How to track calories by texting

This guide covers the three ways to log by text, what a good estimate looks like, and the habits that keep text logging accurate over months rather than days.

Three ways to log a meal

Describe it. "2 eggs, toast with butter, a banana" is enough. You don't need grams unless you have them. A good assistant assumes typical portions, tells you what it assumed, and lets you correct it.

Photograph it. A photo of the plate carries a lot of information: what the food is, roughly how much, what it's served with. Photo estimates are less precise than weighed food, but they are far more precise than not logging at all, which is the real alternative for most people. How to log food with a photo covers what the camera gets right, what it misses and when to add a sentence.

Say it. A voice note while you're walking out of the restaurant ("burrito bowl, chicken, no rice, extra guac, ate about three quarters") gets transcribed and logged like a text. It's the fastest option when your hands are full.

With Bay, all three land in the same thread. Bay replies with the estimate (calories and protein up front, carbs and fat behind them), and a 👍 or "yes" confirms it. If something is off, say so: "that was a small tortilla" or "make it 300 calories" and the entry is updated.

What a good estimate looks like

A useful reply does four things:

1. Names what it saw, so you can catch a misread ("chicken burrito bowl, ¾ eaten").
2. Gives one number to act on. Calories first, then protein. The rest matters less day to day.
3. Says where you stand. "850 of 2,250 today, 128g protein to go" turns a log into a decision about dinner.
4. Learns from corrections. If you always eat a bigger bowl of oats than the default, the default should move.

If you don't yet have a daily target, start with how many calories you should eat to lose weight. The target is what gives each log its meaning.

How accurate is text and photo logging?

Honest answer: less accurate than a food scale, more accurate than memory. Studies of self-reported intake consistently find people under-report what they eat, often by 20% or more, and under-reporting is worst for snacks and drinks that never get written down. A method you'll actually use every day closes more of that gap than a precise method you abandon in week two.

Two things improve text accuracy a lot:

• Log at the meal, not at night. Reconstructing a day from memory is where the biggest errors come from.
• Mention the parts that hide calories: oil, butter, dressing, cheese, the second drink. "Salad" and "salad with ranch and croutons" are 300 calories apart.

Habits that make it stick

Log everything for the first two weeks, including the bad days. The point isn't a perfect record; it's an honest picture of your real average, which is what your target gets adjusted against.

Save your repeats. Most people eat the same breakfast five days a week. If your assistant can save "my usual breakfast", logging it becomes one word.

Don't chase the last 50 calories. The difference between a 410 and a 460 calorie breakfast is noise against a weekly total. Consistency beats precision.

Pair it with the scale. A weekly weigh-in tells you whether your logged intake is doing what it should. If the trend isn't moving the way you expect after three weeks, the target moves, not your willpower. See how many calories you should eat for how that adjustment works.

Protein deserves its own number

Calories decide whether you lose or gain weight; protein decides how much of that change is muscle. It's the one macro worth tracking on its own, and it's the one most people under-eat. If you're not sure what to aim for, how much protein you need per day walks through the evidence and gives a simple range.