Logging works whether you're precise about it or rough, but a few habits make the numbers metrIQ hands back — your targets, your trend, Sophia's advice — worth trusting rather than merely present. None of this is required; it's what pays off if you want more from the same few minutes a day.
Log close to the moment
The easiest time to describe a meal or a workout accurately is right after it, while the portion, the time and what was actually in it are still fresh. Sophia backdates entries without any trouble, so catching up later is never a problem — but reconstructing a whole day from memory at bedtime means guessing at times and losing the small stuff, the handful of nuts or the extra splash of oil. Logging in short bursts through the day beats one long recall at the end of it.
Be specific about portions
Sophia estimates well from a vague description, but a quantity turns her estimate into something closer to the truth: "150g of rice" logs more precisely than "some rice," and "two eggs" more precisely than "eggs." You don't need to weigh everything — a size comparison or a rough gram count is enough — but the more specific you are, the less she has to guess on your behalf.
Consistency beats precision
A week logged roughly every day is worth more than three perfectly precise days followed by four blank ones. Your targets and your trend are both read from a pattern over time — a run of recent days, a line fitted through recent weigh-ins — not any single day's accuracy. A gap in the log hurts that pattern more than an imprecise entry does, because an estimate still gives it something to work with, while a blank day gives it nothing. If you're choosing between logging something roughly and not logging it at all, log it.
Use the pantry for repeat foods
If you eat the same things often — a protein shake, a regular lunch — save them to your pantry once with their exact macros. After that, mentioning the food is enough: Sophia matches it and logs the numbers you saved instead of estimating, so your regulars come out exact every time with no extra typing.
Weigh in on a routine
Day-to-day weight moves with water, salt and digestion well before it moves with fat or muscle, which is why metrIQ reads your trend rather than any single reading. That trend needs several recent weigh-ins before it means anything, and it gets steadier the more regularly you add to it — roughly the same time of day, most days. An occasional weigh-in isn't wrong, but it gives the trend far less to work with, so it swings more with whatever that one morning happened to be.
Not sure whether a habit here is worth changing for your situation? Ask us.