Best Fasting Apps with Meal Tracking
Quick Answer: Most fasting apps focus on when you eat, not what you eat. Fasted integrates meal logging alongside fasting tracking, weight monitoring, and detailed stats in one app. Zero added nutrition features with Zero Plus. Fastic offers meal plans rather than open logging. For the most complete fasting-plus-food tracking experience, Fasted is the top choice.
Intermittent fasting is about timing. But timing alone does not determine your results. What you eat during your eating window matters enormously for weight management, energy, and the health benefits you get from fasting.
Despite this, most fasting apps completely ignore the food side of the equation. They track when you fast but not what you eat. This leaves you juggling a fasting app and a separate nutrition app, with no connection between the two data sets.
This guide covers the fasting apps that actually include meal tracking and why that integration matters.
Why Meal Tracking Matters for Fasters
Fasting creates an eating window. What you do inside that window determines your outcomes.
Weight management. A 16:8 fasting schedule does not guarantee weight loss if your eating window includes excessive calories. Tracking what you eat helps you understand whether your nutrition supports your goals.
Identifying patterns. When you log both fasting and food, you can see connections. Maybe you eat more on days when your fasting window is shorter. Maybe certain meals leave you more satisfied and make the next fast easier. These patterns are invisible without food logging.
Nutritional quality. Fasting should not mean eating whatever you want during your window. Logging meals creates awareness about nutritional quality, which tends to improve eating habits over time even without strict dieting.
Accountability. The act of logging a meal makes you more conscious of what you are choosing to eat. This awareness effect is one of the most consistently documented benefits of food tracking in nutrition research.
For more on what to eat during your eating window, see our best foods for intermittent fasting guide.
Fasting Apps with Meal Tracking
Fasted
Fasted includes integrated meal logging as part of its core tracking experience. You can log what you eat during your eating window, and that data sits alongside your fasting history, weight tracking, and stats.
The integration is the key advantage. Instead of cross-referencing a fasting app with a food diary, everything lives in one place. You can see how your nutrition patterns relate to your fasting consistency and weight trends.
Meal logging in Fasted is designed to be practical rather than obsessive. The goal is awareness and pattern recognition, not calorie-counting anxiety. You log what you ate, note the meal, and move on.
Meal tracking approach: Flexible logging integrated with fasting and weight data.
Zero (Plus)
Zero added nutrition tracking with its Zero Plus premium subscription. The feature lets you log meals and see nutritional data alongside your fasting history. This was a significant addition to an app that previously focused exclusively on the timer.
The nutrition features are solid but require the $69.99 per year subscription. If you are already paying for Zero Plus, the meal tracking is a welcome addition. If you are on the free tier, you will not have access.
Meal tracking approach: Nutrition logging behind premium paywall.
Fastic
Fastic takes a different approach to food. Rather than open-ended meal logging, the app provides meal plans and recipes. During your eating window, Fastic suggests what to eat rather than asking you to log what you ate.
This is a planning tool rather than a tracking tool. For people who struggle with meal decisions, having recipes and plans ready is genuinely helpful. But it does not give you a record of what you actually consumed, which limits its value for pattern analysis.
Meal tracking approach: Meal plans and recipes (prescriptive, not logging).
Simple
Simple offers some nutritional guidance through its AI coach. The coach can suggest foods and provide recommendations about what to eat during your window. However, comprehensive open-ended meal logging is limited compared to dedicated food tracking tools.
Meal tracking approach: AI-guided suggestions, limited logging.
BodyFast, Life, and Others
BodyFast does not include meal logging or meal plans. Life Fasting Tracker does not track food. Most other fasting apps similarly focus exclusively on fasting timing without addressing nutrition.
This leaves a gap that most fasters fill by using a separate nutrition app like MyFitnessPal or Cronometer alongside their fasting tracker. It works, but the data is siloed.
Meal Tracking Feature Comparison
| Feature | Fasted | Zero Plus | Fastic | Simple |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Open Meal Logging | Yes | Yes | No | Limited |
| Meal Plans/Recipes | No | No | Yes | AI suggestions |
| Calorie Tracking | Basic | Yes | Via plans | Limited |
| Macro Tracking | Basic | Yes | Via plans | Limited |
| Integration with Fasting Data | Yes | Yes | Partial | Partial |
| Integration with Weight Data | Yes | Yes | Limited | Yes |
| Requires Premium | Partial | Yes ($69.99) | Yes ($39.99) | Yes ($59.99+) |
| Food Database | Basic | Yes | Recipe-based | Limited |
One App vs Two Apps
The core question for fasters who care about nutrition is whether to use one integrated app or two separate apps.
One app approach (Fasted, Zero Plus): Everything in one place. Fasting data, meal data, and weight data all connected. Patterns are visible without manual cross-referencing. Less friction means more consistent logging.
Two app approach (fasting app + MyFitnessPal/Cronometer): Dedicated nutrition apps have larger food databases, barcode scanning, and more detailed macro tracking. But the data lives in a separate app, making it harder to see how nutrition and fasting interact.
For most people, the one-app approach wins because of consistency. The best meal tracking is the kind you actually do, and reducing friction by keeping everything in one app increases the likelihood that you will log meals regularly.
If you are a serious nutrition tracker who needs detailed macro breakdowns and a massive food database, a dedicated nutrition app may serve you better for the food side. But you can still use Fasted for fasting, weight, and streaks alongside it.
How to Make Meal Tracking Work with Fasting
Meal tracking during intermittent fasting is simpler than general meal tracking because you have fewer meals to log. A 16:8 schedule typically means two to three meals. OMAD means one. Less logging means less friction.
Log during or immediately after eating. The longer you wait, the less accurate your memory and the less likely you are to log at all.
Focus on what, not just how much. For fasting purposes, knowing that you ate a balanced meal versus grabbing fast food is more valuable than precise calorie counts. Patterns in food quality correlate with fasting success.
Review weekly, not daily. Individual meal logs are less meaningful than weekly patterns. Look at your week of eating alongside your fasting consistency and weight trend. This is where integrated apps like Fasted shine, because the data is all in one view.
Do not use meal tracking as punishment. The purpose is awareness, not restriction. If logging meals triggers anxiety or disordered eating thoughts, skip it and focus on fasting consistency instead.
For a comparison of the top fasting apps across all features, see our best fasting app roundup. For a detailed look at how Fasted compares to Simple's AI-guided nutrition approach, read our Fasted vs Simple breakdown.
The Best Fasting App for Meal Tracking
If integrated meal tracking is important to you, Fasted offers the best combination of fasting tracking and food logging at the most accessible price point. The integration between fasting data, meal logs, weight tracking, and stats provides a complete picture that siloed apps cannot match.
Zero Plus is a strong alternative if you are already invested in the Zero ecosystem and willing to pay the higher subscription price.
Fastic works well if you want meal plans and recipes rather than open logging.
For everyone else, the combination of a fasting app plus a dedicated nutrition app remains a viable but less integrated approach.
Frequently Asked Questions
Do I need to track meals while intermittent fasting?
You do not need to, but it helps. Meal tracking creates awareness about what you eat during your window, which helps identify patterns that support or undermine your goals. Many people find that simply logging meals, even without calorie counting, improves their food choices.
Which fasting app has the best food database?
Among fasting apps, Zero Plus has the most developed nutrition database due to its dedicated nutrition tracking features. Fasted offers practical meal logging focused on awareness rather than exhaustive nutritional data. For the largest food databases, dedicated nutrition apps like MyFitnessPal or Cronometer remain superior.
Can I use MyFitnessPal with a fasting app?
Yes. Many people use a fasting app for timing and a nutrition app for food tracking. The downside is that the data is siloed in separate apps, making it harder to see how nutrition and fasting patterns interact. An integrated app like Fasted eliminates this separation.
Should I count calories during intermittent fasting?
Calorie counting is not required for intermittent fasting to work. Many people achieve their goals through meal awareness and portion control without precise calorie tracking. However, if your weight loss has stalled, calorie awareness can help identify whether your eating window nutrition is aligned with your goals.
What should I eat during my eating window?
Focus on whole foods, adequate protein, healthy fats, and vegetables. Avoid using the eating window as an excuse to eat unlimited junk food. For detailed nutrition guidance during fasting, see our best foods for intermittent fasting guide.