Relative Chlorophyll measures the greenness of the leaf and is widely used as one of the important measures of plant health. The Konica Minolta SPAD meter 502+ is a standard commercially available instrument for measuring SPAD (Relative Chlorophyll index) and is used, limited to research studies due to the high initial cost of more than Rs. 1.3 lakh. The present innovation is a low-cost alternative to existing SPAD meter. The CIAE- SPAD meter achieves similar accuracy to that of commercially available SPAD meter at low cost. The SPAD value is used in plant physiology-based research investigations and making nitrogen fertilizer recommendations. Therefore, CIAE- SPAD can become a potential diagnostic tool for measuring nitrogen status for research and field use due to its lower cost. It also added the benefit of data logging to the Android smartphone as compared to commercially available SPAD meter.