What is MyNetDiary’s Advanced Autopilot, and is it best for my weight-loss plan?

MyNetDiary’s Advanced Autopilot is a Premium feature designed to help users effectively achieve their weight goals by automatically adjusting calorie and nutrient targets based on personal progress.

Read on to learn how it differs from MyNetDiary’s basic Autopilot and the pros and cons of this feature to better determine if it’s right for you.

What is Advanced Autopilot, and how does it help with weight loss?

When it comes to losing weight, MyNetDiary realizes one size does not fit all. To better account for metabolic differences over time, we created Advanced Autopilot.

This Premium feature uses algorithms to provide personalized recommendations based on a week’s worth of consistent tracking of the following:

• Food and drink (consumed calories)
• Body weight

The app takes this information and adjusts weight maintenance calories under “My Weight Goal & Plan” to create a calorie budget to meet your health goals.

How to enable Advanced Autopilot

Turn on the feature by navigating to My Weight Goal & Plan > Overview (See screenshot below)

How does Advanced Autopilot differ from MyNetDiary’s basic Autopilot feature?

Basic AutoPilot

Basic AutoPilot sets and adjusts daily calorie targets based on your weight goal, current weight, and timeframe for achieving your goal. This mode requires less interaction and is ideal for users who prefer a general hands-off approach.

Key characteristics of Basic AutoPilot:

• Initial Setup: Adjusts your calorie budget based on your initial weight and weight goal.
• Periodic Adjustments: Makes adjustments based on your weight changes at regular intervals without considering metabolic adjustments.
• Simplicity: It is a more straightforward tool that doesn’t consider detailed factors such as your daily activities or exercise routines.

To get the most out of Basic AutoPilot

• Record daily intake of food and drinks, making sure to be as detailed as possible.
• Weigh and update weight once a week in the app.

Advanced AutoPilot

Advanced AutoPilot offers a more comprehensive and dynamic approach to managing your diet and health goals. It is designed to evaluate and adjust your calorie and macronutrient targets more precisely, taking into consideration additional factors that can influence your progress.

Key features include:

• Dynamic Adjustments: Estimates changes in your metabolism and energy needs over time, making necessary adjustments weekly. This includes logged food, exercise, and expected versus actual weight changes.
• Feedback and Suggestions: Lets you know if you are eating too few calories (such as below BMR or basal metabolic rate) and how much weight you were predicted to lose vs. how much you lost. If the system calculates your calorie budget to be less than your BMR or basal metabolic rate you will be asked to update your plan or disable it.
• Exercise Integration: Considers your physical activity levels (adding exercise calories to your daily budget is optional) and adjusts calories to ensure you’re eating enough to fuel your workouts while maintaining a calorie deficit.
• Progress Tracking: Monitors your weight loss trends and keeps your goals on track by adjusting your nutrition plan based on your progress.
• Plan Adjustments: Allows for immediate reactivation after making necessary adjustments to your plan, ensuring real-time guidance and support.
• Consistency Requirement: Advanced AutoPilot requires consistent food logs (at least six days a week) and weigh-ins (at least twice a week) for accurate recommendations.

Pro tips to get the most out of Advanced Autopilot

1. Set a realistic weight-loss goal. We suggest striving to lose one pound (0.45kg) a week. By setting a more aggressive goal (such as two pounds (0.91kg) or more a week), the algorithm may suggest a calorie budget lower than your BMR or basal metabolic rate. If you choose to select this lower calorie budget, the feature will be disabled. MyNetDiary is looking out for your overall health, and it can be very challenging to meet your essential nutrient needs when you eat less than your BMR. Eating less than your BMR may put you at risk for nutrient deficiencies and may negatively impact your health.
2. Do not enable Advanced Autopilot if you desire a fixed daily calorie budget.

What about “Exercise Calories?”

When using MyNetDiary’s Advanced Autopilot feature, you may wonder whether to enable the “Add Exercise to Calorie Budget” option.

The “Add Exercise to Calorie Budget" option can be toggled on or off by navigating to My Weight Goal & Plan > Exercise Plan > Add Exercise to Calorie Budget.

Enabling the feature will adjust your daily calorie budget based on your logged exercise. This is helpful for users whose exercise or activity varies greatly from day to day.

On the “My Weight Plan” screen, you can configure the share of exercise to increase from 0% to 100% and, if desired, choose specific macros to adjust.

Pro tip:

Only log exercises that go beyond your typical daily activities. Routine activities like walking, standing, or work-related movements are already accounted for in your selected activity level. Logging routine activities and extra exercises could double-count your calorie burn, affecting your progress.

Generally, we recommend leaving the feature off to provide a more stable budget.

Advanced Autopilot considerations

Pros

Advanced Autopilot takes the guesswork out of figuring out your daily calorie budget.

Promotes losing weight at a reasonable rate.

No manual calibration of your calorie budget is needed!

The feature allows users to accept or decline proposed plan changes. Think about your life and what is reasonable for you, and then decide if you want to accept the plan.

Cons

Advanced Autopilot assumes your food log is complete, and you have not forgotten to record any nibbles or underestimated portions.

It works best after analyzing about three weeks of food, weight, and exercise records. In our culture of “immediate gratification,” this can feel like a long time.

Some users have experienced unexpected turn-offs or weight-tracking discrepancies.

Tips:

• Make sure not to forget to log any snacks or nibbles. Short on time and can’t record the details of your meal? Try out the “Meal Photo” feature, which lets you snap photos of your meal to create a visual record. You can then review the meal or log when you have more time.
• Try to record your weight two days before your official weigh-in day for the best results.
• The feature will reduce your daily calorie budget if you are not losing weight. Sometimes, the background math equations reduce your budget too much and advise eating less than your BMR. If the calorie budget is not sustainable, switch to basic AutoPilot instead.

What should you do if you are not losing weight with Advanced AutoPilot?

• Disable “Add Exercise Calories to Budget.”
• Make sure you remember to record each snack or meal.
• Double-check to ensure you are avoiding these tracking pitfalls.
• Return to using Basic AutoPilot instead.

The MyNetDiary app is very flexible, offering a variety of features to support your unique weight-loss journey. If the scale does not reflect your hard work after a few weeks of using Advanced Autopilot, do not hesitate to reach out to our registered dietitians by tapping on the “Community” tab in the app. We are here to answer your nutrition and weight-loss questions and help you find the correct settings to meet your weight-loss goals. Remember, weight loss is nuanced, and every person is different.

Related content

Have you been dieting and exercising but not losing weight? Try these proven plateau solutions

Using non-scale victories to measure and celebrate weight-loss progress

How to plan your calories for weight loss or gain with MyNetDiary

Still new to MyNetDiary? Learn more today by downloading the app for FREE.

Weight Loss->Goals & Monitoring