Cronometer: Calorie Counter

Cronometer is the food tracker we would point to first for anyone who wants to know what is actually in their diet, not just how many calories it adds up to. Its core database is curated rather than crowdsourced, built on lab-analyzed sources such as the NCCDB and USDA FoodData Central, and it tracks up to 82 nutrients, from vitamins and minerals to individual fatty acids. Much of that depth is available without paying. The cost is effort. Cronometer rewards people who weigh their food and are comfortable reading a nutrient table, and it can feel like more app than a casual calorie counter needs. It suits micronutrient-minded eaters, keto and therapeutic dieters, and wearable users who want food and biometrics in one place; anyone who only wants a quick daily calorie number may prefer a lighter app.

What makes Cronometer different

Most popular calorie counters grew by letting users add foods themselves. That produces an enormous catalog, but searching for a common food can return dozens of near-identical entries with different numbers. Cronometer takes the opposite approach. Its core entries come from research databases, and the company says user submissions are reviewed by its own nutrition data staff before they reach global search. The result is a smaller catalog with far less noise. Searching for a whole food tends to surface a clean, verified entry rather than a list to sort through.

The second difference is the breadth of measurement. A typical tracker shows calories, protein, carbs and fat, perhaps with fiber and sodium. Cronometer breaks a day down into vitamins, minerals, amino acids and fatty acids, and shows progress against a target for each. For someone trying to work out whether they get enough iron, magnesium or omega-3s, or someone told to cap potassium or phosphorus, that view is the main reason to use the app. Its energy summary also goes further than a single calorie number, splitting expenditure into components such as resting metabolism, activity and the thermic effect of food, and it shows net carbs for low-carb users.

Walking through the app

Logging works three ways: text search, barcode scanning, and custom foods or recipes. Search is where the curated database shows its value; for packaged goods, the barcode scanner is the fast route. Custom recipes let you build a dish from weighed ingredients and then log a portion by weight or volume, which suits batch cooking.

Each diary entry feeds your nutrient targets, which you can leave at the defaults or adjust for a particular diet. For ketogenic, low-carb, renal or intermittent fasting plans, the relevant tools are macro-ratio settings, adjustable targets and caps for individual nutrients, and, with Gold, the fasting timer. We would add one caution: Cronometer is a logging tool, so anyone following a medical diet should set targets with a clinician rather than relying on defaults.

Beyond food, Cronometer logs biometrics. You can record weight, blood pressure, blood glucose, ketones and similar measurements by hand, or import them from connected services. Cronometer lists Garmin, Fitbit and Google Health Connect among its integrations, along with continuous glucose and sleep data from specialized devices. Seeing glucose readings next to what you ate can help anyone trying to understand how particular meals affect them. A web version is also available for entering long recipes on a full keyboard.

Free versus Gold

The free tier is genuinely usable. Search, barcode scanning, custom recipes, biometrics and the full nutrient breakdown are part of the core experience, and users generally describe the free version as workable for day-to-day logging. The free version shows ads; removing them is one of the Gold benefits.

Gold, a recurring subscription, adds analysis and convenience tools:

• Nutrient Oracle, which suggests specific foods that would close the gaps in a given day’s nutrients.
• Recipe importer, which parses a recipe from a web link instead of requiring ingredient-by-ingredient entry.
• Custom charts, for plotting trends and comparing nutrients or biometrics over time.
• Target scheduler, for diets that change targets by day, such as carb cycling.
• Fasting timer and timestamped logging, for people tracking when they eat as well as what.

In our view the line is drawn in a sensible place. If you mainly want to log meals and check your nutrient totals, the free tier covers it. If you want to analyze patterns across weeks or import recipes regularly, plan on Gold. Pricing varies by region and billing period, so check the in-app offer before subscribing.

Cronometer also says it does not sell personal health information to advertisers. That matters for an app that may end up holding your glucose readings and other health measurements alongside everything you eat.

Why users stay, and what gives them pause

The micronutrient view earns the most praise: users describe using it to spot and correct shortfalls that a basic calorie counter would never show. The database comes next. People who switch from crowdsourced trackers frequently mention the relief of searching for a food and finding a single trustworthy entry instead of hundreds of conflicting ones. People managing diabetes or kidney conditions add that ratio tracking and nutrient caps have become part of their daily health management.

The most common reservation is cost. Users generally find the free tier functional, but some feel the most useful long-term analysis, such as trend charts and timestamps, sits behind an ongoing subscription.

Where it frustrates

The learning curve is real. The interface puts a lot of numbers on screen, and someone who just wants to stay under a calorie target may find the diary busier than they need. Most of it can be ignored, but it is there from day one.

The catalog is smaller. Curation means fewer entries, and niche regional products or local restaurant meals may not be in the database. In that case you create a custom food from the label, which adds a step each time. People who eat mostly packaged or takeaway food will run into this more often than people who cook from whole ingredients.

Labels carry fewer nutrients than lab data. When a packaged product’s entry is built from its nutrition label, it can only include the nutrients that label lists. A day built mostly from branded products may therefore show apparent shortfalls in vitamins or minerals that reflect missing data rather than a real deficiency. Generic, lab-analyzed entries give the fullest picture.

Precision takes effort. The numbers are only as accurate as the amounts you enter. Cronometer works best with a kitchen scale, and homemade meals mean weighing each component the first time you build a recipe.

Who it’s not for

Cronometer is not the best fit if you want the fastest possible calorie log with minimal reading, if most of your meals come from restaurants and regional brands that a crowdsourced database is more likely to cover, or if you won’t weigh food. And as with any detailed tracker, people for whom close monitoring of food feeds anxiety or an unhealthy focus on numbers may be better served by a simpler approach, or by no tracking at all.

How it compares

Against MyFitnessPal, the trade is coverage versus consistency. MyFitnessPal’s large crowdsourced database is more likely to have a specific branded or restaurant item, but entries can be duplicated or inconsistent. Cronometer has fewer items and more reliable ones, and its micronutrient view goes considerably deeper.

Against Lose It!, which centers on simple calorie budgets, Cronometer is the more analytical choice. If weight is your only goal and you want a lighter interface, Lose It! may suit you better.

Against MacroFactor, a subscription app known for adjusting calorie targets based on your weight trend, the question is what you want the app to do. MacroFactor focuses on tuning your calorie and macro targets over time; Cronometer focuses on the composition of what you eat, and it has a free tier.

A note on recency

The Play listing shows a last update of April 7, 2026, about six months before this review. Cronometer is a long-established product with a mature core feature set, so the gap matters less than it would for a younger app. Wearable integrations depend on third-party services that change, so we would confirm your specific device is supported before committing to Gold.

The verdict

Cronometer is one of the strongest choices for people who care about nutrient quality as much as quantity. Its curated database, detailed micronutrient tracking and biometric logging make it a natural fit for health-focused users, low-carb and therapeutic dieters, and anyone tired of sorting through duplicate entries. The costs are effort and, for the deepest analysis, a subscription. If you are willing to weigh your food, the free tier alone is a capable, detailed nutrition tracker, and Gold is a reasonable upgrade once you know you will use its charts and planning tools.