Short answer. Both apps now sell barcode scanning as a paid feature. Lose It! goes further and puts macro tracking behind Premium too, so its free tier is calories only. MyFitnessPal's free tier still shows macros, though custom macro goals are Premium. Lose It! is the only one of the two selling a lifetime unlock, listed at $49.99 and $59.99 on the US App Store. If you want to pay once and never again, that row is the whole comparison.
Disclosure: MacroLog publishes this page and sells a competing calorie tracker. No affiliate links, no commission from either app. Every rival figure was read on 10 September 2026 from the company's own page or its US App Store listing, both linked at the bottom. Lose It!'s own website blocks automated requests, so its facts here come from the App Store listing only, and anything the listing does not state is left out rather than guessed.
Feature and price table
| MyFitnessPal | Lose It! | |
|---|---|---|
| Developer | MyFitnessPal, Inc. | FitNow, Inc. |
| US App Store rating | 4.7, 2.4M ratings | 4.8, 776K ratings |
| Annual price (US) | Premium $79.99; Premium+ $99.99 | Listed IAPs run $9.99 to $79.99 |
| Monthly price (US) | Premium+ $24.99/mo | Not stated on the listing |
| Lifetime option | No | Yes, $49.99 and $59.99 |
| Free: calorie tracking | Yes | Yes |
| Free: macros | Yes, custom macro goals are Premium | No, listed under Premium |
| Free: barcode scanner | No, Premium | No, Premium |
| Photo meal logging | Premium (meal scan) | Premium |
| Voice logging | Premium | Premium (AI Voice) |
| Intermittent fasting tracker | Premium | Premium |
| Community features | Community forums | Free: friends and support groups |
| Meal planning | Premium+ only, 1,500+ recipes | Premium |
US App Store and US web pricing, 10 September 2026. App Store in-app purchase lists show every price point a publisher has configured, including promotional ones, so the range is wider than what a new user is offered.
The free tiers are not equivalent
Read the two free columns and the difference is one row wide. MyFitnessPal's free tier tracks calories and macronutrients; you just cannot set your own macro split without Premium. Lose It!'s App Store description lists "Advanced Tracking – Track macronutrients like protein, carbs, fat, sugar" as a Premium feature, and its free list contains three things: calorie tracking, a weight-loss plan built from your body composition, and community support.
That makes Lose It! free the wrong tool for anyone tracking protein. It also makes it a cleaner tool for anyone who is not. A person told by their doctor to eat less who has never counted anything gets a calorie number, a plan and a support group at no cost, with nothing else on screen.
Paying once versus paying every year
MyFitnessPal Premium at $79.99 a year costs $399.95 over five years. Lose It!'s lifetime unlock is listed at $49.99 and $59.99. Even at the higher figure, one lifetime purchase costs less than a single year of MyFitnessPal Premium+, which is $99.99. Nobody else in this category still sells a lifetime tier, and that is the strongest argument for Lose It! on this page.
The caveat is what "lifetime" means in practice: it is the lifetime of the app, not yours, and neither the listing nor any public commitment guarantees the feature set stays where it is. MyFitnessPal's own 2022 barcode change is the proof that feature sets move.
What each does better
MyFitnessPal. The food database is the largest in consumer nutrition, built from user submissions over more than fifteen years, and 2.4M App Store ratings tell you how much of the fitness ecosystem assumes you are on it. Premium+ at $99.99 a year adds a meal planner, 1,500+ recipes, grocery delivery syncing and automatic meal-plan logging, which Lose It! does not match.
Lose It! It rates higher, 4.8 against 4.7, across a substantial 776K ratings, and holds #47 in Health & Fitness on the US App Store. It puts friends and support groups in the free tier, where MyFitnessPal's social layer is a separate community site. And it is the only one here that will take a single payment.
Which to pick
| Situation | Choose | Reason |
|---|---|---|
| You track protein manually and refuse to pay | MyFitnessPal | The free tier supports manual protein and macro logging; custom macro goals are Premium. |
| You want a free barcode scanner | Neither | Both apps put barcode scanning behind Premium. See the alternatives page below. |
| You want to pay once | Lose It! | Lifetime unlock at $49.99–$59.99 |
| You eat out or buy regional brands | MyFitnessPal | Largest database, deepest restaurant coverage |
| You want meal plans and a grocery list | MyFitnessPal Premium+ | 1,500+ recipes, $99.99/yr |
| You want accountability from other people | Lose It! | Groups and friends in the free tier |
| Your coach exports to a specific app | MyFitnessPal | Widest third-party integration base |
MacroLog as a third column
We build MacroLog, so treat this section as the interested party talking. MacroLog's free tier includes manual search, unlimited barcode scanning, basic stats and local storage; that scanner row is the one place we differ from both apps above. Pro costs $5.99 a month or $49 a year in the US, and the first week costs $2 rather than being free. Pro adds AI photo logging, voice logging, 12 micronutrients and CSV/JSON export.
MacroLog has no lifetime tier, no meal planner, no recipe library and no community feed. Its food data comes from OpenFoodFacts and USDA FoodData Central with FatSecret as a fallback, and OpenFoodFacts is user-submitted, so a barcode can return a wrong number. The app rejects entries reporting zero calories; it cannot catch the rest.
Questions people ask
Is Lose It! free?
There is a free tier, and its App Store listing describes it as calorie tracking, a weight-loss plan and community support. Barcode scanning, macros, photo logging and fasting are Premium.
Does MyFitnessPal still let free users scan barcodes?
No. Barcode scan sits under Premium in the current App Store description, after MyFitnessPal announced the change in August 2022 and applied it on 1 October 2022.
Which is cheaper over three years?
Lose It!, if you take the lifetime unlock: $59.99 once against $239.97 for three years of MyFitnessPal Premium.
Can I move my history from one to the other?
MyFitnessPal lists downloadable progress reports under Premium. Lose It!'s listing does not state an export feature, so we do not claim one either way.
What this is based on
- Lose It! on the US App Store, read 10 September 2026. Source for the developer, 4.8 / 776K ratings, chart position, the full in-app purchase price list including the lifetime tiers, and the quoted free-versus-Premium feature split.
- MyFitnessPal on the US App Store, read 10 September 2026. Source for 4.7 / 2.4M ratings and the Premium description quoting barcode scan.
- myfitnesspal.com/premium, read 10 September 2026. Source for $79.99 Premium, $99.99 Premium+, $24.99/mo, and the Premium and Premium+ feature lists.
- Droid Life, 24 August 2022, read 10 September 2026, non-vendor coverage of the barcode paywall announcement and its 1 October 2022 start date.
- MacroLog product documentation, for the MacroLog paragraphs only.
What this page cannot tell you
Lose It!'s website refuses automated requests, so everything above about it comes from one App Store listing. That listing does not state a monthly subscription price, does not describe its Apple Health sync in data-type detail, and does not say what happens to your diary if you stop paying. We left all three blank rather than filling them in from a third-party blog. Neither app publishes a measured accuracy figure for its database, and neither do we for MacroLog, so no page here can rank the three on accuracy. MacroLog's own gap: multi-device sync is planned rather than shipped, and there is no web app, so a diary logged on your phone stays on that phone.