Privacy policy

Real Calorie Tracker ("we", "us") is a calorie, meal-planning and training tracker on the web and in our iPhone and Android apps. This policy explains what we collect, why, who can see it and the choices you have. The short version: we only keep what the app needs to work, we never sell your data, and the website's free public pages are supported by ads from Google. Your diary, health and account data are never used for advertising.

Using it without an account

You can log food on the website without signing up. That diary, your calorie goal and any custom foods are saved in your browser's local storage on your device. They are not sent to us. Clearing your browser data removes them.

What we store when you have an account

• Account details: your name, email address and password. Passwords are stored only as a salted scrypt hash; we can't read them. At sign-up we also ask your sex (male, female, or prefer not to say), used to estimate your calorie needs and to choose the body shown on your muscle map. You can change it any time in Progress & goals.
• Food diary and goals: foods you log, portions, calories and macros, water, your calorie and macro targets, saved meals and foods you create.
• Body and goal settings (optional): birth year, height, activity level, goal and weekly rate, and weigh-ins, used to suggest calorie targets and show your progress.
• Recipes, ingredients, meal plans and shopping lists you create or import.
• Training: workouts, sets and reps, programs, equipment you have, and step counts.
• Supplements and medications you choose to track, their schedules and the doses you tick off.
• App settings: reminder preferences, your time zone (so reminders arrive at the right local time), Fun mode, badges and family high-fives.
• Devices for notifications: if you allow notifications, a push token or browser push address for each device.
• Sign-in sessions: a random session token (stored only as a hash) so you stay signed in.

Health data from Apple Health and Health Connect

If you connect Apple Health (iPhone) or Health Connect (Android), the app reads your step counts and workoutsonly, and only after you grant permission. We use this data solely to show your activity and training in the app. It is never used for advertising, never sold, and never shared with third parties. You can disconnect at any time in the app or in your phone's Health settings. Logging out of the app also disconnects it on that phone.

Family sharing

If you join a family, the other members can see:

• the family's shared recipes, ingredients, meal plan and shopping list;
• your name, your daily calorie and macro targets, and what you logged each day (from when you were both in the family);
• if Fun mode is on, your score in the weekly family challenge (for example, the number of days you hit your step or water goal).

Your email address, weight, body settings, supplements and medications are never shown to your family. You can leave a family at any time; recipes you created leave with you.

Why we use your data

• To provide the app: sync your diary across devices, calculate nutrition, plan meals, share with your family.
• To send the reminders and notifications you've turned on.
• To keep the service secure, for example rate-limiting sign-in attempts and preventing abuse.

We don't use your account data (diary, weight, health, training, supplements or family data) for advertising, and we don't build marketing profiles from it. Ads on the website are covered in the next section.

Advertising

Our public website pages, such as the home page and the food database, show ads served by Google AdSense. The signed-in parts of the website and the iPhone and Android apps don't show ads.

• Third-party vendors, including Google, use cookies to serve ads based on your previous visits to this and other websites. Google's use of advertising cookies enables it and its partners to serve ads to you based on those visits.
• You can opt out of personalised advertising in Google's Ads Settings, and opt out of some other vendors' cookies at aboutads.info(or youronlinechoices.eu in Europe).
• Learn more in how Google uses information from sites that use its services.
• If you're in the European Economic Area, the UK or Switzerland, you'll be asked for consent before personalised ads or advertising cookies are used, and you can change your choice at any time from the privacy link in that message.

Ads never receive your diary, weight, health, training, supplement or family data.

Who else processes it

• Our hosting provider, which runs the servers and database that store your account data.
• Push notification services: Apple Push Notification service, Google Firebase Cloud Messaging and Expo (phone notifications), and your browser's push service (Google, Mozilla, Apple or Microsoft). They receive the notification's text to deliver it.
• Websites you import recipes from: when you paste a recipe link, our server fetches that page. Nothing about you is sent to it.

We don't sell or rent your personal data, and we only disclose it if the law requires us to.

Cookies and local storage

The website uses one essential cookie to keep you signed in. Your browser's local storage holds things like your signed-out diary and display preferences. On public pages, Google and its partners may set advertising cookies as described above; outside the EEA, UK and Switzerland you can block them in your browser or opt out as described.

How long we keep it, and deleting it

We keep your data while you have an account. You can delete your account at any time from Account settings on the website or Profile in the app. That permanently deletes your profile, diary, weights, workouts, supplements, recipes and ingredients you created, and signs you out everywhere. Database backups are kept for up to 14 days and are then overwritten.

Your rights

You can access, correct, export and delete your data. Download everything we hold about you as a JSON file from Account settings (website) or Profile → Export my data (app). Depending on where you live (for example under the GDPR or the CCPA) you may have further rights, such as objecting to or restricting processing. To exercise any of them, email us at privacy@realcalorietracker.com.

Security

All traffic is encrypted with HTTPS. Passwords and session tokens are stored only as hashes, each account can only access its own data (and what its family shares), and sign-in attempts are rate-limited.

Children

Real Calorie Tracker is not intended for children under 13 (or under 16 in the EU and UK), and we don't knowingly collect their data. If you believe a child has created an account, contact us and we'll delete it.

Not medical advice

The app provides general nutrition and fitness information. It isn't a medical device and doesn't give medical advice. Talk to a healthcare professional about diets, supplements and medications.

Changes to this policy

If we make material changes, we'll update the date at the top and let you know in the app before they take effect.

Contact

Questions about privacy? Email privacy@realcalorietracker.com.