I use Livestrong MyPlate to track the calories and food that I eat. However, I am frequently annoyed by it and have tried a couple of other places which had things I also didn't like. So, am wondering about any options.
Here are the things that I would want:
1. Must be online
2. Would like a large database of food already in it
3. Must be easy to add foods -- this is the big issue I have with MyPlate. You can add foods that aren't in the database but it is difficult to do so. You have to either link to the food manufacturer website (which doesn't always easily have info there) or send in a screen shot. Also if a food is already in their database but is wrong you can only suggest corrections but can't actually submit the correct info. The main thing I am looking for is a site that will allow you to easily add foods, even if only for your own use.
4. Needs to be show not just calories, but also carbs, fat, protein, fiber, etc.
5. Needs to be able to set up your own nutrient goals.
6. Needs to be able to see your totals for at least the day and also weekly.
7. Ideally you could set a range of calories that you don't want to go over instead of just one number -- I haven't found this anywhere and it may not exist anywhere. But ideally instead of say setting calories at 1200 a day I could set it at 1100 to 1300 or set it for a weekly goal.
8. Makes it easy to record foods you eat often. As a gold member at myplate I have a weekly page where I can drag and drop food from one day to the next which I like.
9. I probably won't find this anywhere but would be nice if it calculated net carbs or if it had a place where you could yourself make a note of net carbs.
10. Would like to be able to record exercise as well.
I love Calorie Count. It does not let you calorie cycle or set a range, but as you've said I haven't found that anywhere else either. I love the set up, it's fairly easy to add your own food, and it gives you a water tracker too. I dare say it is kind of fun as well, because you can set weekly goals and unlock badges
If you join, find me and we can support each other - I'm WasabiSushiSama.
One thing I really love about sparkpeople is that I can track food on the go. They have an app that communicates with the actual website which is nice. There are ways to set intakes for all nutrients, etc. which I love. Once you play around with it, it ends up to be a really good site (for me atleast!). I realize though that everyone needs something a little different (: Hopefully you find what you are looking for! I only have had good experiences with sparkpeople so i can't really recommend any other sites that i would *love*
I have the LoseIt ap on my iPhone and use it every day! It has a cool "scan barcode" function, so I can just scan the barcode of what I'm eating and it automatically enters the data in! You need a camera on your phone to use the barcode function, but even without a camera, they have SO MANY foods on record that it's rare for them not to have something...
My Fitness Pal meets most of your criteria. It also has a smartphone app with a barcode scanner. You set a daily goal, but there is a weekly view in the app that can be used for viewing your average if you're cycling. There are some food items that are entered with "net carb" versions but the majority are not.
You can enter individual foods, save entire meals to be used again, and create recipes in order to calculate individual servings. You can choose which macros to track on your main page (I have calories, fat, protein, carb, fiber, and sodium on mine).
I like LoseIt also. Can be done as an app or via the website, or as a combo of both. With the app, it also works offline, so I don't have to have an Internet connection to be able to record my meals.
I don't know how good the database is, because I've created my own custom foods for everything. That way I can enter it all to the gram.
It doesn't allow for a target range... Not sure of any that do, but maybe there's something out there I'm not aware of.
Last edited by Blueberries; 04-22-2012 at 03:47 PM.
I am working my way through these. I did go back to Sparkpeople...I hadn't been there in over a year.
I do like it much better now. Some of the plusses.
You can set a calorie range for each day (not one for the week though) which I really like. You can also set nutrient goals and there is one for carbohydrates and for carbs and carbs seems to be carbohydrates less fiber which is nice.
I like that you can search for foods and can see what other people have entered and can use that nutritional info if it is correct but can add your own if it isn't correct.
So far the only thing that I really haven't found is any way to display how much sugar you've eaten. You can input that as part of nutrition info but I don't see a way to actually display the totals (I try to limit sugar so want to see that). Maybe it is there and I just haven't figured it out....
I tried my fitness pal before and forget why I liked MyPlate better. But, again, it iwas a long time ago so I need to go check it out again (as well the others that I haven't seen before).
I use Loseit currently, but for ease of setting your own nutritional goals, I'd suggest looking into Fitday. They've been around a looooong time, pretty good.
Edit to add - both are pretty good for adding your own foods. I like Loseit's ability to add whole recipes/divide them by serving size.
Last edited by Desiderata; 04-22-2012 at 08:14 PM.
Koshka, go to reports in the subnav. Click on daily nutrition feedback. Click edit nutrition goals. Click Add another nutrient to track. Choose what you want from the pull down menu and save.
Note that what you add won't show up on the home screen, youhave to actually look at the daily report to see anything but the defaults.
Calorie tracking Sites
