Compare · Food Tracker vs Cronometer

A free alternative to Cronometer.

Cronometer is the app for people who care about micronutrients, and its data is the best in the category: verified sources rather than crowd entries. The free tier shows ads and limits reports to the last seven days, and photo logging, voice logging and the longer reports are in Gold at $59.99 a year. Food Tracker tracks seventeen micronutrients against Indian RDAs for free, and your assistant does the logging from a photo or a voice note.

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At a glance

Cronometer prices checked October 2026. Free tier with ads, barcode scanning and 7-day reports. Gold $10.99 a month or $59.99 a year. US prices.

CronometerFood Tracker

PriceCronometerFree with ads. Gold $59.99 a year.Food TrackerFree. No tiers, no trial, nothing held back.
Logging a mealCronometerSearch a verified database, pick, weigh. Precise, and slow.Food TrackerTell your assistant what you ate. It itemises the meal, estimates portions in grams, shows you the numbers and logs them when you say yes.
Photo of your plateCronometerGold only.Food TrackerFree, through ChatGPT or Claude.
Voice noteCronometerGold only.Food TrackerFree, through ChatGPT or Claude.
Barcode scannerCronometerFree.Food TrackerNone. Send a photo of the label or name the product and the assistant works from that.
Food databaseCronometerLab-verified sources (NCCDB, USDA). The most accurate in the category.Food TrackerNone to search. The assistant estimates from food-composition data, and you check the numbers before they are saved.
MicronutrientsCronometer84 nutrients. This is why people use it.Food TrackerSeventeen, free: sugar, the fats, cholesterol, sodium, potassium, calcium, iron, magnesium, zinc, vitamins A, C, D, B12 and folate.
ReportsCronometerSeven days on the free tier; longer in Gold.Food TrackerThirty-day charts and weekly reports, free.
AdsCronometerYes, on the free tier.Food TrackerNone.
Fasting, recipes, supplementsCronometerFasting timer and recipe importer in Gold; supplement tracking.Food TrackerNone of these.
For clinics and gymsCronometerCronometer Pro, a paid professional product.Food TrackerWhite-labelled programmes for clinics, hospitals, gyms and trainers; staff see summaries, never meals.

Why people look for a Cronometer alternative

Cronometer asks for the most work per meal of any tracker: find the verified entry, weigh the portion, enter it. The reward is numbers you can trust. The friction is why most people stop after a few weeks, and the free tier makes it harder with ads and a seven-day view of your own data. The features that take the work away, photo and voice logging, are in Gold, which has risen to $59.99 a year.

What is different about Food Tracker

Food Tracker is the opposite trade. You photograph the plate or say what you ate, and ChatGPT or Claude estimates the items, the portions and the nutrients, including sugar, saturated, mono, poly and trans fat, cholesterol, sodium, potassium, calcium, iron, magnesium, zinc and vitamins A, C, D, B12 and folate. Those are estimates from food-composition data, not lab values, and the app says so: you see the numbers before they are saved and can correct them.

Each nutrient has its own page with a thirty-day chart and the foods that contributed most, against ICMR-NIN RDAs. No ads, no window on your own history, and no AI running inside the app, which is why it is free.

Where Cronometer is still better

Precision. Verified data and weighed portions beat estimates. If you track for a medical reason, stay with Cronometer.
Depth: 84 nutrients against our seventeen, plus supplements and custom foods.
Device sync, the fasting timer, and the recipe importer.
Cronometer Pro for dietitians who need exact client data.

Switch to Food Tracker if

You want to see micronutrients without weighing and searching every meal.
You stopped logging because of the effort, not the data.
You eat Indian food and want RDAs that match.
You would rather have free charts over a month than seven days with ads.

Three minutes to set up. Then you only talk to your assistant.