Some popular websites to choose from include:
Calorie Count (www.caloriecount.about.com): Getting started is easy. By creating an About.com account, you choose a member name and password, provide an e-mail address and answer a few basic questions about your body type, goals and whether you would like to share your progress with other members. After completing the initial setup, you can customize your experience. Features include health and fitness articles, a journaling section that allows you to express your thoughts, and an advice section with questions and answers submitted by other users and monitored by professional nutritionist Mary Hartley, RD.
Other great features on this site include the food and activity logs. Type in the name of a food or activity and the database will locate the nutritional and calorie content of that food or tell you the approximate calories burned for a specific activity. Best of all, an ”eat meter’ slowly fills, letting you know when it is time to stop eating for the day.
Progress is automatically tracked and the amount of calories is tailored specifically to individual needs based on the weight loss goals you provide during the initial setup. Foods are graded to let you know which ones are good for you and which are best to avoid.
So even if you are not trying to lose weight, this is a valuable tool for maintaining weight or checking the amount of nutrients in foods. A favorite pick because it provides all the tools you need in one place, free of charge, with minimal setup.
SparkPeople (www.sparkpeople.com): A global site that connects members from all around the world. The initial setup requires an e-mail address, a username and password. Next, you choose your reason for using Sparkpeople: losing weight or creating a healthy lifestyle. Both choices ask for your weight and height in order to evaluate your progress when you check back in with the site. Depending on which you choose, you will be asked different questions about any current diseases or conditions you may have and about weight or fitness goals.
Once you have completed the initial setup you are taken to your homepage, where first-time users can watch an instructional four-minute video on how to use the site, or can opt out and explore on their own. SparkPeople is divided into three main sections, myTools, myContent and myCommunity. Track calories, activities, and water consumption easily, peruse the message boards, find motivation and wellness information, even create meal plans and grocery lists all using the tools provided.
Calorie King (www.calorieking.com): Calorie King is a paid service that costs $12 per month. Users have the chance to try the service out with a seven-day free trial. Calorie King has a unique food and exercise diary, a meter that tracks calories consumed versus calories burned, a helpful checklist used along with goal completion and more. The advantage to Calorie King is the personal attention and customization that comes with a paid service. Calorie King offers the same basic service as Calorie Count and SparkPeople but with more interactive qualities such as Q&As, the opportunity to create an online group of people with common interests and goals and blogging.
If you have been struggling with your weight loss goals and need more personal attention and motivation, you may want to try Calorie King.