Testing The Meal Scan Accuracy For 6 Popular Nutrition Apps

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With the introduction of AI, many calorie-counting apps are coming out with a “Meal Scan” feature.

I want to be clear: 

I am NOT referring to the barcode scanner, which has been around for almost a decade.

The “Meal Scan” feature is different. 

And, in theory, it should make logging whole foods, like bananas, chicken, and potatoes, much easier. 

This is because rather than weighing your food and looking up each ingredient manually, you snap a pic, and the app recognizes it automatically, knowing the quantity, and then logs it. 

Since I am always looking for easier ways to log my food, I wanted to test the accuracy of this feature across every app to see if it’s truly better. 

Spoiler: I was shocked at the wide degree of inaccuracy between apps. And truthfully, out of the six apps I tested, there was only one I would recommend.

My Testing Process

Let me explain how I tested the meal scan feature.    

Six calorie-tracking apps offer this feature, and I put each one through a few different tests.  

I first tested it on a “simple meal” with only single ingredients that were easy to identify on the plate:

•  Chicken breast, basmati rice, and asparagus. 

I then tested it with a meal that was more “complex” with ingredients that were mixed together in a bowl, making them more difficult to identify: 

• An oatmeal packet cooked in water with a scoop of vanilla protein powder, topped with frozen blueberries, mini dark chocolate chips, and Nutella.

Lastly, I tested how the meal scan feature in each app performed under different circumstances, such as poor lighting, changing photo angles, and using different plate designs to see which app handled these variables the best.

Meal Scan Test Results From Best to Worst

1. SNAP CALORIE

Without a doubt, the Snap Calorie app had the most accurate and well-functioning meal scan feature.

This shocked me, considering some of the other more prominent apps on this list.

Snap Calorie allows you to access the meal scan feature within its 2-week free trial period, which I thought was great. 

If you decide to continue to use the app, it will cost you $69.50 USD per year. There is no monthly option available, which could be a barrier for some people. 

I first tested the app on my simple ingredient meal. 

The app could identify the chicken breast, rice, and asparagus, whether I took the photo in good or poor lighting, and the numbers kept consistent even when I used a plate with a funky design. 

It also remained accurate whether I took the photo from a top view or at different angles.

The portions that Snap Calorie estimated were also the closest compared to any other app I tested. 

It estimated my meal as having 437 calories, 8 grams of fat, 43 grams of carbs, and 44 grams of protein. The meal contained 440 calories, 12 grams of fat, 47 grams of carbs and 38 grams of protein.

Onto the “complex meal.”  

Snap Calorie was the MOST accurate with my complex meal in terms of both food suggestions and portion sizes compared to any other apps. 

The meal scanner picked up every ingredient except the protein powder (which I expected since it was mixed into the oatmeal). 

I did have to go in manually and edit the portions of the oatmeal slightly, but its estimations were not far off.

The app estimated my oatmeal portion at 187 calories, and the actual portion was 150 calories. Its portion size estimations for the chocolate chips, blueberries, and Nutella were 100% accurate.

Most importantly, I could easily edit the portions of each food scanned if needed. I could use any measurement I preferred also (grams, ounces, cups, tbsp, etc). 

This is important to note since most of the other apps did not allow me to do this, as you’ll read below.

Overall, the Snap Calorie app’s meal scan feature worked quickly, with different photo angles and in good or bad lighting. It felt straightforward to use and edit foods. 

When it comes to making food logging more efficient, this is the only app I recommend using if you want to utilize the meal scan feature regularly.

That said, the next app does have some impressive features, and if you want to use an app beyond just the meal scan feature, it might be worth your attention.

2.    MYNETDIARY

In terms of accuracy, MyNetDiary came in second place with its meal scan feature.

You can access the meal scan feature on the free version, but only for three meals. After that, if you want to continue to use the feature, you must sign up as a premium member for 6.50 USD per month.

When it came to my simple ingredient meal, MyNetDiary was able to identify the ingredients properly if I took the photo in good lighting and from a top-view angle. 

However, I did find that if I shifted the angle of the photo to 45 degrees or took the photo in poor lighting, it would mistake the chicken for grilled salmon.

The portion estimates the app made were close, but not as close as Snap Calorie. 

It estimated the meal as having 470 calories (the actual meal was 440 calories), and in particular, over estimated the amount of fat (24 grams of fat vs the actual meal containing 12 grams). 

Thankfully, it was easy to go into each food and edit the amount in any measurement that I needed (grams, ounces, cups, tbsp).

When I tested the meal scan feature on my complex oatmeal bowl, it did fairly well, too. 

It accurately identified oatmeal, frozen blueberries, chocolate chips, and chocolate spread. However, it did add “milk” to the oatmeal, and it overestimated the portion of oatmeal by about 220 calories.

When the app would miss an ingredient, I could easily search for the ingredient I needed and add it. If the app incorrectly suggested an ingredient or food, I did not have to add it if I disagreed with it. 

• If you want to learn more about MyNetDiary check out my full review.

Onto the next app.  I’ve spoken frequently about how I think MyFitnessPal has gone down over the last few years, but has the meal scan feature redeemed my opinion of it? 

3.    MYFITNESSPAL

The meal scan feature is only available on the premium version of MyFitnessPal. You cannot access meal scan on the free version, and the cost to be a premium member is a hefty $19.99 USD per month.

When I scanned my simple ingredient meal, MyFitnessPal pulled up a ton of suggestions that I had to choose from (some of which were correct, most of which were not). 

For example, the app did pull up a few correct suggestions, such as chicken breast and asparagus. Still, besides those suggestions, it pulled up many more for me to choose from, such as chicken thigh, green beans, cauliflower, risotto, broccoli, and potato.

None of the portion sizes it suggested were based on the photo but instead were generic portion sizes that I had to go in and edit manually.

I sifted through the suggested foods and chose the ones that fit my meal. 

Without manually editing my portions, the app calculated my meal as having 388 calories, 30 grams of protein, 49 grams of carbs, and 7 grams of fat. 

While this was close, it was not completely accurate, so I had to go in and edit the servings (specifically the chicken portion) to match my numbers (440 calories, 12 grams of fat, 47 grams of carbs, and 38 grams of protein.) 

When I scanned the complex meal, the experience was similar. 

It would bring up at ton of suggestions, some of which were correct (e.g. oats and blueberries) and some which were way off (e.g. nuts, yogurt, muesli, etc). It gave generic portion suggestions that I had to go in and edit manually.

Having used MyFitnessPal quite frequently in the past, I found this to be no more efficient than simply manually adding my food, especially if you are eating a meal frequently since the app will save these foods on your favorites.

In fact, because the app threw out SO many suggestions for one meal scan, I actually found it to be more overwhelming and confusing than simply adding the food into the app manually.

I also found that, particularly with my complex meal, it missed several key ingredients, such as the Nutella and chocolate chips. Again, this resulted in me having to manually search for ingredients and defeating the purpose of the AI scan.

If you’re already using MyFitnessPal, then the meal scan feature is okay, and you can likely use it for some meals, but just know it’s not going to be quicker than other methods. However, if you don’t use MyFitnessPal already, I wouldn’t be switching to the app over this feature.

• If you want to learn more about MyFitnessPal check out my full review.

The next three apps I’m going to discuss are truly shocking in terms of the inaccuracies I saw and makes me wonder why any company would launch a feature like this when it’s clearly not ready.

4.    FOODVISOR

The next app is Foodvisor, which costs $21.00 USD for 3 months with no free trial or monthly option.

When using the Foodvisor app, I discovered that I could use my camera to hover over an ingredient to identify it, or I could take a photo of my meal and have the app analyze it. 

This would have been a cool feature if the app was more accurate with its suggestions.

With my simple meal of chicken, rice, and asparagus, I found that the app could correctly identify the rice and asparagus, but it could not seem to pick up any trace of chicken (or protein at all) in my meal. 

If I took the photo in poor lighting or at a 45-degree angle, the food suggestions became even less accurate (mistaking the rice for couscous and the asparagus for green beans).

I could manually search for foods the app missed and edit the portions if needed, similar to MyFitnessPal.

With the correct ingredients that the app DID pick up, its portion suggestions were close to my meal. 

It set my rice portion as 150 grams when the correct portion was 125 grams, and it suggested 60 grams of asparagus when the actual portion was 75 grams. 

It is important to note that I do not believe that Foodvisor suggested these portions based on my photo but rather gave a common portion size for these foods that I was expected to go in and edit manually.

When I scanned my complex meal, the Foodvisor app really struggled. 

Similar to MyFitnessPal, it would only pick up the oatmeal and the blueberries, and left out key ingredients like chocolate chips, Nutella, and protein powder.

When I would rescan the same meal multiple times, it gave many incorrect suggestions, such as an acai bowl, muesli, and fruit salad. When I took multiple photos of the same meal, it would bring up different suggestions and was inconsistent.

Like MyFitnessPal, Foodvisor gave generic portion size suggestions that were not custom to my meal and photo. While I could go in and edit each food, I found this time-consuming, especially given that many of the food suggestions were inaccurate, and I had to manually search for my meal anyway.

The meal scan feature in both the Foodvisor and MyFitnessPal apps worked similarly in terms of food suggestion accuracy and portion sizing. 

I did find that Foodvisor gave even fewer food suggestions than MyFitnessPal, which resulted in me having to search for more ingredients. For this reason, it comes in the number 4 spot and is not an app I recommend using for the meal scan feature.

• If you want to learn more about Foodvisor check out my full review.

The next app has a trendy name, but unfortunately falls short.

5.    DIET AI

Diet AI has no free option and costs $8.99 USD per month, which is slightly more expensive than SnapCalorie and MyNetDiary, but is far less user-friendly. 

When I tested the app on my simple ingredient meal, the food suggestions were correct in some areas, and off in others. 

The app correctly analyzed asparagus and rice but would always analyze my chicken as fish. This did not change even if I took the photo at close or far range, in good or bad lighting, at a top or side angle, or with a plain dish.

The app did not tell me what its estimations for the rice and asparagus were in terms of grams or ounces. Instead, it listed it as 1 “serving” of rice that contained 130 calories and 28 g of carbs.

While it‘s estimation for the calories in the rice portion was a bit low (130 calories when it should have been 210 calories), it’s estimation for the asparagus was quite close at 20 calories.

A very large flaw in the app was that it would not allow me to manipulate the portion size of the foods with traditional measurements such as grams, ounces, cups, etc.

The app would scan your meal and bring up food suggestions, but it would only measure the food in terms of “servings” (e.g., it logged my chicken as one serving, and I could manipulate that amount to be more or less, but only by increasing or decreasing “servings.”) 

It did give the calorie and macro breakdown for what a serving was, but there was no way for you to measure the food portion in terms of grams or ounces like one normally does while food tracking.

This is quite confusing and could be quite inaccurate for someone who is trying to log their macros using grams and ounces.

Things got even more confusing when I scanned my complex meal.

The app correctly identified the meal as a bowl of oatmeal with blueberries, Nutella, and chocolate chips. Like all of the other apps, it missed the protein powder component.

However, unlike with my simple ingredient meal, the meal scanner did not separate the ingredients, so I couldn’t go in and manipulate the portions of each separate ingredient. 

Instead, it scanned my meal as a “bowl of oatmeal with blueberries, chocolate spread, and chocolate chips”. It showed this entire meal as “1 serving”, and estimated this entire meal at 450 calories, 9 grams of protein, 65 grams of carbs and 20 grams of fat. 

While these estimations were close regarding carbs and fat, it was very low in its protein estimation because it had missed the protein powder. 

I could not go in and manipulate each ingredient of the meal because it had scanned it all as one and listed it as a “serving.”

In addition, this made it impossible to edit my meal if the app accidentally suggested the wrong food or drastically over/underestimated the portion size of a particular ingredient.

The app does not have a good system for manually searching for correct foods and their portions. While you do have the option to search for any foods that the meal scanner isn’t picking up, you cannot put in the food amounts in normal measurements and have to go by the app’s “serving” suggestions.

For example, I manually searched “blueberries,” and the app brought up one serving of blueberries as 85 calories, 21 grams of carbs, 0 grams of fat, and 1 gram of protein. The only way I could increase or decrease that amount was by increasing or decreasing the serving size in 0.5 increments. (e.g. 1.5 servings was 128 calories, 32 grams of carbs, 0 grams of fat and 2 grams of protein).

Overall, I would not recommend this app for the meal scan feature (or frankly, anything else). While it did analyze the food ingredients quite well, it was almost impossible to make changes to the app’s recommendations, and the portion sizes were very confusing and difficult to manipulate.

Alright, here comes the worst app out of the bunch when it comes to the meal scan feature.

6. FATSECRET

Coming in last place is the FatSecret app. The app is free, and the AI scan feature is available without upgrading your membership. However, it was quite obvious after using the app why it’s free.

When it comes to food accuracy, the meal scan feature in FatSecret performed terribly. 

It had difficulty identifying ingredients in my simple ingredient meal, even with a good photo angle, good lighting, and a simple plate.

For example, when I scanned my chicken breast, rice, and asparagus, the foods it suggested were cabbage, popcorn, pasta with cheese, and a ham and cheese sandwich. 

I tried scanning this same meal a few times to see if it was just a glitch, but it continuously gave me extremely inaccurate suggestions, not even getting close to the actual ingredients of my meal.

The app performed just as poorly with my complex oatmeal bowl option. 

When I scanned this meal, it came up with suggestions like Kellog’s all-bran buds, egg omelet with onions, peppers, tomatoes, and mushrooms, or a Nicoise salad.

I did have the ability to search for other foods if the foods the app suggested were not accurate, but to me, this completely defeated the purpose of the meal scan feature since the app was incorrect nearly 100% of the time.

The app also did not estimate portions at all. 

Instead, you had to click on the food that was suggested, choose from a large database of those foods, and manually add your portions. Again, this defeated the purpose of the feature, and in my mind, it would be easier and faster just manually to log your food.

I would not recommend this app, even though it is free to use. I recommend manually entering your meals in a quality food tracking app for a much more accurate and efficient experience.  

• If you want to learn more about FatSecret check out my full review.

Final Thoughts

Of course, you shouldn’t base which app you use on a single feature.   So, if you want to know the absolute best calorie and macro tracker on the market based on testing 20+ apps, then watch this video:

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