Weight Watchers or MyFitnessPal??

Drewlssix wrote: »

jnv7594 wrote: »

herrspoons wrote: »

Fruits and veg aren't free. A large apple has over 100 calories.

^^^This. I don't understand the idea that some foods are free. I tried weight watchers in the past without much luck. I've lost 75 pounds on MFP, and for the first time ever, I feel like I have found a sustainable eating plan.

I consider a few things like broccoli to be "free" in that the calorie hit is tiny while the good stuff is significant. In stregnth circles the common line is "eat as much broccoli as you want". My wife did WW a few years ago and did well but couldn't justify sticking with it and dealing with the contorted diet it produces. Eating good stuff in a deficit beats picking random items from a list and being unhappy.

You know? Saying that really depends on your calorie allowance. I get 1280 calories a day. I've eaten 120 calories worth of microwave steamed broccoli at a meal. I weighed my portion so I know the exact calories. That's 1/10 of my daily intake. Not counting that over time would really add up. Were I a 6'2" man, it might not matter as much. If I didn't eat as much broccoli, it might not matter as much.

Don't make blanket statements about vegetables. They have calories. People can eat them in quantity, and the calories in those quantities can add up.

When I did WW, most fruits were 1 point, bananas were 2 points, most veggies were 0 except for peas, and carrots, I think. I did well with weight loss but always ended up not eating more nutritious options because I had no idea - I only went by points. I wasn't concerned about protein, iron, or even the amount of fiber, or fat...only "points." So I consistently chose as many low point foods as I could so I could eat more....nutrition came 2nd. Now since I ate a lot of veggies, I'm sure I got a lot of vitamins and minerals but really lacked in protein.

MFP is far superior in this regard.

I'm gonna go with the free one, every time. And the veggies/fruit thing "free" doesn't make sense to me. If that's the case, that's all I'd mentally "want" to eat.

My Mom is a Lifetimer at WW. I got her to try MFP and she love it. Down 7lbs since January with 7lbs to go (doing things slowly after cancer and she's 61) and is thrilled.

I lost 45lbs with the help of MFP in 2012, I will always recommend it to ANYONE I meet that is struggling! When I'm doing MFP right, I lose/maintain. If I get off it thinking I don't need it any more, the weight always comes back.

I had lost close to 100 lbs in the past when doing WW, but sadly gained it all back and then some due to some rough patches in life. In the past year I had tried doing both WW and MFP to get the weight off again but it was just too much to deal with so I quit WW and just am sticking with MFP (and besides FREE is always a good thing). WW has also changed their plan so many times over the past few years it just didn't seem to "click" with me like it had in the past. The whole fruits/veggies thing being "free" didn't really make sense to me.

So here I am...and here I'm gonna stay...and succeed!

MFP is free. Don't trust any "diet" plan that makes money when you regain the weight you lost. My friends who do WW seems to be on a constant cycle of "go to WW, lose weight, stop WW, regain, go back to WW". That seems to be an expensive and difficult way to maintain. It's better to get on here, log every day, and do the same thing whether you're losing, bulking, or maintaining.

Also WW tries to make calorie counting "easier" with the points system. OK, it's easier, but it's also less accurate. MFP gives you all the control.

And MFP can be used with IIFYM to lose weight, where WW has their own philosophy of good foods/bad foods. Why should I get punished for eating chocolate and red meat, and why should I get rewarded for overeating fruit which is packed with calories? I mean, OK, if you're really trying to change your eating habits from all processed foods, maybe it would benefit you. But for someone like me - I eat a very healthy, balanced diet, but just too much of it to lose weight.

For me it's MFP for many reasons but the two main ones are it's FREE and you are doing the same as Ww but on here you get ideas for variety of foods from around the world and all healthy GET in !!!!!! I found that my wife when on Ww was eating same food as before but using the points to track her diet on here we both use the tools to find better options with proper foods not mass produced rubbish.

I'm currently doing both

Started with weight watchers, online only for the tracking. The points system is simple and easy to parse, I find it easy to use 'on the fly' with a quick glance at food labels and the 'free' fruits and veggies is an easy trap to avoid with some common sense.

MFP is free, more accurate and tracks some things that WW doesn't; specifically your carb/fat/protein breakdown. The food database is larger, although I would recommend taking some time to build your own 'favorites' and to examine the items pulled from the database with extra care. There's people out there with a loose grasp on how many calories are in things, or how to measure a portion.

I'll likely graduate entirely to MFP. The free is compelling, and having double tracked for the last few weeks, I'm getting a good grasp on how things translate between the two programs

I've done both. I loved Weight Watchers but I now prefer MFP. The "free" fruit messes up a lot of people and I think it was a bad idea.
But the reasons I like MFP better are: it's free, and I prefer just looking at the calories/fat/protein, etc rather than pulling out my points calculator to figure it out (call me lazy lol).
The meetings are awesome (if you have a good leader) and that part of Weight Watchers is great. But overall, I think calorie counting and MFP are the better way to go, for me anyway.

I followed WW for 4 years and lost 120 pounds. Their online tools are horrible, so for me the value came from meetings. but then my awesome leader left and they started using canned PowerPoint presentations and talking at us. I stopped meetings so there was no need to use their crappy online tools for however much it costs. MFP gives me waaaay more useful information and I'm eating a lot less. Getting a little more carbs and fat than before, which rocks for me. I feel like WW was a good first start to keeping track of my intake, but they need to make some serious changes to their business model to keep up with free sites/apps like MFP. I still miss that in-person check-in and having to weigh in front of someone else once per week.

when WW moved to the Points Plus system and made fruits/veggies "free", then they reduced your total allotment of points. Before, a banana was 2 points but one of their chocolate bars was 1 point. They were just trying to get people to eat more fruits and veggies but many, like me, went a little nuts. One woman in the forums was talking about eating 7 bananas a day! C'mon. I'm much better off when I'm weighing my fruits and veggies and knowing exactly how much it's costing me in calories and macros.

No contest for me. I lost over 160# using MFP and have been maintaining for almost 16 months. There are no foods that have "no" calories, so WW it seems, is kind of misleading people. MFP is free, but I, for one, would pay for using it. That is how well it works for me. Having said this, everyone has to do what works for them to be successful.