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Interfacing with a digital weight scale

myersgrace25
myersgrace25 Posts: 1 Member
in Feature Suggestions and Ideas
I recently purchased a weight scale that interfaces with my phone and allows me to very accurately track calories based on weight. My life is forever changed, it is so so so much easier and more accurate than trying to enter everything in manually. The only downside is it cannot interface with myfitnesspal which is my preferred app for calorie counting. Please please please interface with or create your own digital scale that autopopulates calories based on weight.
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  • AnnPT77
    AnnPT77 Posts: 35,148 Member
    myersgrace25 wrote: »
    I recently purchased a weight scale that interfaces with my phone and allows me to very accurately track calories based on weight. My life is forever changed, it is so so so much easier and more accurate than trying to enter everything in manually. The only downside is it cannot interface with myfitnesspal which is my preferred app for calorie counting. Please please please interface with or create your own digital scale that autopopulates calories based on weight.

    Calorie goal?

    Weight is one factor in calorie goal, but not the only one. Even with personal profile data, a scale is at best only going to be very, very approximate, if only because it can't know how much we've been moving over the course of a day. The ones I've used give BMR estimates, but BMR is about what we'd burn in a coma flat out in bed; if they ask for average activity level in user profile, they could give a rough total calorie estimate, but MFP already does that for us, including the ability to update when body weight changes.

    There are scales that interface with MFP to keep weight in sync, both those here:

    https://www.myfitnesspal.com/apps?app_category=scales

    . . . as well as some others that sync through health apps (Renpho, Withings, probably others), all of which can be found here:

    https://www.myfitnesspal.com/apps

    For updated daily calorie goals based on personal and lifestyle factors, including daily activity, that's more what fitness trackers do, and MFP also can interface with a bunch of those:

    Those are scattered around in the apps list, but some are here:

    https://www.myfitnesspal.com/apps?app_category=wearables
  • Alatariel75
    Alatariel75 Posts: 18,625 Member
    Is this a body weight scale, or a food weight scale?
  • AnnPT77
    AnnPT77 Posts: 35,148 Member
    Alatariel75 wrote: »
    Is this a body weight scale, or a food weight scale?

    Good point. I missed that.

    I know there are some digital food scales that say they give calorie estimates. I'm a little skeptical, TBH, but that would be nice.
  • Alatariel75
    Alatariel75 Posts: 18,625 Member
    AnnPT77 wrote: »
    Alatariel75 wrote: »
    Is this a body weight scale, or a food weight scale?

    Good point. I missed that.

    I know there are some digital food scales that say they give calorie estimates. I'm a little skeptical, TBH, but that would be nice.

    I bought a new scale recently and saw there were some that have an app, and the app has a food diary so the scale speaks to the app, then you do a search for the food and it already has the weight for you. I considered them for a sec, then realised that it really wasn't that big a time saver and what I really needed was one with a pull-out display so I could still see the numbers when there was a big pot or plate on them! :)
  • AnnPT77
    AnnPT77 Posts: 35,148 Member
    Alatariel75 wrote: »
    AnnPT77 wrote: »
    Alatariel75 wrote: »
    Is this a body weight scale, or a food weight scale?

    Good point. I missed that.

    I know there are some digital food scales that say they give calorie estimates. I'm a little skeptical, TBH, but that would be nice.

    I bought a new scale recently and saw there were some that have an app, and the app has a food diary so the scale speaks to the app, then you do a search for the food and it already has the weight for you. I considered them for a sec, then realised that it really wasn't that big a time saver and what I really needed was one with a pull-out display so I could still see the numbers when there was a big pot or plate on them! :)

    My skepticism is mostly about the accuracy and completeness of the food database in those apps. In calorie counting apps, there are tradeoffs between the curated ones (potentially more accurate) and the crowd-sourced ones like MFP (potentially more comprehensive). I'm probably ingrained in my weighing/logging habits enough now that a digital food scale interface would feel add more complexity to my logging process than saving steps, but I believe OP when she says it's different for her.

    I assume that you had already figured out that you can put a bowl or similar on the scale platform to raise the thing you're weighing and make the numbers visible . . . .
  • Alatariel75
    Alatariel75 Posts: 18,625 Member
    AnnPT77 wrote: »
    Alatariel75 wrote: »
    AnnPT77 wrote: »
    Alatariel75 wrote: »
    Is this a body weight scale, or a food weight scale?

    Good point. I missed that.

    I know there are some digital food scales that say they give calorie estimates. I'm a little skeptical, TBH, but that would be nice.

    I bought a new scale recently and saw there were some that have an app, and the app has a food diary so the scale speaks to the app, then you do a search for the food and it already has the weight for you. I considered them for a sec, then realised that it really wasn't that big a time saver and what I really needed was one with a pull-out display so I could still see the numbers when there was a big pot or plate on them! :)

    My skepticism is mostly about the accuracy and completeness of the food database in those apps. In calorie counting apps, there are tradeoffs between the curated ones (potentially more accurate) and the crowd-sourced ones like MFP (potentially more comprehensive). I'm probably ingrained in my weighing/logging habits enough now that a digital food scale interface would feel add more complexity to my logging process than saving steps, but I believe OP when she says it's different for her.

    I assume that you had already figured out that you can put a bowl or similar on the scale platform to raise the thing you're weighing and make the numbers visible . . . .

    Oh, absolutely! But I tend to use some BIG containers when I'm making salami or smallgoods, so when I needed a new scale, the one where I didn't have to do any balancing was very attractive!

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