# NannaLife vs a spreadsheet tracker for blood test results

> NannaLife turns the lab reports you already have into one private, source-linked health timeline, with an AI that answers from your own results.

This is the Markdown version of https://nannalife.com/vs/spreadsheets.

## The short answer

A spreadsheet gives you total control and costs nothing, but you must find and type every value, and a mistyped digit cannot be checked against the report it came from. NannaLife reads the reports instead, normalizes names and units across labs, and keeps each value linked to its source. If you enjoy the sheet and want custom calculations, keep the sheet.

## Where a spreadsheet wins

- You decide the columns: symptoms, medication changes, cycle day, anything.
- You can compute anything: ratios, rolling averages, correlations.
- You can graph anything, including against non-lab values.
- Formatting and colour rules are yours.
- It works offline, never changes shape, and exports as plain CSV.

## Where it breaks

- Entry is the whole cost. Twelve markers across four reports is nearly fifty numbers typed by hand.
- Errors are invisible. A mistyped 10.7 instead of 107 looks like a real result forever.
- Reference ranges are printed per lab, so a single "normal" column goes wrong when you change labs.
- Units drift between mg/dL and mmol/L, producing two incompatible columns.
- Upkeep decays: most sheets are diligent for a year or two, then stop.
- Nothing explains what a marker measures.

## Side by side

| What matters | Spreadsheet | NannaLife |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Getting values in | Typed by hand | Read from the report automatically |
| Risk of transcription error | High, and undetectable | Verify against the linked source |
| Custom columns and formulas | Unlimited | Not supported |
| Cross-lab normalization | Manual | Names and units |
| Reference range handling | One column, or manual per lab | Per result, from its own report |
| Original report retained | No | Yes, linked to every value |
| Explains what a marker means | No | Per biomarker |
| Ask questions of your own results | No | With NannaDoc |
| Effort over five years | Grows with every report | One upload per report |

## The honest recommendation

**Keep the spreadsheet if** you want computations NannaLife does not do, you track non-lab values alongside lab values, or you need your data as a plain file you fully control.

**Use NannaLife if** the typing is why your sheet stopped, you use more than one lab, or you want to check a suspicious value against the report it came from.

The realistic combination is both: NannaLife for the reading, the timeline, and the source links, and a small sheet for the two or three derived numbers you care about.

## Questions

**Can I export my NannaLife data into a spreadsheet?**
There is no export feature yet. If exporting your data matters to you, that is a fair reason to keep your own sheet as well.

**Why does a spreadsheet stop working?**
Hand transcription is slow and error prone, and the sheet has no copy of the original report to check a mistyped decimal against.

**Does NannaLife calculate ratios and averages?**
No. It shows each marker over time and classifies it against its reference range, plus an overall health score per profile.

## Links

- [Compare hub](https://nannalife.com/vs/)
- [Homepage](https://nannalife.com/)
- [Privacy Policy](https://nannalife.com/legal/privacy)