Mood tracker

What It Means

A mood tracker is a simple daily record of how you felt, kept on paper or in an app. Most use a number, a word or a color for each day, and many add a note on sleep or what happened. The National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) notes that health care providers sometimes ask people to keep a daily mood chart, tracking moods, behaviors and sleep, to make patterns and the effect of treatment easier to see.

How People Say It

• "I give every day a number from one to five."
• "My mood tracker showed I crash every Sunday night."
• "My doctor asked me to chart my moods and sleep for a month."

The Breakdown

Signs a mood tracker could help

• Your moods seem to swing and you can't tell what sets them off.
• A doctor or therapist has asked how you've been, and you struggle to remember.
• You want to see whether a change, like more sleep or a new routine, makes a difference.

How to set one up

1. Pick a scale you'll actually use, such as 1 to 5 or three colors.
2. Rate each day at about the same time, for example before bed.
3. Add a few words about sleep and anything that stood out.
4. Every week or two, look for patterns: certain days, people, or amounts of sleep.

A short self-check. Look back over the last two weeks. Are low days becoming more common, or bunching together? If they are, that's worth raising with a doctor.

Starting the conversation. Bring the tracker to your appointment: "Here's how my mood has been every day for the past month. The low stretches seem to follow nights I sleep badly."

Good to Know

NIMH's self-careSelf-careTaking time to do things that help you live well and look after your physical and mental health, such as moving, sleeping, resting and staying in touch. See more guidance says to seek professional help if you've had severe symptoms for 2 weeks or more, and to get help right away for thoughts of suicide or self-harm. Cleveland Clinic notes that apps and devices can help you flag patterns to share with a provider, though they don't replace formal testing. A doctor or a licensed mental health professional can help work out what the patterns mean. If you're thinking about suicide or are in crisis, call or text 988 (the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline). Call 911 in an emergency.

Related Terms and Categories

• Habit tracker

  A simple record, on paper or in an app, where you mark each day you do a habit so you can see your progress at a glance.

• Journaling

  Writing down your thoughts and feelings, in a notebook or an app, to understand them more clearly and to see what's behind your stress.

• Feelings wheel

  A circle chart of emotion words, with a few core feelings in the middle and more precise words around them, used to find the right name for what you feel.

• Emotional check-in

  A short pause to notice and name how you feel right now, often as a word, a number on a scale or a point on a feelings chart.

• Bullet journal

  Ryder Carroll's notebook method for tracking tasks, events and notes with short entries and symbols, organized into an index and daily, monthly and future logs.

• Sleep hygiene

  The everyday habits and bedroom setup that make it easier to fall asleep and stay asleep, like a steady wake-up time and a quiet, cool room.

Wellbeing and habits