How to Track Your Macros: A Step-by-Step Beginner's Guide

What Are Macros (And Why Do They Matter)?

Macros — short for macronutrients — are the three types of nutrient that make up the calories in your food:

Protein (4 calories per gram) — builds and repairs muscle, keeps you full
Carbohydrates (4 calories per gram) — fuels your workouts and brain
Fat (9 calories per gram) — supports hormones, absorbs vitamins, provides energy

Calories tell you how much you’re eating. Macros tell you what you’re eating. Two people can eat 2,000 calories and get completely different results depending on their macro split.

Someone eating 150g protein, 200g carbs, and 70g fat will build more muscle and feel more satisfied than someone eating 60g protein, 300g carbs, and 80g fat — even though the calories are similar.

Step 1: Calculate Your TDEE

Your Total Daily Energy Expenditure (TDEE) is how many calories your body uses in a day, including activity. This is your starting point.

Use PT Tracker’s built-in calculator or any TDEE calculator online. You’ll need your age, weight, height, and activity level.

Want to lose fat? Eat 300-500 calories below your TDEE
Want to build muscle? Eat 200-300 calories above your TDEE
Want to maintain? Eat at your TDEE

Step 2: Set Your Protein Target

Protein is the most important macro for body composition. Aim for 1.6-2.2g per kilogram of bodyweight. If you weigh 80kg, that’s 128-176g of protein per day.

Start at the lower end and work up. Getting enough protein is the single biggest nutritional lever for building muscle and losing fat.

Step 3: Fill the Rest With Carbs and Fat

After setting protein, divide your remaining calories between carbs and fat. A reasonable starting point:

Fat: 0.8-1g per kg bodyweight (essential for hormones)
Carbs: whatever calories are left after protein and fat

Don’t overthink the carb/fat split. As long as protein is hitting target and total calories are in range, the ratio between carbs and fat is flexible.

Step 4: Start Tracking

Open PT Tracker and log your food. The app has:

Barcode scanner — scan packaged food for instant macro info
Food search — search the database for common foods
Saved meals — save meals you eat regularly so you can log them in one tap
Daily dashboard — see your remaining macros at a glance

For the first few days, weigh your food with a kitchen scale (£8 from any supermarket). This feels tedious at first but it’s eye-opening. Most people dramatically underestimate portions of calorie-dense foods like rice, pasta, nuts, and oils.

Common Mistakes to Avoid

Obsessing over perfection. Hitting your macros within 5-10g is close enough. Aiming for exact numbers every day will burn you out. 80% consistency is what produces results.

Forgetting cooking oils. A tablespoon of olive oil is 120 calories and 14g of fat. If you’re frying food and not logging the oil, your numbers are wrong.

Not weighing food. “A chicken breast” can be anywhere from 100g to 250g. That’s a 150-calorie difference. Weigh things, at least initially.

Skipping days. It’s better to track roughly every day than perfectly three days a week. Log what you eat, even if it’s a bad day. Data is data.

The Two-Week Rule

Track diligently for two weeks. Not forever — just two weeks. In that time you’ll learn:

How much protein is actually in the foods you eat
Which meals hit your macros easily and which ones don’t
What portion sizes actually look like
Where your calories are really going

After two weeks of tracking, most people can eyeball portions with reasonable accuracy. You might choose to keep tracking, or you might use the knowledge to eat intuitively with a much better sense of what’s on your plate.

Start Today

Don’t wait for Monday. Open PT Tracker, set your targets, and log your next meal. It takes 60 seconds and it’s the first step toward understanding exactly what your body needs.