The Ultimate Macro
Calculator
Use the Precision Nutrition
Calculator to instantly get a
nutrition plan—with macros,
calorie, and portions—that’s
personalized for your body,
eating preferences, and goals
By Brian St. Pierre, MS, RD
Do you want to lose weight? Gain muscle?
Improve health? Boost performance? This
free calorie, portion, and macro calculator
from Precision Nutrition can help you
achieve the results you want… more easily
than ever before.
Ready to try it? Click “Get Started” below
and enter your information to instantly
calculate your calories, portions, and
macros.
(Once we calculate your macros, we’ll send
you a free, personalized guide to using our
hand portion system for hitting your calorie
and macro targets.)
Nutrition
Calculator
How much should you eat?
Let’s find out.
Get started
© Precision Nutrition
What makes this macro
calculator so great?
Designed, developed, and tested in the
Precision Nutrition research lab—and
proven effective with thousands of clients—
it’s the most comprehensive calorie, portion,
and macro calculator available.
Here’s why: The Precision Nutrition
Calculator first determines the appropriate
daily calories for your body, based on the
NIH Body Weight Planner (and adapted
from research collected at the National
Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and
Kidney Disease).
This estimate takes into account:
Your personal details (height, age,
weight, sex)
Physical activity levels (both daily
movement and purposeful exercise)
The date you want to reach your goal by
(within reason!)
The changing and adaptive nature of
human metabolism (a major benefit of
this calculator)
It then calculates your daily macros,
combining the above data with additional
factors, including your:
Nutrition and fitness goals (weight loss,
muscle gain, body recomposition, better
health, peak performance)
Dietary preference (Paleo, keto,
vegetarian, fully plant-based,
Mediterranean, and of course, “anything”)
Macronutrient preference (balanced,
low-fat, low-carb, or virtually any other
macronutrient ratio you want)
But here’s the reason this calculator is
truly revolutionary: Once it estimates your
calorie and macronutrient needs, it
automatically converts those numbers into
food portions that are equivalent to parts of
your hand. (Specifically, your palm, fist,
cupped hand, and thumb.)
The result: If you choose, you can skip
weighing and measuring your food—as well
as logging the details of every meal into
calorie and macro tracking apps. Instead,
you can use our hand portion tracking
system to achieve your calorie and macro
targets.
This unique approach takes the hassle out
of calorie and macro tracking, making it
easier for you to lose weight, gain muscle,
eat healthier, and improve your
performance.
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The benefits of this calorie,
portion, and macro
calculator
Some people naturally eat the appropriate
amount of food and calories for their
individual needs. They’re able to maintain a
stable body weight for years—even decades
— without counting calories, or tracking
macros, or ever measuring their portions.
Unfortunately, these “intuitive eaters”
represent only a small segment of the
human population. The rest of us typically
need help with our eating, in the form of
external structure and guidance, at least
temporarily. This can help you:
Eat the right amount of calories and
macros for your goals
Understand appropriate portion sizes
Improve your food choices and eating
habits
That’s why we created this calorie, portion,
and macro calculator. It gives you a
nutrition blueprint for achieving your goals
and, at the same time, helps you develop
the skills you need to eat well for life.
(For optimal results, it’s best to combine this
nutrition plan with intuitive eating and selfregulation skills.)
The problem with only
tracking calories
Most people know calories matter. If you eat
more calories than your body needs, you
gain weight. If you eat fewer calories than
your body needs, you lose weight.
(Yes, this certainly sounds simple, but as
you’ve likely experienced, there are many
factors that make managing your calorie
intake… not so simple. Learn more here.)
By tracking your calories, you can better
know if you’re eating the right amount of
food for your goals. There are, however,
disadvantages to only tracking the total
number of calories you eat daily.
Most notably: This method doesn’t ensure
you’re getting an appropriate amount of
macronutrients for your body, goals, and
preferences. Depending on what you’re
trying to achieve, this can negatively affect
your appetite, hormones, energy levels, and
nutrient consumption.
And that can make it harder to lose weight,
gain muscle, eat healthier, and improve
athletic performance.
Why tracking your macros
gives you an advantage
Just in case you’re not sure, let’s start by
defining what macros, or macronutrients,
actually are.
There are three major macronutrients:
Protein, carbohydrates, and fat. (The fourth
macronutrient is alcohol.)
Your body breaks down the macronutrients
you eat into compounds used to help create
energy, build body structures, create
chemical reactions, and stimulate the
release of hormones. Which means they can
impact how you feel, perform, and even
behave.
When you track macros, you don’t need to
count calories directly. Instead, you log how
many grams of each macronutrient you eat
every day.
That’s because each macronutrient provides
a certain number of calories:
1 gram of protein = 4 calories
1 gram of carbohydrate = 4 calories
1 gram of fat = 9 calories
(1 gram of alcohol = 7 calories)
As a result, tracking macros means you’re
automatically tracking calories. It’s just that
you’re ensuring a certain number of those
calories come from protein, carbohydrates,
and fat, respectively. This is known as your
macronutrient ratio.
For example, let’s say you eat:
30% of your calories from protein
40% of your calories from carbohydrate
30% of your calories from fat
Your macronutrient ratio would then be:
30:40:30.
By adjusting your macronutrient ratio based
on your age, sex, activity levels, goals, and
preferences, you can optimize your eating
plan.
If you’re trying to lose weight, you might eat
a higher proportion of protein, since it can
help you feel satisfied longer after meals. Or
if you’re a very active athlete, you might
want a higher ratio of carbohydrates to meet
your greater energy demands.
The good news: Our calorie, portion, and
macro calculator will figure all of this out
for you.
Just enter your information and, within
milliseconds, you’ll get a macro ratio that’s
customized exactly for your body, goals, and
preferences. (Plus, the Precision Nutrition
Calculator gives you the option to further
adjust these numbers, in case you want to
try a different macronutrient ratio.)
Like calorie counting, though, conventional
macro tracking has its downsides. Perhaps
the biggest challenge: Because it requires
careful food measuring and weighing, most
people won’t stick to it for long.
Many say it feels cumbersome and even
takes the joy out of eating. Which can limit
its effectiveness to very short periods of
time. That’s where the Precision Nutrition
hand portion tracking system comes in.
Hand portions: The easiest
way to track calories and
macros
When we created this calorie, macro, and
portion calculator, we asked:
How can we help people eat the right
amount of food, but without the burden of
having to weigh and measure every
morsel?
Our solution: to give personalized targets
not just for daily calories and macros, but
also hand portions. That way, you can use
whichever method you prefer.
This hand portion system—developed by
Precision Nutrition—allows you to use your
own hand as a personalized, portable
portioning tool. You’re not actually
measuring your food, but rather using your
hand to gauge portion size. It’s highly
effective for food tracking because your
hand is proportionate to your body, its size
never changes, and it’s always with you.
Here’s a snapshot of how it works:
Your palm determines your protein
portions.
Your fist determines your vegetable
portions.
Your cupped hand determines your carb
portions.
Your thumb determines your fat portions.
Based on the calorie, portion, and macro
calculator’s output, all you have to do is
eat the recommended number of each
hand portion daily. (Again, we’ll show you
how to put this method fully into practice
once you’ve put your information into the
Precision Nutrition Calculator and received
your free report and eating guide.)
How effective are hand
portions for tracking
macros?
Our research shows hand portions are 95
percent as accurate (or better) as carefully
weighing, measuring, and tracking. With
substantially less effort and time involved.
Plus, our hand portion tracking system
allows you to easily adjust your intake to
further optimize your results.
Ready to get started? Go ahead and enter
your information into the calorie, portion,
and macro calculator above, and we’ll do
the rest, providing you with a free nutrition
plan customized just for you.
If you have more questions right now, or
want to understand the nutrition rules we
used to design this calorie, portion, and
macro calculator, see the Resources section
for a full breakdown.
Resources
Calculator development notes and FAQs
If you’re a coach, or you
want to be…
You can help people build nutrition and
lifestyle habits that improve their physical
and mental health, bolster their immunity,
help them better manage stress, and get
sustainable results. We'll show you how.
If you’d like to learn more, consider the PN
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coaching skills today!
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