Frequently asked questions

A healthy eating programme for adults living with type 2, pre-diabetes or type 1 diabetes. Each week the programme plans your breakfasts, lunches and dinners around how you like to eat, helps you buy the right food, keeps an easier option ready for the nights that fall apart, and gives you a healthy eating coach built into the app that you can message any hour. It’s built for changes that last rather than a burst of willpower: instead of relying on you to want it enough at 6pm, it puts a system around your week to help eating well become the easiest thing to do. There’s no calorie counting and no food diary to fill in: you mark meals as eaten, skipped or eaten out, and that’s all.

The programme runs as a weekly loop. You get a week of meals already decided around how you like to eat, and a minute of skimming sets it up. Bolus helps you buy the food for it from your usual UK supermarket, grouped by aisle. Through the week you cook what’s there and mark each meal as you go: cooked, swapped, ate out. At the end, a short review asks how it went, and your next week is built around the meals you’d repeat, quietly dropping the ones that didn’t fit. Week by week the programme fits your life better. That’s the point of running it week after week rather than handing you a plan and wishing you luck.

Adults in the UK living with type 2, pre-diabetes or type 1 diabetes who broadly know they should eat better but struggle to make it happen week after week. If you’ve had plenty of advice and what you’re short of is structure, that’s who the programme is for. You need to be 18 or over and living in the UK.

Most programmes hand you the knowledge and leave the doing to you: a plan to follow, a diary to fill in, a coach you speak to once a fortnight. Bolus covers the whole run, from what to eat, to help buying it, to a backup for the nights that fall apart, and then a weekly loop that reshapes the next week around what you actually cooked. The coach is built into the app, so you get an answer at 6pm on a Tuesday instead of joining a waiting list. And there’s no calorie counting and no food diary to keep up: you mark meals as eaten, skipped or eaten out, and that’s all.

A healthy eating coach built into the app that you can message any hour, with no appointment and no judgement. Ask what to make when you’re tired and haven’t shopped, how to get back on track after a slip, or whether a swap works. It’s the app itself answering, not a person on shift.

Bolus gets you eating in line with the NHS Eatwell Guide, week after week: meals around vegetables, beans and pulses, higher-fibre carbs and sensible portions, instead of whatever gets grabbed when nothing is planned. That kind of eating is what weight loss is usually built on. Knowing that was never the hard part. Doing it, in a week that’s already full, is. That’s what Bolus takes on, and it’s what we’ll stand behind: the meals decided, the right food in the house, and nothing to work out at 6pm. Follow it for 30 days and if healthy eating doesn’t feel easier, you can claim your money back under the guarantee’s conditions.

No. There are no shakes, no bars, no meal replacements and no banned food lists. It’s everyday cooking: real meals you’d be happy to put in front of anyone, built around how you like to eat. Carbs aren’t off the table, you just get higher-fibre versions and sensible portions. And it isn’t all or nothing. The aim is a better average held over time, not a perfect week. It’s a programme you run, not a diet you go on and come off.

Concrete, filling meals built around vegetables, beans and pulses, higher-fibre carbs where they fit, fish, eggs, meat, yoghurt and olive oil, in line with the principles behind UK healthy eating guidance. It isn’t “diabetic food”, a low-fat diet, or shakes and bars. Foods sold as diabetic or sugar-free don’t earn a place: they cost more and offer no real benefit. You tell Bolus how you like to eat, including vegetarian, pescatarian, vegan or lower-carb-style, and the programme is built around that.

Yes, and you set how easy. Every meal carries an effort badge based on how long it takes to prepare: Easy is under about 6 minutes, Standard about 6 to 15, Tight about 16 to 30, and V.Tight is 31 minutes or more. In your settings you choose the effort you want for each meal on each day, so a busy Tuesday dinner stays quick while a relaxed Sunday can take longer. The programme only offers meals that fit the time you’ve set for that slot.

Yes. You set your household size and the programme scales the portions and the shopping to match, so you’re cooking one meal for the table rather than something separate for yourself. The food is ordinary cooking the rest of the house will happily eat. The plan is still built around your preferences and the allergens you’ve listed, and a change to portion or household size applies to your next week rather than the one you’ve already shopped for.

No. Bolus helps you buy the right ingredients from your usual UK supermarket, in store or online; you shop and check out yourself.

Bolus is a single subscription covering the whole programme: the weekly plans, the shopping, the coach and the weekly review. You pay for three months at a time, through Apple, charged when you start, and it renews every three months unless you cancel. The price is shown on the screen where you subscribe, before you commit to anything, and your card details stay with Apple. You can see the renewal date any time under Subscriptions in your Apple settings.

Because a few days isn’t long enough to tell. Bolus is a programme rather than a plan you follow once: you get a week, cook it, review it, and the next one fits you better. It’s the repeating that does the work, and a trial pushes people to judge it before the loop has done anything. So you start on the full programme from day one, with the 30-day guarantee behind you rather than a countdown in front of you.

Follow the programme for 30 days from the day you buy, eating at least 70% of your planned meals, and if healthy eating doesn’t feel easier, email [email protected] within 14 days after that period ends and we’ll refund your subscription fee. It can be claimed once per customer. Payment goes through Apple, so you request the refund at reportaproblem.apple.com; if Apple doesn’t process it and you meet the conditions, we refund you ourselves. The full conditions are on the guarantee page.

Yes, any time. Payment goes through Apple, so you cancel in your Apple settings rather than in Bolus: tap your name, then Subscriptions, then Bolus, then Cancel Subscription. You keep access until the end of the period you’ve paid for and nothing is deleted. Cancelling stops future charges but doesn’t refund one already taken, so cancel at least a day before the renewal date to be sure.

The programme runs on iPhone. It’s an early release, so you install it through TestFlight, Apple’s free app for trying apps before they reach the App Store: go to the download page on your iPhone, install TestFlight, tap the invite, and a short setup gets your first week ready. There’s nothing to apply for and no waiting list. If a link expires or the install fails, email [email protected] and we’ll resend access.

Not yet. The programme runs on iPhone only at the moment and Android is on the way. Join the Android waitlist on the download page and we’ll email you the moment it opens. There’s nothing else to do in the meantime.

Not yet. Bolus is for adults living in the UK: the meals, the shopping lists and the pack sizes are built around UK supermarkets, and you confirm you’re 18 or over and living in the UK when you join. Other countries aren’t open yet.

You can run the programme alongside medication your prescriber has given you. Bolus handles the food side only: it doesn’t know what you’re taking, it isn’t adjusted around it, and it gives no medical or dosing advice, so keep taking it exactly as prescribed and take any questions about the medication itself to your prescriber or care team. One practical note: appetite is often smaller on these medicines, and you can set a smaller portion size in your settings so the meals and the shopping match what you’ll actually eat.

If your dietitian has given you a specific plan, follow theirs. Bolus builds general healthy eating around your preferences; it doesn’t know your plan and can’t be tailored to a clinical one. You can set your diet type, allergens, foods to avoid and portion size so the weeks stay close to what you’ve been advised, but Bolus doesn’t replace clinical advice, so check with your dietitian before running the two together.

No. Bolus doesn’t dose insulin, count carbs for dosing, or provide medical care, and it isn’t a medical device. It’s a healthy eating programme that sits alongside your usual clinical support.

Optionally, yes. FreeStyle Libre connects through your LibreLinkUp login, and Dexcom through Apple Health. It’s display-only: you see your own glucose around logged meals to reflect on afterwards. Bolus doesn’t use it to score or choose your meals, and it never gives medical or dosing advice. You don’t need a CGM either way, as the programme plans your food fully without one.

You can delete your account from your settings in Bolus. Deletion is immediate and permanent: it erases your profile, plans, shopping lists, meal history and any connected glucose data, and only a small record that you accepted the terms is kept, for a limited period, for legal reasons. If you’d like a copy of your data first, or you’d rather we handled it, email [email protected]. See the Privacy Policy for the full detail.

Message Bolus on WhatsApp and you’ll get a real member of the team, not a bot. You can also email [email protected], or use the contact page. Once you’ve started, there’s Report an issue on any screen, and the help centre has step-by-step articles for running the programme day to day.