How to save recipes from TikTok

Why saved recipes get lost

A recipe on TikTok is a video, and a video is a poor format for a recipe. The quantities are said once, fast, or they flash on screen over music. Your Favorites tab shows you covers, not ingredients, so finding “that lemon pasta” means scrolling and watching again.

Whatever method you pick has to do two things: get the recipe out of the video as text, and put that text somewhere you can search.

The manual way, with no extra app

This works with TikTok and the notes app already on your phone. TikTok moves its menus between versions, so if a label differs, look for the icon.

1. 1

   Check the caption first

   Open the full caption and the pinned comment. Many creators write the ingredient list there, and some link to the full recipe from their profile. If it is there, you are nearly done.

2. 2

   Add the video to a collection

   Tap the bookmark to add the video to Favorites, then put it in a collection called Recipes. This keeps the video. It does not make it searchable.

3. 3

   Capture the text on screen

   Pause where the ingredients are shown and take a screenshot. On an iPhone, open the screenshot in Photos and press and hold the text to select and copy it (Live Text).

4. 4

   Write it down once

   Make one note per recipe: name, ingredients, steps, and the link to the video (Share, then Copy link). For quantities that are only spoken, you will have to listen and type.

5. 5

   Keep the notes together

   Put them in one folder, so your notes app’s own search finds “chickpeas” across all of them.

This is reliable and free. It also takes several minutes per recipe, which is why the habit rarely survives the third one.

The Inboxy way

Inboxy does the watching and the typing. You send a link, and it sends the recipe back as text.

1. 1

   Copy the link

   In TikTok tap Share, then Copy link.

2. 2

   Send it to Inboxy

   Paste the link into a chat with @InboxyAIBot in Telegram. On an iPhone you can skip the copying: tap Share and pick Inboxy.

3. 3

   Let it read the video

   Inboxy takes the caption and transcribes what is said. If nobody speaks - music only, text on screen - it reads the text shown in the frames instead. Photo carousels are read slide by slide.

4. 4

   Get the note

   You get a one-line essence, key points and action items. For a recipe, the key points hold the ingredients and the method as far as the video states them.

5. 5

   Find it when you need it

   Search by meaning (“creamy chicken, one pan”) or ask in plain words: “what do I need for the lemon pasta?” The answer cites the save it came from.

Action items from your saves also collect into one to-do list, and you can set a reminder on a recipe for the day you plan to cook it.

What to expect, honestly

• The note is a note, not a recipe card. There is no servings scaler, no unit conversion and no shopping list.
• The note only holds what the video states. If the creator never says how much flour, the note will not say either.
• Transcription can mishear a quantity. Check the numbers against the video before you cook.
• The video has to be public. Inboxy reads it from the link and cannot see private accounts.
• The Free plan covers 50 saves a month.

Questions

Read next

• How to find a saved Reel
• How to turn an Instagram Reel into text