Putby Support

Putby is a safety-first home-canning and food-preservation companion — not another thin recipe app. You log every batch you can, ferment, pickle, dehydrate, or freeze; track a living pantry inventory of what's on your shelf and what to eat first; print clean jar labels; run ferment and pickle timers; and check an altitude-aware safe-processing reference before you start. It's local-first and works offline, with no account. Putby is a companion to tested recipes, not a replacement, and not food-safety certification.

When you finish a batch, you record it in seconds — the food, the method (water bath, pressure, ferment, pickle, dehydrate, or freeze), jar size and yield, headspace, your altitude, and the date and lot. A one-tap "did it seal?" check lets you mark which jars popped, and tap a jar if one didn't. Every batch flows straight into your living pantry.

Look up a food and Putby shows whether it should be water-bath or pressure canned, the tested processing time for your jar size, headspace, and acidity — automatically adjusted for your altitude. A botulism check flags low-acid foods (like green beans or meats) that can never be safely water-bath canned and routes them to pressure canning. The reference is grounded in tested USDA / Ball / NCHFP guidance with sources cited, and it's free forever — we will never paywall safety. It is an informational aid, not certification: always follow a current tested recipe.

The pantry is a real inventory of what you've put by — jar counts by food, canned-on and best-by dates, and storage locations. An "Eat me first" rotation list surfaces what to use up next so nothing on your shelf is wasted. It's the reason canners keep a notebook, finally in your pocket.

Putby generates clean, printable and exportable jar labels with the contents, date, batch/lot, and best-by — so every jar says what it is and when you put it by. You can also export your data to CSV and create a local backup. Everything is generated on your device and shared through your device's share sheet; nothing is uploaded to us.

Putby is local-first. All of your data — the jar log, pantry inventory, labels, timers, notes, and full history — is stored only in a private database on your phone. There is no account and no cloud backend, and your pantry never leaves your device. The only information that ever leaves your phone is purchase/subscription data needed to validate Putby+ (handled by Apple, Google, and RevenueCat). See our Privacy Policy for full details.

The Putby+ harvest helper turns a glut of produce into a preserving plan, drafts custom labels, and recaps your season. It runs a small language model entirely on your phone. To keep the app's install size small, the model isn't bundled; it's downloaded only if you opt in the first time you use the feature (roughly 500 MB). After that it works offline, and your pantry data is never sent anywhere to produce its output. On devices that can't run the model, the feature is simply hidden and the rest of the app is unaffected.

Yes. Because your data lives on your device, the jar log, the living pantry, the safe-processing reference, labels, and timers all work without an internet connection — and the app opens instantly with no login. It's built for the cellar, the garden, or a dead zone. A connection is only needed to make or restore a purchase, or for the one-time on-device AI model download if you opt in.

You can export your data and create a local backup from within the app (CSV/PDF), then save or share the file yourself. Because everything lives on your device, keeping your own backup is the best way to move to a new phone or recover after a reset.

Because everything is stored on your device, you're in full control. You can delete individual entries in the app, clear the app's data from within the app or your device settings, or uninstall the app to permanently remove all of its locally stored data. There is no server-side copy for us to delete.

Putby's core jar log, living pantry, and the altitude-aware safe-processing & botulism reference are free forever — no card needed to explore. Putby+ adds pantry intelligence and best-by alerts, yield and cost-per-jar savings tracking, a season planner, the on-device AI harvest helper, unlimited batches and history, and advanced labels. Plans are: Monthly — $3.99/month, Annual — $19.99/year (recommended), and a one-time Lifetime — $39.99. All three unlock the same features. Prices may vary by region and are shown in the app at purchase.

Subscriptions are billed through your App Store or Google Play account — no surprise fees, and we can't trap you. On iOS: open the Settings app → tap your name → Subscriptions → Putby. On Android: open Google Play → tap your profile → Payments & subscriptions → Subscriptions → Putby. Cancellation takes effect at the end of your current billing period. (The Lifetime purchase is one-time and never renews.)

Sign in with the same Apple ID or Google account you used to purchase, open Putby, and use the "Restore Purchases" option in settings. Your Putby+ entitlement will be restored. (Note: your batches and pantry are stored locally, so to move your data to a new device, use the in-app export/backup.)

No. Putby is a tracking, reference, and organization tool that helps you preserve food more safely and stay organized. It is a companion to tested recipes (USDA, Ball/Bernardin, NCHFP), not a replacement, and it does not certify that your food is safe to eat. The botulism check and processing times are informational aids only. Always follow a current tested recipe and your altitude, and when in doubt, throw it out.