You are looking for a MyFitnessPal alternative. Probably not because the counting is wrong, it has been accurate for fifteen years. More likely because after a few weeks you realised you were feeding a database that gave very little back.
This article will not tell you MyFitnessPal is bad. It will give you what its official documentation actually says in 2026, and a framework for choosing what comes next. One disclosure up front: this article is published by Diet Mate, which is itself a MyFitnessPal alternative. You are reading a comparison written by an interested party. Every claim about MyFitnessPal is sourced to its official documentation with the update date, and where a capability is not documented, that is what is written rather than declaring it absent.
The official help page "The difference between Free, Premium, and Premium +", updated 1 September 2026, publishes the full three-tier table. Here is what matters when your question is memory rather than counting.
In the free tier: food and exercise logging, creating your own foods, meals and recipes, logging weight and measurements, viewing macronutrients, customising goals by percentage, sharing your diary, and a printable report.
Paid tiers only: data export, food timestamps, the barcode scanner, Meal Scan, macros by gram, food analysis, goals by meal, and an ad-free experience. Premium+ adds meal planning and grocery lists.
Three of those lines deserve a pause.
Export. The official article "Export your nutrition, progress, and exercise data", updated 6 August 2026, states that the export feature is available to Premium and Premium+ subscribers, while free accounts can still print a report or share their diary with a trainer, doctor or nutritionist. The export emails you a single zip containing three CSV files: meal level nutrition details, progress history, and exercise history. You can choose the date range, but not which files: all three go together.
Going back to free. The official FAQ is clear and fair on this: if you return to the free tier, your logs, recipes and progress history stay in your account, and you lose access to the paid features. Put differently, your history stays, but the key that gets it out sits inside the subscription.
Timestamps. Knowing when you ate is a paid line. Meal timing is exactly the kind of data that makes a history usable months later.
This is the most concrete point for anyone outside an English-language setup, and it comes straight from the official documentation.
The "Voice Logging" help page, updated 5 August 2025, states that the feature is available to Premium users on iOS and Android with their language set to English, on app version 24.35.0 or higher. The same page notes that it does not work offline, and that you cannot use it to log your custom My Foods, My Recipes or My Meals items, nor a Quick Add, weight, exercise or water.
The official Meal Scan FAQ similarly describes availability for Premium users on iOS 18 or Android 13 and above, running version 22.17 or newer, with the language set to English.
This is a rollout decision, not a flaw. But if you are considering a subscription mainly for voice logging or meal scanning and your phone runs in French, German or Spanish, verify this inside the app before paying. It is the kind of detail that turns a useful subscription into a disappointing one.
When people compare nutrition apps, they compare the same three things almost every time: database size, logging speed, price. Those criteria explain why you download an app. They never explain why you keep it.
Six criteria make the difference over time. They are the ones we use in our 2026 nutrition app comparison, and they read as a checklist:
Run that checklist against any nutrition tracker. Most hold up on the first two and collapse on the last four. That gap is what nutritional memory names: the layer that turns a dead archive into a live resource.
| Criterion | MyFitnessPal free | MyFitnessPal Premium | Memory-first approach (Diet Mate) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Capture | Manual database search, custom foods and recipes | Adds barcode scanner, Meal Scan and voice logging, the latter two documented in English only | Voice, text, photo and barcode, unlimited on the free tier, in the user's own language |
| Context | Food notes field | Notes plus food timestamps | The free-form description is kept in full, not just the computed total |
| Continuity | History retained in the account | History retained, analysis by period | Weekly report that compares weeks against each other and surfaces recurring patterns |
| Correction | Edit or delete an entry | Same | Correction in plain language, the estimate is recomputed |
| Recall | Scroll the diary, printable report | Built-in analysis and dashboards | Plain-language questions asked directly of the history |
| Control | Printable report, diary sharing | Three CSV files emailed, subscriber only | CSV and JSON export, deletion, open API, France and EU hosting |
Sources: official MyFitnessPal documentation for the free and Premium columns, consulted 13 September 2026. Diet Mate column: our own product, declared as such.
A clean migration takes about twenty minutes. The order matters.
Diet Mate starts from one premise: in nutrition tracking, logging is the cost and what the app gives back is the value. Most apps optimise the cost. Few optimise the value.
In practice, you describe your meal out loud, the way you would tell someone about it. The app estimates calories, macros and nutrients, and keeps the full description, not just the computed number. That description is where the context lives: the time, the situation, the reason. It is also what makes the history answerable later.
Everything else follows from that. A weekly report that compares weeks and surfaces one recurring pattern rather than a score. The ability to ask your own history a question. CSV and JSON export, deletion, hosting in France and the European Union, and an open API if you want to plug your data into your own tools.
And the limits, since they exist: Diet Mate does not use an external nutrition database, the estimate comes from your description of the meal. That choice handles composite dishes and home cooking well, and it remains an estimate rather than a weighing. The free tier runs a lighter model than the Pro subscription and caps saved recipes. If your need is gram-accurate weighing of simple foods, a classic counter will do the job.
What is the best MyFitnessPal alternative in 2026?
It depends what you want back. If you want to count calories against a large food database, the classic counters all do roughly the same thing. If you want an app that understands your habits over time, look for the one that keeps the context around your meals and lets you query your history. These are two different product categories, not two quality levels.
Is MyFitnessPal still free in 2026?
Yes, the free tier still exists and covers food and exercise logging, creating recipes, tracking weight and viewing macronutrients. According to official documentation updated 1 September 2026, the barcode scanner, Meal Scan, food timestamps and data export sit in the paid tiers. Pricing varies by country and plan length, and MyFitnessPal points to its own website for current prices.
Does MyFitnessPal voice logging work in languages other than English?
The official Voice Logging help page, updated 5 August 2025, describes the feature as available to Premium users with the app language set to English. A rollout into other languages since that date is not documented on that page. Check inside the app before subscribing for that specific reason.
Can I take my MyFitnessPal history with me if I switch apps?
Yes, through the export feature, which is available to Premium and Premium+ subscribers. You receive a zip by email containing three CSV files. Do it before cancelling: returning to free keeps your logs in the account but removes access to export.
What does a memory-first nutrition app give you that a calorie counter does not?
A counter answers how much today. A memory app answers what keeps repeating. The difference is not calculation accuracy, it is the shelf life of the data. A calorie total is stale the next morning. Preserved context gains value every week.
Switching nutrition trackers for the same thing done slightly better is not worth the effort. The question is not which app counts most precisely, but which one will still be useful in three months because it kept something. Run any candidate through the six criteria. The one that holds on all six is your alternative.
Going further: nutritional memory, the full definition, and what the MyFitnessPal redesign says about the future of the food diary.
