Roadmap

Merran is in alpha. This roadmap describes our direction, not a delivery schedule: priorities and scope can change as we learn from people using it. The released features below are available now; planned and exploratory work has no promised release date.

The feature baseline is v0.1.0-alpha.1. See the release verification record for what we have tested and what still needs checking.

Last reviewed: October 17, 2026. Features move to Planned when we choose to build them; In progress will be used only when implementation starts.

Available now

These features already ship in alpha.1 and are not future roadmap items:

Area	Available today
Everyday cooking	Recipe imports and migration, scaling and units, weekly and Any day planning, shopping lists, pantry tracking, and cooking timers.
Pantry	Fridge, Freezer, and Cupboard locations, use-soon suggestions, and deductions when planned meals are marked cooked.
Optional integrations	Browser extension, Android sharing and iPhone Shortcut setup, store connections, AI assistance, nutrition, video import, generated photos, and server voices. Each has its own prerequisites.
Accounts and appearance	Separate households, roles and invitations, household switching, three palettes, light/dark mode, and home-screen installation.
Developers	A documented API, permission-scoped API keys, and a live event stream.
Running Merran	SQLite or Postgres, signed release images, encrypted saved secrets, and a secret-rotation command. Manual backup and restore procedures are documented.

Start with the guides and integration setup. The release verification record separates implementation from the device and provider checks still to do.

Up next

Our immediate focus is checking the released workflows in real use before choosing the next feature to build.

• Everyday workflow verification: exercise the full first-week walkthrough, real recipe imports, and interrupted jobs so households can follow the guides with confidence.
• Device and integration checks: test extension installation, phone sharing, store connections, and optional providers on real devices and accounts so setup instructions reflect what people actually encounter.
• Broader deployment and accessibility checks: verify more hosting environments, proxy behavior, and assistive technology so Merran is easier to run and use reliably.

Fresh SQLite and Postgres installation and isolated backup/restore smoke tests have already passed; the remaining work broadens that coverage.

Planned

These are features we intend to build. Their order here does not indicate priority, and none has a promised release date.

• Offline recipes, plans, and shopping lists: keep previously opened recipes, the week’s plan, and shopping lists useful without a connection, with list check-offs syncing when you reconnect.
• Prep reminders: help you remember to thaw ingredients, start a marinade, or begin cooking before dinner is due.
• More sign-in options: add passkeys, authenticator-based two-step sign-in, and OIDC single sign-on so you can choose a sign-in method that fits your household or server.
• Webhooks: let tools such as Home Assistant and n8n react when recipes, plans, lists, or pantry items change.
• MCP support: let compatible external AI tools work with your household’s recipes, plan, and list, with proposed changes reviewed before they are applied.
• Translations: make the interface available beyond English, including the planned option to translate recipes as they are imported. Measurement conversion already works.
• Email delivery: send invitations and password-reset messages through an operator-configured SMTP server. Invitation links already work.
• Guided onboarding: add in-app tours, explanations, and a glossary alongside the existing website guides.
• After-cooking pantry checks: offer a checklist of ingredients that ran out, with an option to put them on the shopping list. Existing planned-meal deductions remain available.
• Server administration: add automatic backups before migrations, a consolidated Problems page, an audit log, and a guided SQLite-to-Postgres transfer. Manual restore smoke tests and secret rotation already exist; they do not implement these additions.
• Distribution and project services: add an Unraid template, a hosted app demo, and a telemetry receiver with public aggregate totals. The published documentation site and scripted homepage previews are already available.

Today, Merran uses password sign-in and an English interface. Its scoped API keys and live events are available now; they are not webhook delivery or an MCP server. Cook timers are available, but scheduled prep notifications are not.

Installing Merran on a home screen does not provide offline data access: the current service worker receives shared files, while recipes, plans, and lists still need the server. Likewise, localization infrastructure is present, but English is the only bundled interface language.

Exploring

These ideas need more feedback and design work before we choose whether or how to build them.

• Barcode scanning: make it quicker to identify packaged food when adding it to the pantry.
• Meaning-based recipe search: help you find a meal by what you have in mind, even when you do not remember its title or exact ingredients.
• A limited role for children: let younger household members take part with permissions suited to their needs.
• OAuth connections for external AI apps: make connecting supported remote AI clients easier without manually copying an API key.
• More recipe tools: consider Tandoor migration, step photos, recipe translations beyond import, and AI-ranked meal suggestions.
• Larger deployments: consider household-owned integration keys, OpenTelemetry, and a Helm chart.

More ideas from everyday kitchens

These are research candidates, not scheduled work. We would like feedback before choosing their scope.

• Saved meal plans and menus: keep named plans for a busy week, a holiday, or a camping trip, then reuse them with new dates and serving counts. Repeat last week already works; this would add a reusable library.
• Prepared meals and freezer portions: record portions of meals you have already cooked, plan when to eat them, and avoid buying their original ingredients again. Fridge/freezer locations and leftover notes already exist; this would track the prepared food itself.
• Calendar subscriptions: show the meal plan in your preferred calendar through an optional read-only iCalendar feed with a revocable link. Calendar apps control how often they refresh it.
• Minimum-stock reminders: set a target amount for staples and review suggested top-ups when measured pantry stock falls below it. This would complement recurring buys and usual-buy suggestions.
• Share a recipe with a friend: create a revocable, read-only link to one recipe without adding the recipient to your household or exposing its other data.
• Print and keep: print clean recipes, plans, and shopping lists, with a possible later option to assemble selected recipes into a family cookbook.

Research included Paprika’s reusable menus, Plan to Eat’s freezer workflow, AnyList’s calendar subscriptions, Grocy’s stock thresholds, Tandoor’s sharing controls, and Recipe Keeper’s printable cookbooks. These examples informed the ideas; they do not set Merran’s implementation or delivery dates.

Tell us which problem matters to you and how you handle it today in GitHub issues. We will link individual tracking issues here as they are opened. For current capabilities and setup instructions, start with your first week.