What is a Food Calorie Counter

A food calorie counter is a great tool to use to see how many calories are being taken in each day and they also help to figure out how many calories that should be consumed based on a person's goals. What makes them convenient is that there are a number of them that are free for anybody to use online.

Why Use a Food Calorie Counter

Using a food calorie counter can assist anyone in meeting their individual goal. Whether it's to gain weight, lose weight or maintain a current weight, using a food calorie counter will help you determine how many calories have been eaten during the day and how many calories that are left for that particular day.

There is also a section for any physical activity that is completed for that day to be entered. This is important since physical activity will change the caloric needs for that day. If somebody is trying to lose weight, they will be allowed a few extra calories depending on the amount of physical activity completed, while still working towards their weight loss goals. For those who are trying to gain weight, physical activity will show them how many more calories they need to consume to continue working towards their weight gain goals.

How to Use a Food Calorie Counter

• Locate a free calorie counter online (My Fitness Pal is a great free one)
• Sign up for a free account
• Enter your personal details (including age, height, weight, sex)
• Determine your goals - the program will ask you whether you want to lose weight, maintain a current weight or gain weight. Choose accordingly.
• Enter all foods that have been consumed that day. You can either do this after every meal or you can wait until the end of the day and enter everything all at once. If you do this, be sure you right down what you eat so you don't forget.
• Enter in any physical activity and the amount of time it was performed for. (For example, 20 minutes of running @ 6mph)

Thousands of different foods are already in the system so you generally won't have to enter anything manually - such as calories. Simply search for the item you ate either by brand name or type of food and it should be on the list. If something you have eaten isn't on the list, you will need to read the nutrition label and add it into the system manually. I have found that I have never had to enter in anything manually.

Food calorie counters are very simple to use and you can access the account online from any computer. Make sure you read everything on the site before signing up with any website. From personal experience, I know that My Fitness Pal is free, but some of them are only free trials or they actually require a payment before they can be used. The free versions of any food calorie counter will work just fine for what they should be used for.