Tracked as a cap
Sodium tracking
- Unit
- mg
- Default cap
- 2,300 mg
- Direction
- Stay under
What it is, and why people track it
Sodium intake is dominated by packaged and restaurant food rather than salt added at the table — commonly cited figures put roughly 70% of intake in that category. That is what makes it hard to manage by intention alone.
It is a cap, not a goal. AIM flags the meal that takes you over rather than filling a bar toward 2,300 mg as though that were a target.
Setting your number
AIM caps sodium at 2,300 mg a day, the figure used on nutrition labels and by most public health guidance. The American Heart Association suggests an ideal limit of 1,500 mg for many adults, particularly those managing blood pressure.
How good is the estimate?
Moderate. Sodium varies enormously between two visually identical versions of the same dish — a home-made soup and a canned one look the same and differ several-fold. Naming the source (“canned”, “restaurant”) meaningfully improves it.
Questions
- What is the daily sodium limit?
- Nutrition labels use 2,300 mg a day, which is AIM's default cap. The American Heart Association suggests an ideal limit of 1,500 mg for many adults.
- Why is my sodium high when I don't add salt?
- Because most sodium arrives in packaged and restaurant food rather than from the salt shaker — bread, sauces, soups, deli meat and cheese are the usual sources.
Also in this group
Cholesterol
Dietary cholesterol as a cap, defaulting to 300 mg a day — tracked because people are asked to track it, with a note on what current guidance actually says.
Potassium
A goal, not a cap — most people fall short. Potassium is the counterweight to sodium in blood pressure guidance and is missing from most macro trackers entirely.
Calcium
A standard metric with a 1,000 mg daily goal — worth watching on a dairy-free or plant-based diet, where the shortfall is easy to miss.
Iron
An 18 mg daily goal by default. One of the most common reasons someone starts tracking a specific nutrient — usually after a blood test.
Track sodium without a database search
AIM estimates it on every meal from a photo or a sentence, and lets you correct anything it got wrong just by saying so.