# Keto Diet Playbook

For a member who has chosen a ketogenic diet and wants it instrumented rather than guessed: carbohydrate against a cap, ketones in the nutritional range, and the lipid panel that tells you how your body is taking it.

Type: feature · Domain: Nutrition & Energy Balance · Accuracy: Not from a wearable · Importance: Supporting

Also called: Keto, ketogenic diet, keto Playbook, carb cap, nutritional ketosis

## In one sentence

For a member who has chosen a ketogenic diet and wants it instrumented rather than guessed: carbohydrate against a cap, ketones in the nutritional range, and the lipid panel that tells you how your body is taking it.

## Who it is for

Members running, or about to start, a ketogenic diet. VT does not rank diets; this Playbook supports the one you chose and describes what your measures do under it.

## Its focus on Home

Nine cards: Ketones, Fasting glucose, Glucose–ketone index, Carbs, Fat, Protein, Hydration, Weight trend and Body fat. The glucose–ketone index needs a CGM and your ketone readings. Also tracked keeps Training Load, steps, calories goal, respiratory rate, resting heart rate, HRV, blood pressure, metabolic age and food noise one swipe away.

## What it gives its best with

Asked for: your meals every day, six days in seven, because the cap can only be counted against logged meals; ketone readings, three days a week for the first four weeks and then one, because blood BHB is the only direct measure and breath readings are estimates; and a lipid panel before you start and another 8 to 12 weeks in, because the lipid response is personal and worth knowing early, marked Coming soon for now. Helps: a smart scale, which shows what the diet does to your composition, and a wearable, whose sleep and heart rate show the adaptation.

## In Meals

A cap of 30 g of available carbohydrate a day, counted by VT from what you log; the "net carbs" on a packet are not used. Fat at least 60% of energy. Five servings of vegetables a day. Sodium up to 3,000 mg in the first four weeks, then 2,300 mg. And Meals stops measuring you against the fruit and whole-grain guidelines, which a ketogenic diet leaves out on purpose.

## Bands

Blood ketones 0.5 to 3.0 mmol/L, the range Volek and Phinney call nutritional ketosis, and carbohydrate up to 30 g, your cap.

## What Eir leads with

Ketones, carbohydrate against the cap, protein, fasting glucose and the lipid panel: the first weeks' adaptation, fluids and sodium, and the "keto flu" described as what it is; satiety and food noise as your own evidence; lipid changes described with their size against your previous panel, with a pointer to a professional, once, when LDL cholesterol or ApoB rises. It makes no claim that keto beats other diets, no therapeutic claim for any condition, and does not treat eating below the cap as a virtue.

## Sources

1. Volek JS, Phinney SD. The Art and Science of Low Carbohydrate Living. Beyond Obesity; 2011
2. Vitality Tracker, the Playbook catalogue (Keto Diet, version 2, published November 2026)
3. the Features page (Playbook Selection).

## Related

- [Playbooks: choosing your focus](https://vitalitytracker.app/knowledge/playbooks)
- [Blood ketones and the breath reading](https://vitalitytracker.app/knowledge/blood-ketones-and-breath-reading)
- [Protein, fat and carbohydrate](https://vitalitytracker.app/knowledge/protein-fat-and-carbohydrate)
- [Lipid profile](https://vitalitytracker.app/knowledge/lipid-profile)
- [Apolipoprotein B](https://vitalitytracker.app/knowledge/apolipoprotein-b)
- [Fasting glucose](https://vitalitytracker.app/knowledge/fasting-glucose)
- [Appetite ratings and food noise](https://vitalitytracker.app/knowledge/appetite-ratings-and-food-noise)
- [Hydration, alcohol and the diet break](https://vitalitytracker.app/knowledge/hydration-alcohol-and-the-diet-break)

Reviewed November 2026 · v1

Source: https://vitalitytracker.app/knowledge/keto-diet-playbook