MacroDiet and MacroFactor share a philosophy — that a calorie target should come from your own data rather than a one-time calculator — and they are at very different stages of delivering it. Zyra builds MacroDiet, so what follows is not an outside review; it is our own product placed next to the one that defined the category, with every MacroFactor fact taken from a MacroFactor page we opened on the date at the top of this article, and every gap on our side named.
The one-line summary
MacroFactor is a native app whose expenditure estimate learns from your logs and whose targets are coached weekly; MacroDiet is a web app whose targets are a documented formula you can reproduce, and whose learning loop is still being built.
Side by side
| MacroDiet (ours) | MacroFactor | |
|---|---|---|
| Expenditure | Starting estimate from Mifflin-St Jeor × activity; update-from-logs engine in development, starting number shown today | "Dynamic expenditure" that "adapts to changes in your metabolism"1 |
| Weekly adjustment | Not yet | Weekly coaching check-ins with automatic macro adjustments1 |
| Program styles | One mode, closest to manual | Coached, Collaborative, Manual2 |
| Logging density the app asks for | 3 consecutive days to start; 3 food days + 1 weigh-in per 7-day period to keep updating | Documented in its help centre (specific minimums omitted here because the page did not render at write time) |
| Food data | Search, barcode via OpenFoodFacts import, custom foods, recipes | "Verified food database", barcode scanner, AI label scanning1 |
| Target rules | Protein 1.2–2.4 g/kg, fat floor max(0.6 g/kg, 20% kcal), calorie floors 1,500 / 1,200, deficit cap 35% — public | Coached programs include a calorie floor and a fat floor; Collaborative and Manual do not2 |
| Platforms | Web; calculators in EN, DE, ES, FR, IT, NL | iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch, Mac, Vision Pro on the iOS listing; Android listed separately1 |
| Price | No payment taken today; paid tier planned | $11.99/mo, $47.99/6 mo, $71.99/yr, 7-day trial1 |
What MacroFactor has that we do not
An expenditure estimate that learns. This is the whole point of MacroFactor and the biggest gap in the table. Its help centre is blunt about why: static TDEE calculators produce an average error of about 325 kcal/day, and about 20% of people get recommendations off by 500–1,000 kcal/day3. MacroFactor's answer is to invert the energy-balance equation over your own logs — calories in, minus the change in stored energy your weight trend implies, equals calories out — and to update that number as data lands. MacroDiet's expenditure page is designed around the same loop and tells you what it needs (3 consecutive logged days to start; 3 food days and 1 weigh-in per 7-day period to continue), but the service that performs the update is still in development. Until it ships, MacroDiet shows the onboarding estimate.
Weekly coaching. MacroFactor turns the expenditure update into a weekly check-in that adjusts your targets1, and offers three program styles — Coached, where the app handles all week-to-week adjustments; Collaborative, where it adjusts weekly calories and you set the daily distribution; and Manual, where everything is at your discretion2. MacroDiet has one mode.
Native apps and a watch. MacroFactor is on iPhone, iPad and Apple Watch1; MacroDiet is a website.
AI-assisted food creation and label scanning1. MacroDiet has barcode scanning and manual custom foods; nothing camera-based beyond the barcode.
What is different in MacroDiet
The formula is public, line by line. MacroDiet's target is the v2 algorithm: BMR by Mifflin-St Jeor, 10·kg + 6.25·cm − 5·age + 5 for a male profile (−161 for a female profile); a multiplier of 1.2 / 1.375 / 1.55 / 1.725 for 0 / 1–3 / 4–6 / 7+ exercise days, nudged −0.05 / 0 / +0.1 for sedentary, moderate and very active days; a rate of 0.3 / 0.5 / 0.75% of body weight per week converted at 7,700 kcal/kg; then the guardrails above. All of it runs on the free macro calculator and is written out on the methodology page. MacroFactor documents its logic in a help centre; MacroDiet documents it as the calculator itself.
Public calculators in six languages, no account. MacroFactor has no public web tools; MacroDiet's calculators are its front door.
Free to use today. No payment is taken while the paid tier is being built. That is a stage, not a strategy, and we say so.
A web app. Weaker in the gym bag; stronger at a desk, and installable from nowhere.
In plain terms: if you want an app that has already learned how to correct itself and you are happy with a native subscription, MacroFactor is the finished version of the idea. If you want documented targets on the web now and are willing to wait for the learning loop, that is MacroDiet — and we will update this page the day the loop ships.
The short version
MacroFactor's expenditure updates from your own intake and weight trend and is coached weekly across three program styles12; it is a native app with a 7-day trial and a subscription. MacroDiet is a web app whose targets come from a published formula with floors and a 35% cap, with public calculators in six languages and no payment taken today — and whose adaptive expenditure engine is still in development. Zyra builds MacroDiet; the gap is named above rather than hidden. Educational overview of nutrition tracking tools only — not medical advice.