Collections on Vinst

Collections let you group your favorite recipes together — by theme, occasion, or whoever you're cooking with — right from your Recipe Box. Build a collection just for yourself, or share it so someone else can add their own recipes to it too. This guide covers creating, organizing, and sharing collections, and how they relate to printed cookbooks.

Top 5 questions people ask

What a collection is

A collection is a set of recipes you group together — it lives in your Recipe Box alongside everything else, and adding a recipe to a collection doesn't move or duplicate it. You can have as many collections as you like, and a recipe can belong to more than one.

Collections are free and digital-only. If you'd like a printed, bound copy, you can turn any collection into a cookbook — see Turning a collection into a cookbook.

📱 Using Vinst on your phone? Everything below works the same way — you'll just find the menu behind the ☰ icon instead of a sidebar, and pop-ups open as full screens instead of small centered windows.

The basics, at a glance

1. Browse or create — see all your collections at a glance, or start a new one
2. Add recipes — select recipes from your Recipe Box when you create a collection, or add more anytime
3. Organize — rename, reorder recipes, or change the cover whenever you like
4. Share — let others view your collection, or invite them to add their own recipes to it
5. Print it (optional) — turn a collection into a cookbook when you're ready to order a physical copy

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Step 1: Browse your collections

Head to Collections (via the "Recipes" breadcrumb, or the Collections bar at the top of your Recipe Box) to see every collection you've created or saved.

• Search by name, or filter by All collections, Created by me, or Created by others.
• Each collection card shows its cover, name, creator, and recipe count.
• If you haven't made a collection yet, you'll see a prompt to create your first one.

The Collections bar at the top of your Recipe Box shows your 8 most recent collections for quick access — click "Show all" to see the full list.

📱 On mobile: "Create collection" moves into a floating button at the bottom-right of the screen (it's in the header on desktop), the grid narrows to 2 columns, and the filter buttons (All/Created by me/Created by others) become a horizontal scroll instead of wrapping.

On desktop:

On mobile:

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Step 2: Create a collection

Click "Create collection" — from the Collections page, the Collections bar, or the "New collection" option when adding a recipe to a collection.

Step 1 of the wizard: select recipes. Choose any recipes already in your Recipe Box. You can always add or remove recipes later, so don't worry about getting the list perfect now.

💡 Don't have any recipes saved yet? See Adding a Recipe to Your Recipe Box first — you'll need at least one recipe in your box before you can build a collection.

Step 2 of the wizard: name it. Give your collection a name (e.g. "Family Favorites," "Holiday Recipes") and a creator name, then optionally pick a cover — one of Vinst's designs, or upload your own photo.

📌 Name + creator combined must be 60 characters or fewer. For the sharpest custom cover, use an image at least 2700×3600 px (300 DPI) — smaller photos still work, just expect some softness.

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Step 3: Organize and edit a collection

Open a collection's kebab menu (⋮) → "Edit collection" to:

• Rename it, or change the creator name
• Change the cover — pick a different template or upload a new photo
• Reorder recipes — drag any recipe up or down in the list
• Remove a recipe from the collection using the trash icon next to it (this only removes it from this collection — it stays in your Recipe Box)

💡 If you're a collaborator (not the owner) rather than the creator, you can only reorder or remove the recipes you personally added — the owner can manage everyone's.

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Step 4: Add more recipes to a collection

There are two ways to add recipes once a collection already exists:

• From a single recipe: choose "Add to..." and pick the collection (or start a new one on the spot). Collections that already include that recipe are marked "Added."
• From the collection itself: open it and click "+ Add recipes" to multi-select from your whole Recipe Box in one go.

💡 If you own the collection, all existing recipes are pre-selected and you can deselect any of them. If you're a collaborator, only your own additions are pre-selected — you can't remove recipes someone else added.

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Step 5: Manage a collection

Every collection card has a kebab menu (⋮) with quick actions:

• Share — open sharing settings (see below)
• Edit collection — rename, reorder, or change the cover
• Delete collection (owner) / Remove collection (saved copy) — this only removes the collection itself; none of its recipes are deleted from your Recipe Box

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Sharing & collaborating on a collection

As the owner, open Share from the kebab menu (or the Share button on the collection page) to control:

• Anyone with a link can: choose View only, or Collaborate (the default) — collaborators can add their own recipes to the collection, though they can't edit your recipe copies.
• Inspire others by having your cookbook appear in the Vinst community — an optional toggle, off by default.
• Allow others to order this cookbook — turning this on asks you to confirm you hold the rights to any third-party assets in the collection, since it lets viewers eventually print their own copy once it's a cookbook.
• Copy link — grab the shareable link to send to anyone.

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Viewing a shared collection

Anyone who opens your shared link can browse the collection's recipes. Depending on who they are:

• Signed-out visitors get a brief sign-in prompt after a couple of seconds, but can keep browsing without signing in.
• Anyone (not the owner) can click "Save collection" to add it to their own account, or "Create your own collection!" to start fresh.
• Collaborators on a collection set to "Collaborate" get a "+ Add recipes" button right on the page.

💡 Received a one-time redemption link instead (e.g. from an email)? Sign in and click "Redeem & Save digital collection" — it's a one-time link, so once redeemed the collection is saved straight to your account.

📱 On mobile: the page layout itself changes — the cover becomes a full-width banner photo with the collection's name and creator overlaid at the bottom, instead of sitting beside the recipe list in a sidebar. The header actions (Share, Edit collection, Turn into a Cookbook) become icon-only buttons instead of labeled ones.

On desktop:

On mobile:

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Turning a collection into a cookbook

Collections are free and digital-only — there's no option to order a printed copy of a collection directly. When you're ready for a physical, bound copy:

1. Open the collection you want to print and click "Turn into a Cookbook."
2. Finish designing it in the cookbook editor (add a dedication, fine-tune photos, arrange it into sections).
3. From there, follow Ordering & Pricing to print and order it.

💰 If you'd like to let someone else pay for and print their own copy of your finished cookbook, turn on "Allow others to order this cookbook" in Share settings, then send them your link.

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More questions

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Questions we couldn't answer here? Reach out to the Vinst team at info@vinst.me — we're happy to help.