I’ve been researching meal kits, figuring out the most affordable meal kit delivery services so you can decide if and which might be a good fit for your family.

I was a little shocked to discover that meal kits are not uniformly pricey. Some are surprisingly affordable.

Here are the details.

Dinnerly is The Cheapest Real Meal Kit

→ Check out the latest Dinnerly prices and this week’s menu

The cheapest meal kit service in the US is Dinnerly, at approximately $3 per serving. That’s a steal.

Dinnerly achieves its rock-bottom prices with a couple of tricks. Its meals are pretty basic such as chicken sheet pan meals, pasta, and tacos, meaning fewer ingredients and lower cost.

It also leaves out frills like recipe cards, sending its instructions by email or an app instead of shipping them along with your meal.

Are Dinnerly portions large enough to satisfy your family? My husband’s only gripe with our Dinnerly experience was that there were no leftovers.

So, if your crew tends to have hearty appetites, keep in mind that you may need to add a couple of sides.

EveryPlate is The Other Budget Heavyweight

→ See EveryPlate’s current price per serving and this week’s menu

At about $5 a plate, EveryPlate also gives you bigger servings than Dinnerly. If you’re trying to feed teenagers, EveryPlate is a good option.

EveryPlate is owned by HelloFresh, which costs $9-11/serving, so I haven’t included it on the list of affordable meal kits. They use the same trucks and infrastructure to deliver meals, but EveryPlate is much less flashy and fancy.

EveryPlate’s packaging is simpler and more modest. Its recipes are a little more straightforward, its ingredients a tad cheaper.

EveryPlate costs half of HelloFresh, making it a real value.

Home Chef is The Family Value Pick

→ Click here to get Home Chef for $4.99 per serving plus free shipping.

→ Or take a look at the Family Menu Kids-Eat-Free offer

Home Chef also has a Family Menu, which offers a few recipes each week that are more likely to please children. It also frequently runs its Kids Eat Free promotion.

Home Chef has the easiest recipes by far out of all meal delivery services. They have many oven-ready meals, where you simply peel off the foil and pop it in the oven.

Marley Spoon is Fancy Food, Coupon Prices (Sometimes)

→ Visit Marley Spoon’s site to see their current introductory offer

Marley Spoon, the Martha Stewart meal kit, is owned by the same parent company as Dinnerly (above), but is a bit flashier and pricier. It offers better-quality meat and fancy fruits and veggies.

You’ll find herbs galore in Marley Spoon boxes.

We plan to use Marley Spoon when we see a great offer, make dinner once, but keep the recipe cards. Later, when we want to “wing-it”, we can raid our recipe-card binder for inspiration and make them again with regular supermarket ingredients.

What about those little meal kits in the grocery store?

Walmart and Aldi have started selling meal kits. They’re in the refrigerated section, near the ready-made entrées, and are intended to feed two.

They’re a couple of main ingredients, like steak and potatoes, plus seasonings. They’re about $9 each.

They’re not meal-kit delivery services, but can be handy to have on hand if you’ve been slacking in the meal-planning department and need to get something on the table.

How about HelloFresh and Hungryroot?

HelloFresh is the OG meal-kit delivery service, but is on the pricey side, though it’s better than restaurant takeout if you compare the math. → Still want HelloFresh anyway? Check their current per-serving price here

Hungryroot is a little like a cross between a meal-kit delivery service and a grocery-delivery service. You answer a bunch of questions, tell them what foods you like and don’t, and then you can build your own grocery-delivery box with fresh foods plus some 15-minute meal kits. → Take the Hungryroot quiz and find the price of your box.

Hungryroot meal kits aren’t exactly budget-friendly, but I did manage to convince a picky veggie-hating teenager to chomp down on a few vegetables by serving up its cashew queso.

How to calculate the per-serving price of a meal-kit delivery service

Most of the meal-kit delivery services have introductory rates, which may not necessarily continue. If the rate isn’t good enough for your budget, I wouldn’t recommend signing up.

The advertised rates are per-serving. To figure out your true price-per-serving, multiply the number of servings in a box by the number of boxes you order.

Then divide the cost of your order by the number of servings. For example, let’s say you ordered three boxes.

Each box offers two servings. That’s six servings.

Divide the price of those three boxes by six. That’s your true per-serving price.

You can cancel a meal-kit delivery service any time

All of the meal-kit delivery services can be cancelled or skipped online. No need to call.

That’s how I roll.

If you only care about price, Dinnerly wins. But if you have children to feed, and want to do as little cooking as possible, pick the $4.99 deal from Home Chef with the Kids-Eat-Free family menu.

Prices may change due to promotions so don’t rely on these numbers to make any decisions.

I’ve spreadsheeted my way through several meal-kit delivery services, calculating serving sizes, figuring out true per-serving prices, and more. Check out my meal-kit reviews:

HelloFresh Review: HelloFresh is a classic. Read our experience with HelloFresh and find out how much it costs.