database, that helps everyone work together, to all save time, money, food, and save the environment!

Thanks for reading! Let us know if you have any questions!