Software Alternatives, Accelerators & Startups

fatsecret VS PHP

Compare fatsecret VS PHP and see what are their differences

Note: These products don't have any matching categories. If you think this is a mistake, please edit the details of one of the products and suggest appropriate categories.

fatsecret logo fatsecret

Individualized and sustainable weight loss.

PHP logo PHP

A popular general-purpose scripting language that is especially suited to web development
  • fatsecret fatsecret home
    fatsecret home //
    2025-09-10

At fatsecret we empower anyone to reach their desired weight through individualized and sustainable weight loss, because we envision a world where everyone can achieve their weight loss goals, leading to better health and happiness.

We support a community of more than 100 million enthusiastic members with the highest quality food and nutrition tracking tools that reduce effort and create lasting healthy habits for sustainable weight loss.

Our free iOS and Android mobile apps and websites let you track your food, exercise and weight as well as engage with a supportive community. The fatsecret community enjoys access to the largest verified database of food and nutrition information globally covering all generic foods, branded products and restaurant items.

fatsecret also operates the fatsecret Platform which includes the fatsecret Platform API and fatsecret Brand Tools. With more than 50,000 developers utilizing the service, the fatsecret Platform API is the largest provider of verified accurate food and nutrition data to health related mobile apps/web services and integrated fitness devices, available in 26 languages for more than 50 markets.

  • PHP Landing page
    Landing page //
    2022-07-21

We recommend LibHunt PHP for discovery and comparisons of trending PHP projects.

fatsecret

$ Details
freemium $9.99 / Monthly
Platforms
Web iOS Android REST API
Release Date
2006 September
Startup details
Country
Australia

fatsecret features and specs

  • Weight Loss
  • Calorie Counter
  • Diet Tracker
  • Community

PHP features and specs

  • Cost-Effective
    PHP is an open-source language, meaning it is free to use. This helps reduce the overall cost of a project.
  • Large Community
    PHP has a large and active community. This means vast amounts of documentation, tutorials, and third-party resources are available.
  • Cross-Platform
    PHP is platform-independent and can run on various operating systems like Windows, Linux, and macOS.
  • Database Support
    PHP supports a wide range of databases including MySQL, PostgreSQL, SQLite, and more.
  • Speed
    PHP is generally fast, especially when used with built-in tools and extensions. It integrates easily with web servers like Apache.
  • Built-in Functions
    PHP comes with a vast range of built-in functions and libraries, which makes developing common functionalities easier and faster.
  • Server-Side Scripting
    PHP is designed specifically for server-side scripting, making it well-suited for web development.

Possible disadvantages of PHP

  • Security
    If not properly managed, PHP applications can be vulnerable to security threats like SQL injection, XSS, and others.
  • Inconsistency
    PHP's function naming and parameter ordering can be inconsistent, which can make the language difficult to learn and use efficiently.
  • Performance
    While fast for many tasks, PHP can struggle with performance for high-resource applications compared to other languages like Node.js or Python.
  • Error Handling
    Error handling in PHP is less efficient and more cumbersome compared to modern languages like Python or JavaScript.
  • Concurrency
    PHP lacks native support for multi-threading, which can be a limitation for applications requiring high concurrency.
  • Old Codebases
    Many older PHP applications use outdated coding practices, making maintaining and updating them more difficult and costly.
  • Type System
    PHP historically had a weak typing system, though recent versions have introduced better type support, it's still a drawback for older codebases.

Analysis of fatsecret

Overall verdict

  • FatSecret is generally considered a good resource for those seeking a free and user-friendly way to monitor their diet and fitness journey. Its extensive food database and additional features like community support make it a valuable tool for many users.

Why this product is good

  • FatSecret is a popular nutrition and diet tracking tool that provides users with a comprehensive database of foods, including nutritional information and calorie counts. It allows users to track their meals, exercise, and weight loss progress. The app also features a community forum and provides access to healthy recipes and diet tips, which can be helpful for individuals looking to maintain or lose weight.

Recommended for

    FatSecret is recommended for individuals who want a simple yet effective app to track their calorie intake, monitor their weight loss or maintenance goals, and engage with a community of like-minded individuals. It is particularly useful for those on a budget, as the app's basic version is free.

Analysis of PHP

Overall verdict

  • PHP is a solid choice for web development, especially if you are working with server-side tasks. While it may not be as modern as some newer languages or frameworks, it is still reliable, widely supported, and serves as the backbone for many popular content management systems like WordPress.

Why this product is good

  • Simplicity
    PHP is known for its simplicity and ease of learning, making it accessible for beginners.
  • Performance
    With the release of PHP 7 and later versions, significant performance improvements have been made.
  • Community support
    It has extensive community support and a vast array of libraries and frameworks.
  • Hosting compatibility
    PHP is compatible with most web hosting services, offering a seamless deployment experience.

Recommended for

  • Beginners looking to get into web development
  • Developers building or maintaining traditional server-side web applications
  • Projects requiring wide hosting service compatibility
  • Existing projects using CMS like WordPress, Joomla, or Drupal

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PHP videos

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  • Review - For PHP Agents - Advice On Making The Most Of Your Insurance Sales Career

Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to fatsecret and PHP)
Health And Fitness
100 100%
0% 0
Programming Language
0 0%
100% 100
Nutrition
100 100%
0% 0
OOP
0 0%
100% 100

Questions & Answers

As answered by people managing fatsecret and PHP.

What makes your product unique?

fatsecret's answer

fatsecret is defined by its global scale and data integrity. Unlike many platforms that rely solely on unverified user-generated content, fatsecret provides a highly curated, verified global food and nutrition database covering 56 countries and 24 languages. Our consumer app empowers millions of users to lose weight, while our professional-grade Platform API serves as the nutritional backbone for global tech giants. This ensures that whether a user is tracking a meal in Melbourne or a developer is building a health app in San Francisco, they are accessing the most accurate, localized and comprehensive data available.

Why should a person choose your product over its competitors?

fatsecret's answer

Users and businesses choose fatsecret for its uncompromising transparency and accessibility.

For Consumers: We offer a completely free, high-quality core weight loss experience including a barcode scanner, comprehensive macro tracking and an engaged community - without the aggressive paywalls common in the industry.

For Developers: We provide a "no lock-in" contract and a white-label API that is arguably the most flexible and easy to integrate in the market. Choosing fatsecret means choosing a partner that prioritizes data accuracy and user success over short-term monetization.

How would you describe the primary audience of your product?

fatsecret's answer

fatsecret serves a diverse, global audience:

Health-Conscious Individuals: People seeking a personalized, easy-to-use tool for sustainable weight loss and nutrition management.

The Developer Ecosystem: Over 35,000 developers and startups who require high-quality, localized nutrition data to power their own innovative health, fitness and medical applications.

Enterprise Leaders: Global corporations in the technology, insurance, and healthcare sectors (such as Google/fitbit, Samsung and Abbott) that integrate our data into their wearable devices and wellness platforms.

What's the story behind your product?

fatsecret's answer

Founded in 2006 in Melbourne, Australia, fatsecret began with a simple mission: to empower people to achieve their ideal weight through individualized and sustainable nutrition. Over the last ~20 years, we have evolved from a social network for dieting into the worldโ€™s leading provider of verified food and nutrition data to the leading consumer weight loss solution, now even expanding into medically supported weight loss through the fatsecret Clinic.

Which are the primary technologies used for building your product?

fatsecret's answer

The fatsecret platform is an API-first ecosystem designed for high-concurrency and global reliability. Our core infrastructure handles millions of API calls per month, utilizing:

  • Scalable REST APIs: Delivering JSON-formatted data with localized support.
  • Enterprise-Grade Security: Implementing robust OAuth protocols and role-based authentication to ensure data integrity for our global brand partners.
  • Advanced Image Recognition: Proprietary AI/ML models for automated food detection and portion estimation.

Who are some of the biggest customers of your product?

fatsecret's answer

Our Platform API is trusted by some of the most influential companies in the world to power their health and wellness offerings. Customers include:

  • Technology Giants: Samsung and Google (Fitbit).
  • Healthcare & Med-Tech: Lingo, LifeScan, Welldoc and Hims & Hers.
  • Global Brands: Nestlรฉ and Betty Bossi.
  • Innovative Apps: Bending Spoons, Health2Sync and CalAI.

User comments

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Reviews

These are some of the external sources and on-site user reviews we've used to compare fatsecret and PHP

fatsecret Reviews

Top Alternatives to MyFitnessPal
FatSecret provides basic calorie counting and community support in a simple, easy-to-use app. It is free and offers basic tracking capabilities including a food diary, exercise log, and weight chart. While it is user-friendly and offers community support, it lacks advanced features and has a less detailed food database compared to other apps, which may limit its usefulness...
Source: calsnaps.com
10 Best MyFitnessPal Alternatives
As we speak, there are multiple options that bear a striking resemblance to MyFitnessPal as tools for tracking our diet, workouts, and general health. The selection process is pretty specific too; it could be an all-inclusive weight loss application such as Noom or simply calorie counting tools like FatSecret. Thus, everyone can have a solution at hand when they need one.
The 8 Best Calorie Counter Apps
FatSecret also offers a monthly summary view, which displays total calories consumed each day and averages for each month. This feature may be convenient for tracking your overall progress.

PHP Reviews

Top 10 Rust Alternatives
PHP is another general purpose-based computing language. This language is mostly found in HTML. It is usually used for the management of content that is based on dynamic information.
Top 20 Javascript Libraries
As the name suggests, JsPHP is a Javascript library for PHP API to be available in the JS environment. It is open-source and provides a compelling interface for JS developers who work in PHP. JsPHP can work in tandem with other libraries in an application. JsPHP supports PHP functions, including regular expressions, date-time evaluations, JSON, error handling, object...
Source: hackr.io
The 10 Best Programming Languages to Learn Today
What kind of development projects do you want to work on? If career flexibility is a priority, learning Python or C++ will allow you to work across different types of programming. If your passion is web development, learning JavaScript or PHP is a smart choice.
Source: ict.gov.ge

Social recommendations and mentions

Based on our record, PHP should be more popular than fatsecret. It has been mentiond 56 times since March 2021. We are tracking product recommendations and mentions on various public social media platforms and blogs. They can help you identify which product is more popular and what people think of it.

fatsecret mentions (6)

  • 100g of rice contains 27.9g of carbs, 2.66g of protein, 0.28 g of fat, and about 400 mg of everything else in terms of nutrition, where is the other 68.78g? Is it the amount of excretion we will produce?
    Data from fatsecret.com Source : https://www.fatsecret.com/calories-nutrition/generic/rice-white-cooked-regular?portionid=53181&portionamount=100.000. Source: almost 3 years ago
  • How to lose 10 pounds?
    I'm using fatsecret.com to track my calorie intake and used another site to figure out the macro ratios I should be eating. I eat healthy food anyways but after tracking it for a few weeks my macros were WAY off eating too many carbs and not enough protein. Just had to adjust the ratios of ingredients in what I was already making to even things out and to also bring the calorie count down. Made a pact with myself... Source: about 3 years ago
  • CMV: Eggs served in a restaurant should come properly salted unless otherwise requested by a customer.
    Should fatsecret.com be the one to determine standards for the amount of salt on eggs? I would think this ought to be up to the chef. Source: over 3 years ago
  • How do you plan your keto meals?
    I use fatsecret.com to plan my meals and track my carbs and calories. The rest of my household eat as far from keto as I can imagine, so I cook for myself. Using tips from the internet, I make up a menu and prepare everything the day before (I love to be organized!). I rarely use others' s recipes - I experiment with food combos that I think will work. I have a bent for math, so planning my meals became a... Source: over 3 years ago
  • Now that itโ€™s exam season, time to spend money for the next week on food to avoid cooking and maximize time to study. What are the best deals around campus with the best quality and quantity tradeoff?
    One large pizza has enough calories for an average males daily intake and the actually calorie count of the walk in special is most likely higher due to the additional toppings even if the pizza with just cheese were to be less calories than what fatsecret.com listed it as. Source: over 3 years ago
View more

PHP mentions (56)

  • PHP's Biggest Problem
    The PHP website is indeed one of the worst parts of the whole ecosystem. Just look at the landingpage (https://php.net) and compare it with those of other languages. There's not a single piece of PHP code on the page. No "what is PHP", no "why should I use it", and no "that's why PHP is great". It's just a news page showing the latest releases, and a small section for downloading PHP. And speaking of the website:... - Source: Hacker News / 2 months ago
  • Self Hostable Multi-Location Uptime Monitoring
    My initial idea was to leverage the main applicationโ€™s queue worker by deploying a queue worker remotely and setting up a secure connection between them using something like Wireguard. Vigilant is written in PHP using the Laravel framework, for queuing it uses Laravel Horizon. This is a queuing system built on top of Redis. All monitoring tasks in Vigilant are executed on this queue, it allows for multiple queues... - Source: dev.to / 8 months ago
  • The Lost Art of Reading Documentation
    I remember being 15 (18 years ago ๐Ÿฅฒ) and learning PHP. Stack Overflow wasnโ€™t as big yet, and finding answers often meant digging through forums filled with half-baked solutions, each dependent on specific hosting configurations. There was no universal standard, some hosts supported certain php.ini settings while others didnโ€™t. The only reliable resource? The official PHP documentation: php.net. - Source: dev.to / over 1 year ago
  • Using named arguments in php8 and up
    That's the first I've heard of it, and I like it! I can't tell you the number of trips to php.net to look at argument order for a function. Is it haystack/needle, or needle/haystack? Of course it could turn into the same thing w/ argument names (is it whole_name or full_name?), but I'm going to use it. Source: about 3 years ago
  • How to display results from multiple SQL queries in the same table cell?
    Prepare to spend a fair bit of time reading and going back to phptherightway.com and php.net. I've also found this Tutorial from Envato Tuts+ to be quite good. Source: about 3 years ago
View more

What are some alternatives?

When comparing fatsecret and PHP, you can also consider the following products

MyFitnessPal - Track the number of calories that you consume each day with MyFitnessPal. The app also lets you create a diet and track the exercise that you complete each day whether it's walking, running or some other type of program.

Python - Python is a clear and powerful object-oriented programming language, comparable to Perl, Ruby, Scheme, or Java.

Cronometer - A big trend in todayโ€™s world is health and fitness, particularly in recording nutritional information. There are several options available to achieve this result.

JavaScript - Lightweight, interpreted, object-oriented language with first-class functions

Lose it! - Snap a photo of your food to get nutritional facts

Java - A concurrent, class-based, object-oriented, language specifically designed to have as few implementation dependencies as possible