Voice logging, how to track your day without typing

Voice logging means saying one natural sentence, such as "ran 5k this morning, felt good", and having it filed as an entry in the right tracker. It works because speaking is faster than opening a form and filling in fields, which is where most tracking habits quietly die. Say what you did, how much, and when, then check what was saved. Planwell on the App Store does the filing for you.

The short version

• Logging fails when it takes longer than the thing you are logging, so the fix is to make an entry take about five seconds.
• One sentence is enough if it says what happened, how much, and when.
• A photo beats talking for anything with many details, such as receipts, recipe pages and menus.
• Always glance at what was saved, because speech recognition and AI can both get a detail wrong.
• Planwell for iPhone has a Voice button on Home and a mic in its chat and tracker bars, so you can speak an entry in many of its trackers.

Why do forms kill tracking habits?

A typical form asks you to open an app, find the right screen, tap add, pick a date, type a number, choose a category and save. None of those steps is hard, but together they make you say "later", and later becomes a gap in your history.

Talking removes most of the steps. You say the thing and let the app work out where it belongs. That turns logging from a small task into a reflex, which is what a tracker needs to stay useful across weeks.

What should I say so it gets filed correctly?

Give every sentence three parts: what, how much and when.

• What is the thing itself, such as a run, your weight or a gym membership.
• How much is the number and the unit, such as 5 kilometres, 72.4 kilos or 35 pounds a month.
• When is the time, such as this morning or the 3rd of each month. Say it whenever it was not just now, and check the date afterwards.

Here are examples that carry all three:

• "Ran 5 kilometres this morning, easy pace."
• "Weight 72.4 this morning."
• "Slept 7 hours last night, woke up at 6:30."

Include the unit, because "five" could be kilometres, miles or minutes. A short sentence you actually say beats a perfect one you do not.

When is a photo better than talking?

Use a photo when the information is already written down and has too many parts to read aloud.

• Receipts. A photo captures every line and the total. How to track expenses by photographing receipts has more.
• Recipe pages. Ingredients and quantities are long and easy to mishear.
• Menus and meal plans. A diet plan or printed menu has many meals across several days.
• Workout plans on paper. Exercises, sets, reps and weights are a list.

Use your voice for anything short, such as a weight, a run or a film you want to watch.

When should I check the result?

Check every time, but briefly. Speech recognition and AI can both get a detail wrong, so a "13" can become a "30" and "yesterday" can land on the wrong date. Look at the saved entry and check the number, the unit and the date, and be stricter when it matters, such as a payment amount. If something is wrong, edit it or say the correction.

How does voice logging work in Planwell?

Planwell is an iPhone app with 15 trackers, and speech works in several places.

The Voice button on Home

On Home, under the "Ask Planwell anything" bar, tap Voice. The "Speak to Planwell" screen opens and starts listening, and the first time iPhone asks for microphone access. Say your sentence and tap stop. The screen shows "Writing it down" while it turns your words into text, and then they open in the Ask Planwell chat, where the assistant logs the entry in the right tracker.

The Ask Planwell chat

When the Ask Planwell message box is empty, it shows a mic. Tap it, speak and the words are sent as your message. The assistant can add, edit and delete entries across every tracker, and answer questions about your own entries, such as "how did I sleep last week".

The quick add bar inside a tracker

Many trackers, including Workout, Sleep, Expenses, Subscriptions, Meal Plan, Recipes and Watchlist, have a bar at the bottom of the screen. It shows a mic when the field is empty. In the bars for Workout, Expenses, Meal Plan and Recipes there is also a camera button for attaching photos. In Workout the bar reads "Say what you did, or snap your plan".

Example sentences and where they go

What is sent when I use the assistant?

The assistant does not run on your phone, so some of your information has to leave it. Planwell asks for your permission first, on a screen titled "Before you use the AI assistant".

• It runs only when you start it. Nothing is sent in the background.
• It sends your message, any photo you attach, your voice recording if you dictate, and only the part of your data relevant to your question.
• Anthropic runs the assistant. ElevenLabs turns a voice recording into text. If you paste a link, a third party reads the public page behind it.
• It is not used to train an AI model, and nothing is sold. There are no ads and no data brokers.
• You can say no and keep using the rest of Planwell, and change your mind later in Profile, then Data and privacy.

You can use Planwell as a guest and delete your account and everything in it from inside the app. The full policy is at planwell.me/privacy.

How do I try voice logging?

1. Download Planwell on the App Store.
2. Switch on a tracker you would use today, such as Workouts.
3. Tap Voice on Home and say one sentence.
4. Open the tracker and check the number, unit and date.

To choose which trackers to start with, read one app instead of ten, an all-in-one tracker for iPhone. Planwell Pro costs US$3.99 a month or US$39.99 a year, each with a 7 day free trial for new subscribers. To see how fast it can be, get Planwell for iPhone and log your next workout by speaking.

Frequently asked questions

Can I log workouts by voice on iPhone?

Yes. In Planwell you can say "log a 30 minute run" from the Voice button on Home or the mic in the Workout screen's bar, and it is saved in the Workouts tracker. Check the duration and date afterwards.

Is my voice recording private?

Planwell only sends a recording when you use the mic, and only with your permission. It is turned into text by ElevenLabs and is never used to train an AI model. The details are in the privacy policy at planwell.me/privacy.

Should I speak or use a photo for a receipt?

Use a photo. A receipt has many lines and amounts that are slow to read out. In Planwell, the Expenses bar has a camera button for this, and you should still check the total afterwards.