How Gauge estimates your macros

Type "chicken burrito" and Gauge hands back calories and macros. Here's what's behind that number — and how to make it more accurate when it matters.

Where the numbers come from

Every lookup runs through Gauge's nutrition engine, which researches the food (including web sources for restaurant and packaged items) and returns an estimate with its reasoning. Open any entry and tap Why these numbers to see exactly how it was worked out, with tappable source links when they exist.

Your accuracy levers

• Be specific when you log. "Large flour tortilla burrito with double chicken" beats "burrito." Detail in, accuracy out.
• Add what the photo can't see. Photo logging asks "Anything the photo doesn't show?" — cooking oil, dressings, and hidden ingredients change numbers a lot.
• Fix portions after the fact. The portion stepper and ½×–2× multipliers rescale everything instantly.
• Ask Gauge. On any entry, tell it what changed — "cooked in butter," "it was the family size" — and it re-runs the numbers for you to accept or discard.

Calorie Estimate Bias

When a food has a plausible range (a restaurant meal might be 500–700 calories), which end should Gauge pick? Settings → Calorie Estimate Bias lets you choose — estimate conservatively, in the middle, or high. If you're cutting, biasing high keeps you honest.

Restaurant lookups near you

Turn on Settings → Use Location for Restaurants and mentioning a specific restaurant pulls nutrition data for that chain or spot. Only your approximate city/region is used — precise coordinates never leave your phone.

The honest part

Every nutrition number — including the ones on packaging — is an estimate. Gauge's job is to be consistently close and easy to correct, because a log you actually keep beats a perfect one you abandon.