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Calorie tracking.

10 apps · 6,164 reviews held · 2,648 negative · 2026-09-02 snapshot

The market’s shape

2.1star
How angry
43%
Negative reviews
39%
Room to enter
9 of 9
Willingness to pay

Mostly solved: login & auth. 6 of 9 apps run below the store’s typical rate on it, while 9 of 10 still carry accuracy complaints.

5 gaps.

Shares of this market’s 2,648 negative reviews.

Accuracyextreme

6.8% vs 1.5% typical store-wide.

Counted in 179 reviews · 9 of 10 apps · 2.1star mean

What they said · 3 of 179
  • Calorie Counter - MyNetDiary1star· Sep 4, 2026

    Upgrades Ruined Function and History — Ever since the recent upgrade I can no longer easily and seamlessly copy meals, relocate meals if I added in the wrong place, find past meals to select from, add new meals if they were bad choices (no option for hamburgers), several restaurant options previously populated or used no longer exist. For the cost of the premium version this loss of prior value fu

  • Calorie Counter - MyNetDiary3star· Aug 21, 2026

    Decent but there is inaccuracy… — Cool idea but when I barcode scans one item and it comes up with another there is an issue. Then the logical thing to do is send it in to get reviewed by their “professional team”. Then this “professional team” decides to turn it around and say I’m scanning the wrong barcode instead of realizing there might be an issue with the one that was originally scanned. **E

  • Calorie Counter - MyNetDiary1star· Aug 21, 2026

    Difficult to add your own recipes. Not easy to track calories. — This app is not what it was advertised as. I cook a lot of my own recipes and do not use any oil in cooking. So if I have to search up a generic recipe my calorie count is way off. If you just want to scan prepackaged food or things that are easy (1 apple) it works great. But adding recipes is a total pain. The icons are difficult

UXhigh

15.5% vs 4.9% typical store-wide.

Counted in 410 reviews · 8 of 10 apps · 2.1star mean

What they said · 3 of 410
  • Lose It! – Calorie Counter1star· Sep 2, 2026

    Horrible — Don’t even bother! All of these apps have gotten way too complicated. We don’t need their food plans, their coaches, their communities, their macro definition, putting way too much together to justify a ridiculous price. All we need is to be able to easily count calories for the food ingest, how much protein caramel carbs and, fat are in those calories. Then we need to be able to link

  • MyFitnessPal: Calorie Counter1star· Aug 29, 2026

    Latest update is terrible — Title says it all.

  • Lose It! – Calorie Counter3star· Aug 29, 2026

    Hard to use — Incredibly difficult to reset password. The forced questionnaire to start an account is annoying. Bad user experience. Moving on to a different app.

Sync & dataelevated

1.5% vs 0.9% typical store-wide.

Counted in 41 reviews · 7 of 10 apps · 1.8star mean

What they said · 3 of 41
  • Lose It! – Calorie Counter3star· Aug 11, 2026

    Bad UI changes and performance — I’m a lifetime premium subscriber and have been using this app pretty much since it came out. The recent UI changes have made the app so difficult to use. The fat bubbles around meal items when adding food and font changes have made it almost illegible. It used to be easy to visually scan through many past entries to add food. but now the info density is so much

  • MyFitnessPal: Calorie Counter1star· Aug 10, 2026

    No help from support — I have not received any help for a syncing issue within the app and it’s been about five days. This app sucks. It’s so annoying. I need this fixed.

  • MyFitnessPal: Calorie Counter1star· Aug 7, 2026

    Does Not Sync Apple Health Workouts — This used to work and nothing has changed about the permissions. I have granted to Apple health. Although my fitness pal is enabled in the Apple Health app, and I have deleted and re-uploaded the app several times and undertaking every troubleshooting measure they have advised, this no longer works. That’s a dealbreaker for me.

Named problems · 2
  • Sync fails between devices11 of 41
  • Everything gone at once6 of 41

Limits & capselevated

3.1% vs 1.9% typical store-wide.

Counted in 82 reviews · 9 of 10 apps · 2.4star mean

What they said · 3 of 82
  • Lose It! – Calorie Counter1star· Sep 4, 2026

    Doesn’t Work — Constantly either crashing or showing server-side error messages. Not to mention features that were once free are now locked behind a paywall. Just use a pen and paper.

  • Lose It! – Calorie Counter1star· Sep 3, 2026

    Recent update ramped up ads aggressively and it’s now basically unusable — That was the only thing this app had over myfitnesspal but they went the same direction by paywalling features as simple as adding calories to a different day

  • MyFitnessPal: Calorie Counter1star· Aug 28, 2026

    Went downhill — Too many features behind a paywall, app is barely usable now.

Named problems · 1
  • Core feature locked behind the paywall15 of 82

Billingelevated

47.5% vs 30.8% typical store-wide.

Counted in 1,257 reviews · 10 of 10 apps · 2.1star mean

What they said · 3 of 1,257
  • Lose It! – Calorie Counter2star· Sep 4, 2026

    Far too many ads on paid plan — I’m on the paid annual plan and still receive at least 2-3 full screen takeover the app ads each week.

  • Calorie Counter - MyNetDiary1star· Sep 4, 2026

    Upgrades Ruined Function and History — Ever since the recent upgrade I can no longer easily and seamlessly copy meals, relocate meals if I added in the wrong place, find past meals to select from, add new meals if they were bad choices (no option for hamburgers), several restaurant options previously populated or used no longer exist. For the cost of the premium version this loss of prior value fu

  • Lose It! – Calorie Counter1star· Sep 4, 2026

    Doesn’t Work — Constantly either crashing or showing server-side error messages. Not to mention features that were once free are now locked behind a paywall. Just use a pen and paper.

Named problems · 4
  • Price judged too high for the value94 of 1257
  • Trial converted without clear consent55 of 1257
  • Cancellation blocked or broken35 of 1257
  • Charge the user never authorised20 of 1257

Also counted

ThemeOf 2,648 negatives
  • Performance285 · 10.8% · 9 apps
  • Support234 · 8.8% · 9 apps
  • Ads223 · 8.4% · 8 apps
  • Login & auth141 · 5.3% · 9 apps

The tick marks the store-typical rate. A review can mention more than one theme, so these sum past 100%.

Is anyone looking for this?

What Apple and Google complete after calorie tracking, in their order.

Who they're for
kidsweight gainpregnancyindian food
Google
calorie tracking appcalorie tracking app freecalorie trackingcalorie tracking app redditcalorie tracking watchcalorie tracking websitecalorie tracking scalecalorie tracking spreadsheet
App Store
calorie counter freecalorie trackingcalorie tracking app for freefood calorie tracker freefree ai calorie counterfree calorie tracking appai calorie countercalorie counter

Marked App Store phrases are searched, but no app in this market says them in its name. Audiences are what Apple and Google complete after “calorie tracking for”, with the query stripped.

Potential customers

People the apps here do not serve, and what they asked for.

  • Wants lesstoo many features 23 · just a basic one 12 · it used to be simpler 332
  • Wants it to plug inApple Health 9 · Apple Watch 213
  • Outgrown itbulk entry 10 · bulk edit 3 · bulk delete 212
  • Shut out by device or contextiPad 310

Counted in 1 to 4 star reviews. The small numbers are how many reviews named each thing. What they wrote is in the free trial.

Who’s in it

All 10 apps counted in this market · 2026-09-02.

Installs are Google's own count, captured 2026-09-06. 5 of 10 apps have an Android listing we could match. A dash means we could not pair the two stores, not that the app is absent from Play.

What they charge, and what it costs them

Prices from Apple’s public pages; the share counts payment-mechanics language only.

AppMoney complaints
BitePal: Food Calorie Tracker$3.99–$59.99 · 8 tiers13.5% of 349
Cal AI - Calorie Tracker$0.99–$29.99 · 7 tiers13% of 461
Lose It! – Calorie Counter$9.99–$79.99 · 10 tiers11.1% of 287
Calorie Counter - MyNetDiary$8.99–$59.99 · 5 tiers10.7% of 93
MacroFactor - Macro Tracker$9.99–$89.99 · 6 tiers7.6% of 131
Calorie Counter by Numify$5.99–$59.99 · 6 tiers4.4% of 279
MyFitnessPal: Calorie Counter$9.99–$79.99 · 7 tiers2.9% of 858
Cronometer: Calorie Counter$10.99–$59.99 · 5 tiers1.8% of 163
Calorie Counter by fatsecret$10.49–$59.99 · 7 tiers0% of 26

What each one owns, where each is exposed

Owns. Dominant reach (2.34M ratings), decade-long food database, brand recognition, streak culture

Exposed. 72% negative share; two-star reviews explicitly citing the May 2026 UI overhaul destroying daily readability; basic features like quick-add moved behind a paywall at $79.99/yr max; users publicly directing others to competitors

Owns. Photo-based logging novelty, 335K ratings showing real reach

Exposed. 72% negative share; billing described as predatory — refund requests rejected for a full year per receipts; 7 IAP tiers up to $29.99

Lifesum: AI Calorie Counter

Owns. Design polish, AI logging hook, 150K ratings

Exposed. 64% negative share; AI hallucinations destroying tracking trust ('The AI hallucinates, sometimes fails to record items to the diary entirely'); 8 IAP tiers up to $119.99

AI Calorie Tracker by Yazio

Owns. Free entry tier, broad nutrition data

Exposed. 62% negative share; opaque hidden usage limits users hit without warning; bait-and-switch pricing in ads (advertised $23.90, charged $35.89 per receipt)

Owns. Gamified avatar concept, low entry price ($0.99 min)

Exposed. 53% negative share; receipts document charging both basic and pro simultaneously then refusing to cancel one; ghost charges after deletion

Owns. Lowest negative share among scaled apps (40%), 763K ratings — the current safe harbor for MFP refugees

Exposed. Still 40% negative; 10 IAP tiers up to $79.99; the incumbent most likely to absorb the exodus if a new entrant is slow

Owns. Nutrition-depth reputation, 93K ratings, 26% negative share — best-in-class anger metric at scale

Exposed. Full-screen interstitial ads in free tier driving paid-user defection; search UX regressed in recent update; not a UI stability story

Owns. Lowest negative share in the set (25%), coach-mode differentiation, 18K ratings

Exposed. Small reach; billing loop bug trapping users post-subscription with no working escape; support scripted and unresponsive

Owns. 13% negative share — the quietest app in the category; 156K ratings

Exposed. Low anger may reflect low engagement rather than delight; no receipt-level evidence of a loyal, vocal power-user base

The Deep Report on this market

Each rival’s exposed weakness, what not to build, and the call, argued from the same reviews counted above.

Read the Deep Report

Browse the apps behind these counts

Every app we count, with the complaint it runs furthest above the store’s typical rate.

Open the app library

Is there a market for a new calorie tracking app?

10 apps compete on this shelf, holding 6,164 App Store reviews. And the widest unfixed complaint, accuracy, runs in 9 of 10 of them at 6.8% of negative reviews against 1.5% typical. Those are counts, not a verdict. The page shows what is unfixed, not whether to build.

What do users complain about most in calorie tracking?

1. Accuracy: in 9 of 10 apps, 6.8% of negative reviews; 2. UX: in 8 of 10 apps, 15.5% of negative reviews; 3. Sync & data: in 7 of 10 apps, 1.5% of negative reviews; 4. Limits & caps: in 9 of 10 apps, 3.1% of negative reviews; 5. Billing: in 10 of 10 apps, 47.5% of negative reviews.

How many calorie tracking app reviews did App Imp count?

6,164 US App Store reviews across 10 apps, 2,648 of them negative. Counted on the 2026-09-02 snapshot, never estimated.

How markets are ranked

We give each market a mark out of 100 for seven things (nobody's fixed it 20 · above the norm 15 · how angry 10 · room to build 15 · room to enter 15 · getting bigger 20 · willingness to pay 5). Then we multiply the marks together. We do not average them.

Averaging lets a market hide one bad problem behind good numbers. Multiplying means one bad mark pulls the whole score down. That is the point. A market you cannot win is still a market you cannot win, however badly it is served.

Each mark has a fixed rule. Nobody’s fixed it and willingness to pay are plain shares. Above the norm maxes out at 4 times the store’s usual rate. How angry runs from star3.0 down to star1.5. Room to enter is what the biggest app does not own. Getting bigger hits 100 at 10% growth. Room to build is different. It is a sweet spot, not a size. A market can be too small to live on, or too big to break into.

If we cannot count something, we leave it out. We never guess it. The score only sorts this list. Every other number you see on a market is counted.

How this is counted

Every number is arithmetic over the reviews we hold, re-counted weekly: nothing modelled, nothing scored. Themes come from a frozen pattern classifier rather than a model reading reviews, so the same review always lands in the same bucket. A market rate is pooled across every app here; the store rate is the same count across 12,728 apps. A complaint is only called a gap when at least half the market carries it, at least 20 reviews are behind it, and the market’s rate is elevated above the store’s, the same cutoff used everywhere on this site, because a problem concentrated in one app is that app’s bug, and a problem every app on the store shares is nobody’s gap.