What is food waste tracking?
It is a log of the food that leaves your kitchen uneaten. Each time something goes in the bin, you note what it was, roughly how much, and the reason. After a few weeks the reasons repeat, and those repeats are what you act on. The FDA includes “track how much food you throw away” among its tips for cutting waste at home (FDA).
Tracking is a measurement, not a diet. You are not trying to waste less during the first weeks; you are trying to see what normally happens.
Why it is worth a few weeks of effort
Because the amounts are larger than most households guess. The US Environmental Protection Agency says about one-third of food in the United States goes uneaten, and that the average family of four spends almost $3,000 a year on food that is not eaten (EPA). Households are a big part of the total: of the roughly 66 million tons of wasted food the EPA estimated for 2019 across shops, food service and homes, about 40 percent came from households (EPA toolkit).
Most of it is not recovered either. By the EPA's estimate, about 96% of households' wasted food in 2019 went to landfill, combustion or the sewer, and the rest was composted. Those are national figures. Your own log is what tells you where your household sits.
How to track food waste at home, step by step
The EPA's Food: Too Good to Waste toolkit includes a tool called “Get Smart: Take the Challenge”, with instructions and worksheets for households to collect and measure their wasted food over a two to six week challenge. The steps below follow the same idea in a form you can start today. The details are a suggestion, not an official method.
1. Pick a period and stick to it
Two weeks is the short end of the EPA's range, and six weeks the long end. Choose weeks that look like your normal life, not a holiday.
2. Choose one way to measure
Weigh it on a kitchen scale, count portions, or estimate the price. The unit matters less than using the same one every time, so week four can be compared with week one.
3. Log it when it happens
Keep the log where the food is thrown away. One line per item: the date, what it was, how much, and why. Writing it down later from memory loses the “why”, which is the most useful column.
4. Add it up once a week
Total the amount, then count the reasons. Three or four entries with the same reason are a pattern.
A week of a food waste tracker on paper can look like this:
| Day | What | How much | Why |
|---|---|---|---|
| Mon | Bagged salad | Half a bag | Forgotten in the drawer |
| Wed | Cooked rice | 2 portions | Cooked too much |
| Thu | Yoghurt | 2 pots | Past its date |
| Sat | Bread | Third of a loaf | Went mouldy |
| Sun | Chicken | 1 pack | Plans changed, not frozen |
The rows are an example, not data. Decide early whether peels, bones and coffee grounds count. Leaving them out keeps the log about food that could have been eaten, which is the part you can change.
What the reasons tell you to change
Each common reason has a matching habit in the EPA's and FDA's advice. This is where the log pays off.
- Bought too much. The EPA suggests checking the fridge, freezer and pantry before you shop, planning the week's meals first, and buying only what those meals need. Bulk deals save money only if the food is used before it spoils.
- Forgotten. The FDA suggests setting aside an area of the fridge for food that will go bad within a few days (FDA, Tips to Reduce Food Waste). The EPA toolkit has a printable “Eat First” sign for the same purpose.
- Past its date. The FDA estimates that confusion over date labels accounts for about 20 percent of consumer food waste. It is worth knowing which dates are about quality before binning by the calendar.
- Cooked too much. Cook portions for the number of people eating, and refrigerate or freeze leftovers in clear, labelled, dated containers, as the EPA advises.
- Plans changed. Freeze bread, meat or leftovers you will not get to in time. Our guide on how long frozen food is good for covers what to expect afterwards.
For scraps that were never going to be eaten, the EPA's suggestion is composting. Safe, untouched food you will not use can be donated to a food bank.
Food waste management at home after the log
Once the tracking period ends, keep the two or three changes that match your biggest reasons and drop the daily log. Repeat a short log a few months later to see whether the totals moved. Good food waste management at home is mostly that loop: measure, change one habit, measure again.
Paper works well for the challenge itself because it covers everything, including leftovers scraped off plates. For the “forgotten” and “past its date” rows, a reminder does more than a log, because it acts before the food is lost.
That is the part Xpiry covers. It is an expiry date tracker for Android: you add products with their dates, get reminded before they pass, and mark what you used. Its insights then show what you used in time, what expired, and your waste rate month by month. It only knows about the products you added, so it complements a paper log; it does not replace one.
Do “forgotten” and “past its date” keep showing up in your log? Xpiry reminds you before the dates you save and shows what expired each month.
The food expiration tracker page shows how the reminders and insights work for a kitchen.
FAQ
How long should I track food waste?
The EPA's household challenge runs for two to six weeks. Shorter than two weeks and a single unusual shop can distort the picture.
Should I weigh the food or just count it?
Either works for a household. The EPA page describes collecting and measuring wasted food without prescribing one unit there, so pick the one you will keep up and do not switch halfway.
Do peels and bones count as food waste?
That is your choice for a home log. Keeping them separate, or leaving them out, makes it easier to see the food that could have been eaten.
What is the most common thing to fix?
It differs by household, which is the reason to track. Nationally, the FDA's estimate that about 20 percent of consumer food waste comes from date label confusion makes labels a good place to look.
Does a food waste tracking app replace the log?
It depends on what the app records. Xpiry records products you added and whether they were used or expired, which covers packaged food with a date. Plate leftovers and loose produce you never added will not be in it.