Weight Watchers vs. My Fitness Pal

my guess if it is a diet program that you are paying for they are pushing their viewpoints and products it doesn't mean they are up to date with the latest science

http://www.youtube.com/user/drjasonfung?feature=watch

I couldn't agree more! I was on WW and I couldn't understand the point either. I didn't understand how I could eat x amount of points. I hated it. I liked the community feeling, and when I would make "friends" I found out that many of the people that were using WW, were tracking their food on MFP as well and they found it very helpful. I figured why not use this for free and I'm getting the same perks instead of spending how much for WW.

Shortly after I got a sedentary job I gained around 25 pounds and did WW. I lost weight, became a lifetime member and kept it off for a long time. Then after an injury and subsequent weight gain I went back and they were doing the points system. I did WW for about 2 years and yo-yo'd like crazy until I quit. I found points did not hold me accountable for proper nutrition. Not having the visibility into fat, sugar, sodium, etc. led to some bad habits that I am trying really hard to break. After trying a number of things I have landed here on MFP. The points thing just doesn't work for me. My body treats 150 calories of simple carbs differently from 150 calories of protein or complex carbs. (I am sure the "a calorie is a calorie" crowd are going to criticize that but whatever, I live in this body - they don't.)

That said, I did learn a lot from WW and it also has some great tools and every recipe I have ever tried from a WW cookbook was awesome. My husband is a chef and rather serious foodie and he likes all the WW recipes I have prepared.

I did not find the meetings helpful but maybe it was just bad luck on meetings. If you are a lone wolf, you may find the meetings tiresome after awhile and if you don't go then you don't have the support network.

MFP has lots of supportive people and for those who aren't you can just ignore them. Its also free and it fits into your life when its convenient for you.

No harm in trying both for awhile to see which one works best for you. Good luck!

I am an American business loyalist, Weight Watchers is a foreign owned corporation while Myfitnesspal is an American company so MFP will get my vote. Weight Watchers seems to care only about profit and being in control of your wallet and purse strings before your health. MFP seems to care about putting you in control of your health and lifestyle and letting the business bear fruit accordingly. I hope I have not offended anyone but my first post should be from the heart.

I've never tried WW, but I started MFP half-heartedly and I started losing weight! Now I've been logging for a year. I've never dieted more than 2 consecutive weeks in my life. MFP worked for me, so I'm sticking with it. It's probably even more important to log during maintenance--that's my plan.

I joined WW a fortnight ago. I used to do the MFP thing and did awesome on it, got hooked on exercise and unfortunately hurt my knee in the meantime. I got depressed about the lack of control (I used to exercise more than 1.5 hours a day so I could eat heaps) and stopped logging. Gained 15kg. I just could not shake myself out of the rut, my hip had joined the pity party with my knee pain. Dr said hip pain was caused from gaining so much weight so fast and that should be motivation for me to snap out of it. It wasn't so a month later and I was still in a lot of pain so I joined WW a fornight ago for motivation. That was the motivation I needed to come back here and start logging again.

I tried tracking using their online tools and I could hardly find any of the foods I eat. On here, anything I can think of eating - someone has already added to the database. I was so confused with the points thing, I tracked at the end of the day and realised I had eaten 45 points when I'm only supposed to eat 26 (I'm only 1kg from the top end of the healthy weight range).

I am doing so much better this last week eating wise since re-tracking on MFP. I may not have control over my exercise with my injury but I have control over my food. I wish I realised this 15kg ago and wasn't so stupid. I'm happy to be back and in the meantime I'm going to stay with WW for the face-to-face support because I love the social side of things. Its like being surrounded by people who love food as much as me, we all have something in common hahahhaa