Synopsis: Oatsy is a food diary and fitness tracker that promises key features for free.
Price and Platform: Free. Apple and Android.
RDN Score: 2/5
Pros
Simple and clean design to record exercise, steps and food intake from the home screen dashboard.
Set goals to lose or gain weight.
Oatsy provides free macros tracking, health score and meal plans; some of these are paid features with competitors such as MyFitnessPal and Lifesum.
Track macros and choose from diet plans including a balanced diet, intermittent fasting and others.
Access a database of more than 980,000 foods, some of which can be easily accessed using the Oatsy barcode scanner.
Option to opt out of the health access categories (gender, steps and weight), if privacy is a concern.
Can skip profile setup at the expense of customized recommendations.
All features are free and unlocked.
Includes a small collection of recipes with room to add your own foods.
Includes a water tracker and daily nutrition summary.
Track fitness progress using a variety of activities or add your own to the log.
Syncs with the Apple Health app to automatically track steps if you permit access.
Offers an option to share photos, recipes and progress with the Oatsy community.
Cons
Oatsy content includes grammatical errors and misspellings, which take away from its credibility.
Content is rather generic.
The app provides a “fit score” without any real inputs, so accuracy is questionable.
Oatsy uses a traffic light system that lists foods such as salmon or eggs as “yellow” alongside potato chips, bacon, sausage and muffins.
Bottom Line: Oatsy is similar to other calorie counter apps but makes the content and tracking available at no cost. Given the cons listed, Oatsy might work for those who already have a good bit of nutrition knowledge or those who can easily identify what nutrition guidance they should take or leave — but there are better options on the market.
Marisa Moore, MBA, RDN, LD, is based in Atlanta and specializes in culinary nutrition, communications and consulting. She blogs at marisamoore.com. Follow her on Instagram and Twitter.
Synopsis: Oatsy is a food diary and fitness tracker that promises key features for free.
