Weight Loss Apps

Whether we want to admit it or not, we live in a smartphone age. While it may be irritating that your kids give their phones more attention each day than you get from them in a week, there are some serious perks when it comes to our smartphones and weight-loss.

We know some people understand technology more than others so here’s a quick run-down of what an app is. A smartphone app (short for application) is a third party software program that users can download onto their own personal device. Since the world has just about been taken over by smartphones, there is now an app for just about everything. They are quick and easy to download, and provide features that amaze even the most tech-savvy people.

Over at Go Figure we’ve been doing some research on weight-loss apps, and have come up with our list of the very best. You don’t have to be a 10 apps-a-day downloading techie to reap the benefits of smartphone technology. All it takes is a few clicks on your phone to have a personalized dietitian, or personal trainer with you at all times.

Here’s our list of what we think are the very best apps:

My Fitness Pal
This app makes it easy for you to log your food and track what you’ve eaten over time. My Fitness Pal is great because it remembers what you’ve eaten and done most often in the past, making it easier to log your food each time you use the app. It helps you build a profile by entering information such as your current weight, goal weight, activity level, weekly goals and more. It also has a great feature which graphs your progress, which helps keep your motivation high!

Lose it!
This app is great because it allows you to set your goal weight, along with how many pounds a week you would like to lose in order to reach your goal. It gives you a calorie “budget” and allows you to log your food and exercise. It gives you the option to boost your motivation by sharing your progress with friends. This is app is private, so you only share if you want to. The goals section charts your progress and reminds you of the goals you set. This is a great app for maintaining your weight loss, imagine the moment when your chart shows six months, or even a year of consistent weight loss! Now that’s progress!

Eat This, Not That!
This app is a little bit more fun than the rest. It is essentially a game – sort of like “The Price is Right” for food. What it does is show you two meals or products and you choose which one is more nutritious. It’s a fun way to get into the mentality of healthy choices. Warning, it’s a little addicting!

Exercise is not a required part of our program but as part of a healthy lifestyle, we encourage exercise and getting out and about whenever you can. The following app is great for tracking your exercise, whether it be a leisurely walk or an intense workout!

Endomondo
This is a workout app, great for runners, bikers or anyone with an activity that gets them out and about. The app uses GPS to track your routes, times your work-out, logs your distance and monitors your heart rate. You can see a Google Maps view of your route and browse workout history to monitor your improvement. If you’re the sort of person who thrives on encouragement you can get pep talks from friends and notifications every time you hit a workout milestone.

Losing weight isn’t always easy; taking advantage of app technology is a great to educate yourself on-the-go and monitor your weight-loss progress. Overall it’s just a great way to keep your motivation going as the excitement of our new year’s resolutions begins to dwindle. Keep going, it’s worth it!