How to Create a Meal Plan in MyFitnessPal? A Step-by-Step Guide

Studies show that keeping a consistent food diary can significantly increase the likelihood of reaching weight management goals. Understanding how to create a meal plan in MyFitnessPal is a powerful way to turn that tracking practice into a strategic and sustainable habit, making meal prepping and logging effortlessly efficient.

Quick Summary

This guide provides an overview of building custom meal plans in MyFitnessPal. It details how to set personal goals, create and save reusable meals and recipes, use the advanced Premium Meal Planner, and implement logging strategies for consistent tracking.

Key Points

• Start with Goals: Before creating a plan, set your daily calorie and macronutrient targets within the app based on your personal information and objectives.

• Manually Save Meals: Save frequently consumed meals from your food diary to the 'My Meals' tab for quick, one-tap logging in the future.

• Create Custom Recipes: Use the 'Create a Recipe' feature for multi-ingredient dishes to accurately calculate nutrition per serving, perfect for meal prepping.

• Utilize Premium Features: Consider the Premium+ Meal Planner for automated plan generation, recipe suggestions, and an integrated grocery list.

• Log Consistently for Insights: Whether manual or automated, consistent logging provides valuable data on your eating habits, empowering you to make healthier choices based on real trends.

Meal planning is a powerful strategy for anyone focused on improving their nutrition diet, but it can feel like a daunting task. MyFitnessPal, a leading health and nutrition app, simplifies this process by providing a suite of tools that help you build, track, and sustain healthy eating habits. Whether you're aiming to lose weight, gain muscle, or simply eat more mindfully, a well-structured meal plan can take the guesswork out of your daily food choices. By pre-logging your meals, you can ensure you meet your nutritional targets—from calories to macronutrients—while reducing the stress of making healthy decisions on the fly.

The Foundation: Setting Your Nutritional Goals

Before you start building your meal plan, it's crucial to establish your nutritional targets. MyFitnessPal uses your personal information—such as age, weight, height, and activity level—to provide a daily calorie and macronutrient goal.

Accessing Your Goals

1. Navigate to the Goals section: In the app, tap the "More" button (represented by three dots or lines) in the bottom right corner of the screen.
2. Select Nutrition Goals: Tap on "Goals" and then choose "Calories, Carbs, Protein, and Fat Goals".
3. Adjust Macros: Here, you can adjust the percentage of calories that come from carbohydrates, protein, and fat. Note that free users can adjust in 5% increments, while Premium members can set more precise gram-based goals.
4. Set Micronutrient Targets: For those with specific health needs, you can also set goals for various micronutrients like sodium, fiber, and specific vitamins.

Manual Meal Planning: Creating and Saving Your Own Entries

For most users, the simplest way to build a meal plan is by creating and saving custom meals and recipes directly from your food diary. This is an efficient way to log frequently eaten items or entire batch-prepped meals.

Method 1: Creating a Saved Meal from Your Diary

This is ideal for saving a recurring daily meal, like your standard breakfast or lunch.

1. Add all ingredients: First, add all the foods you are eating for a specific meal slot (e.g., Breakfast) to your diary.
2. Save the meal: Once all ingredients are entered, find the "Save Meal" or "Quick Tools" option. On the mobile app, you can often tap the three dots or "More" menu for that meal entry.
3. Name and save: Give your meal a descriptive name (e.g., "Weekday Scramble") and save it. It will now be available under the "My Meals" tab for future logging with a single tap.

Method 2: Creating a Recipe from Scratch

For more complex, multi-ingredient dishes, creating a recipe is the most accurate approach. This allows you to track specific servings.

1. Navigate to Recipes: Go to More > My Meals, Recipes & Foods > Create a Recipe.
2. Add ingredients: You can choose to enter ingredients manually or import them from a website URL. Be sure to add the correct quantity for each ingredient.
3. Set servings: Specify how many servings the recipe yields. This allows MyFitnessPal to calculate the nutritional information per serving.
4. Name and save: Give your recipe a name and save it. You can now easily log a specific number of servings from your "My Recipes" tab.

Advanced Planning with the Premium Meal Planner

For those who want a more automated approach, MyFitnessPal offers a sophisticated Meal Planner feature for its Premium+ subscribers. This tool generates customized meal plans based on your preferences, dietary approach, and goals.

Generating a Plan

1. Start a plan: Tap the "Plan" tab at the bottom of the screen.
2. Choose preferences: Answer questions about your budget, cuisine preferences, allergies, and goals.
3. Review and customize: The planner will generate a custom plan for you. You can swap out recipes you don't like or adjust ingredients.
4. Log with one click: You can log the meals from your plan directly to your diary with a single tap.
5. Get a grocery list: The tool automatically creates a grocery list based on your plan, minimizing food waste and saving time.

Comparison: Manual vs. Premium Meal Planning

To help you decide which method works best for your needs, here's a quick comparison of the two primary meal planning approaches in MyFitnessPal.

Feature	Manual Meal Planning	Premium Meal Planner
Cost	Free (with basic features)	Premium+ Subscription Required
Customization	Full control over individual meals and recipes; requires manual input	Automated plans based on preferences; allows for easy swaps
Convenience	Best for routine meals or batch prepping; relies on saved entries	Highly convenient for generating weekly plans quickly; ideal for variety
Accuracy	Dependent on the user's manual entry and portion sizes	Based on a vast, verified recipe catalog and personalized goals
Grocery List	Requires manual creation based on planned meals	Automatically generated based on your weekly plan
Suitable For	Users who prefer consistency and have a set rotation of meals	Users seeking convenience, variety, and automated planning

Tips for Sustainable Meal Planning and Tracking

• Log ahead: Plan your meals for the day or week in advance. This helps you balance your macros and calories, and makes it easier to stay on track.
• Use a food scale: For calorie-dense foods like oils, nuts, and proteins, measuring by weight is far more accurate than by volume. This ensures your logs are as precise as possible.
• Utilize the barcode scanner: For packaged foods, the barcode scanner (available to Premium members) instantly pulls up the nutritional information, saving you time and effort.
• Copy your meals: If you have leftovers or a repeatable meal, use the "Copy Meal" feature to quickly duplicate it to a future date.
• Stay hydrated: Track your water intake alongside your meals. Proper hydration is crucial for overall health and can sometimes help prevent mistaken hunger cues.
• Leverage the MyFitnessPal blog: The official MyFitnessPal blog offers a wealth of articles and recipes to help you on your nutrition journey.

Conclusion: Making Meal Planning Work for You

Whether you opt for the manual method of creating your own meals and recipes or leverage the advanced features of the Premium Meal Planner, MyFitnessPal offers powerful tools to support your nutrition diet. The key to success is consistency. By setting clear goals, planning ahead, and accurately logging your food, you will gain valuable insights into your eating habits and empower yourself to make healthier, more informed choices. The app transforms the often-challenging process of diet tracking into a streamlined, strategic part of your daily routine, paving the way for long-term health and wellness. Ultimately, the right approach depends on your personal preferences and budget, but both pathways lead to a more mindful and effective nutritional strategy.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can I use the meal planning features for free?

Yes, you can manually create and save your own meals and recipes in the free version of MyFitnessPal. However, the automated Meal Planner and advanced features like gram-based macro tracking are part of the Premium subscription.

How do I create a custom meal from scratch in the app?

To create a custom meal, go to the 'More' menu, then 'My Meals, Recipes & Foods', and select 'Create a Meal'. You can then add a name, ingredients, and save it for future use.

What is the difference between saving a 'Meal' and a 'Recipe'?

A 'Meal' is a simple collection of logged foods that you can save and add with one tap. A 'Recipe' is a more detailed entry where you define ingredients and a total number of servings, allowing you to track a portion of a larger dish.

How can I log restaurant food in my meal plan?

You can search for the restaurant and specific menu item in MyFitnessPal's food database. Many popular restaurants have their menu items pre-loaded, often with verified nutrition information.

Is it possible to copy a meal to a different day?

Yes, you can copy a meal to a future date by accessing the meal details in your diary. This is especially useful for planning leftovers or consistent meals.

How can I change my calorie or macro goals?

From the 'More' menu, go to 'Goals' and then select 'Calories, Carbs, Protein, and Fat Goals' to adjust your targets. Remember that the free version uses 5% increments for macros.

Why does MyFitnessPal add exercise calories back into my goal?

MyFitnessPal is designed to track energy expenditure. As a free user, logged exercise adds calories back into your daily target. For more precise tracking, Premium users can disable this feature.