Mood Tracker Template: Template, Example and Tips

This mood tracker template gives a wellness or mental health coaching client one short daily entry (a mood rating with sleep, movement, social time, stress and a note), a monthly grid that turns those entries into a picture, and a weekly review with prompts you work through together in session. It takes about two minutes a day to fill in. The point is to notice patterns the client can act on in coaching, such as how a short night or a week without seeing friends shows up in their mood. It is not a diagnostic tool, and the template says so in its own safety box.

You can copy the template below into a document, a form or a printed sheet. If you run your practice in Coachful, the daily questions become a check-in your client answers in their branded app, the weekly review becomes a reflection prompt, and every answer is stored with the client record next to their goals, habits, notes and sessions, so you are not chasing screenshots on Monday morning. We make Coachful, so read the comparison later in the article with that in mind; the template itself works anywhere.

Below you will find the full template, a table explaining each section, what mental health and wellness coaches need to add, a filled example for a fictional client, a comparison of ways to send and store it, and a walkthrough in Coachful.

What is in the mood tracker template?

The template has five parts: a one-time setup page, a daily log, a monthly grid, a weekly review and a safety box. Copy all of it, replace the [bracketed] fill-ins with your client's details, and remove anything you will not use.

Part 1. Setup page (fill in together in the first session)

1. Client name: [first name]. Coach: [your name]. Start date: [date]. Review day: [day of the week we look at this together].
2. Why I am tracking my mood: [one sentence in the client's words, for example "I want to see what my good days have in common"].
3. What my mood scale means to me (write a short description next to each anchor so a 4 means the same thing in March as it did in January):
   • 1 = [for example "struggled to get through the day, wanted to be left alone"]
   • 3 = [for example "flat, getting things done but no enjoyment"]
   • 5 = [for example "steady, ordinary day, nothing pulling me down"]
   • 7 = [for example "good energy, looked forward to things"]
   • 10 = [for example "unusually high, buzzing"; we talk about what very high feels like too]
4. The three things I most want to watch alongside mood: [choose from sleep, movement, social time, stress, caffeine, alcohol, screen time late at night, time outdoors, meals, work hours, menstrual cycle, pain].
5. When I will fill it in: [time of day, for example "after dinner, before I pick up my phone in bed"]. Reminder: [app reminder, alarm, sticky note on the kettle].
6. What I will do if I miss a day: [for example "leave it blank and write one line the next morning; no back-filling a whole week from memory"].
7. Who sees this: [only me and my coach]. Where it is stored: [app, shared document, paper kept at home].

Part 2. Daily log (about two minutes)

1. Date: [date]. Time I filled this in: [time].
2. Overall mood today (1 to 10): [number]. Use your own anchors from the setup page.
3. Mood in one or two words: [for example calm, irritable, low, hopeful, wired, numb, content].
4. Did it shift during the day? [steady / better as the day went on / worse as the day went on / up and down]. Lowest point and when: [time and what was happening].
5. Sleep last night: [hours] hours. Quality (1 to 5): [number]. Woke in the night: [yes / no].
6. Movement: [minutes] minutes of [walk, run, yoga, gym, cycling, housework, none].
7. Time outdoors in daylight: [none / under 15 minutes / 15 to 60 minutes / over an hour].
8. Social time: [none / messages only / short chat / a meal or longer time with someone]. With whom: [optional].
9. Stress (0 to 10): [number]. Main source: [work, money, family, health, relationships, nothing in particular].
10. Energy (1 to 5): [number].
11. Anything else that may have mattered: [alcohol, caffeine after 2 pm, skipped meals, period, pain, a big conversation, medication change your clinician made].
12. One thing that helped today: [even something small, like "ten minutes in the garden"].
13. Note (optional): [anything you want your coach to know before the next session].

Part 3. Monthly grid

One row per day of the month, one column per tracked item. Shade or colour the mood cell so a month can be read at a glance. Suggested colour key: 1 to 2 [dark blue], 3 to 4 [light blue], 5 to 6 [grey], 7 to 8 [yellow], 9 to 10 [orange].

Part 4. Weekly review (with your coach, 10 to 15 minutes)

1. Looking at this week's grid, what is the first thing you notice?
2. Which day had your highest mood? What was different about it: sleep, people, movement, place, work?
3. Which day had your lowest mood? What came before it, the day before as well as on the day?
4. Compare your three best nights of sleep with your three worst. Did mood follow, the same day or the next?
5. On days with some social time, was your average mood different from days with none?
6. What did you write under "one thing that helped" more than once?
7. Was anything surprising, or did the week go the way you expected?
8. What is one small experiment for next week? [for example "a 15-minute walk before work on Tuesday and Thursday"]. How will we know if it made a difference?
9. Is the tracker itself working? [too long / just right / want to add or drop an item].
10. Coach check (asked every week): Has anything in your mood or thoughts worried you, or felt different from your usual ups and downs? [client's answer]

Part 5. Safety box (keep on every page)

• This tracker is for noticing patterns in coaching. It does not diagnose anything, and your coach is not a doctor or therapist.
• If you have thoughts of harming yourself, or feel you cannot keep yourself safe, call or text 988 in the United States (the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline) or 9-8-8 in Canada (the 9-8-8 Suicide Crisis Helpline), call your local emergency number, or go to the nearest emergency department. Elsewhere: [local crisis line and emergency number].
• Talk to your doctor if a low mood lasts most days for two weeks or more, if you lose interest in things you usually enjoy, if sleep or appetite change a lot, or if you have stretches of very high mood with little need for sleep.
• My doctor or therapist, if I have one: [name and phone]. My coach's contact between sessions: [method and response time]. My coach is not available for emergencies.

Why does each section of the mood tracker matter?

Each section either makes ratings comparable over time, links mood to something the client can change, or keeps the client safe. The table shows what each part is for and what to watch for as a coach.

Two design choices are worth explaining. First, the template uses a 1 to 10 scale because most clients find it easy and it shows small changes. If a client finds ten points too fine, use 1 to 5 with the same anchor approach. Second, the daily log stays at around two minutes on purpose. A tracker that takes ten minutes gets filled in for a week and abandoned. If you want a lighter companion for behaviours, the habit tracker template pairs well with this one.

What must mental health and wellness coaches add?

Add a written scope statement, a referral plan with named triggers, a short note on how the data is handled, and the crisis numbers for every country your clients live in. A mood tracker collects sensitive information, and the client is trusting you with it.

Scope of practice

Coaching is not therapy and not medical care. Coaches do not diagnose, assess for mental illness or treat it, and a mood tracker does not change that. Put a line like this at the top of the setup page and in your coaching agreement: "Coaching supports goals and habits. It is not a substitute for medical or mental health care, and your coach will suggest you see a licensed professional if something you share falls outside coaching." Avoid words such as "symptoms", "depressive episode", "treatment plan" or "clinical" in anything you send the client. If your training covers this boundary in depth, our guide to mental health coach certification explains what programmes teach about scope.

A referral plan, written before you need it

Agree in the first session what happens if the tracker shows something outside coaching. Name the triggers in plain words, the same ones as in the safety box, and add your own:

• Any mention of self-harm or suicide, in a note, a word or a conversation. Share 988 (US) or 9-8-8 (Canada) or the local equivalent that day, and encourage contact with a doctor or crisis service. The US National Institute of Mental Health's frequently asked questions about suicide lists warning signs in plain language, and SAMHSA explains how the 988 Lifeline works. Canada's federal government lists 9-8-8 on canada.ca, and the Lifeline's own site is 988lifeline.org.
• Mood at 1 to 3 on most days for two weeks or more, or a clear loss of interest in things the client used to enjoy. NIMH's booklet My Mental Health: Do I Need Help? is a good, non-alarming handout for this moment.
• Several days in a row at 9 or 10 with very little sleep, racing thoughts or unusual spending. NIMH's page on bipolar disorder describes why sharp swings in mood and energy should be checked by a doctor. You do not name a condition; you say the pattern is worth showing a doctor.
• Drinking more to cope, eating very little, or sleep falling apart for more than a week.

Keep a short list of local therapists, GPs and crisis lines you can share, and write down what you said and when. Our article on mental health red flags in coaching goes further into how to raise a referral without the client feeling dismissed.

Sensitive data

Mood entries are health-related information. In the EU and UK they count as special category data under the GDPR, which needs a lawful basis and explicit consent; in the US, state privacy laws and your own promises apply. Tell the client in writing who sees the tracker, where it is stored, how long you keep it and how they can ask for a copy or deletion. Coachful is not HIPAA-certified and does not sign a BAA, so if you also work as a licensed clinician, clinical records belong in a clinical system, not in a coaching platform. Our piece on when a health coach needs a second app covers that split.

Local law and professional rules

Title and scope rules for counselling and therapy differ between US states, Canadian provinces and other countries. If you hold a clinical licence as well, your licensing board's rules on record-keeping apply when you coach too. Check with a local lawyer or your professional body if you are unsure which hat you are wearing.

What does a filled-in mood tracker look like?

Here is one week for a fictional client. This is an example with invented details, not a real client. Priya, 34, is a project manager working with a wellness coach on energy and work-life balance. She has no diagnosis and no current treatment, and she chose sleep, movement and social time as her three things to watch.

Her anchors: 2 = "dragging myself through, cancel plans"; 5 = "ordinary, fine"; 8 = "light, chatty, want to do things".

Weekly review notes (example):

• First thing she noticed: "My two worst days were my two shortest nights."
• Highest day: Saturday, the only day with a long stretch outdoors and time with friends.
• Lowest days: Monday and Tuesday, after late work on Sunday and Monday evenings.
• Repeated helper: anything that got her away from the desk (lunch out, leaving on time, yoga).
• Experiment for next week: laptop closed by 9 pm on Sunday and Monday, and a 15-minute walk at lunch on Monday, Tuesday and Thursday. We will compare sleep hours and Monday to Tuesday mood with this week.
• Tracker check: keep as is; add "screen time after 10 pm (yes or no)".
• Coach check: "Nothing unusual, just a heavy work stretch." No referral triggers this week. Coach noted the Sunday "dread" and money stress to come back to if they repeat.

Notice what the coach does not do. There is no label for the low days, no comment on Priya's mental health, and the experiment is a behaviour she chose. If Monday and Tuesday had stayed at 2 for two weeks with the note "can't see the point", the coach would have moved to the referral plan instead of another experiment.

How should you send and store the mood tracker?

Pick the method your client will actually open every day and where you can see entries before the weekly review. A paper or PDF sheet is the simplest; an app with reminders gets the most consistent entries; and wherever it lives, the data should sit with the client's record rather than in your inbox.

Two of those tools deserve a short note. Quenza is a client-engagement tool used by coaches and therapists for activities, worksheets and programs; it marks payments and invoicing as planned rather than available, and its Spark plan caps at 10 clients, as listed in October 2026. Practice Better is practice management for wellness and nutrition practitioners, with scheduling, telehealth, charting and a client portal; portal branding and SMS start on its Plus plan at $99/mo, as listed in October 2026.

If you are comparing trackers more broadly, our guide to client progress tracker templates shows three other formats, and progress tracker UI examples show how platforms display this kind of data to clients.

How do you run the mood tracker in Coachful?

In Coachful the tracker becomes part of the client journey: intake questions at booking, an agreement signed before the first call, a daily check-in, a habit or two, a weekly reflection, and invoices, all under one login for you and one branded app for the client.

Coachful is a coaching platform: one subscription covers booking, payments, contracts, program delivery with habits and check-ins, courses, a community, a website with funnels and email, and an AI assistant. It is built for coaches who deliver programs rather than single sessions, and for coaches replacing several tools. It is not a clinical system: it is not HIPAA-certified, does not handle insurance billing, and does not sync with Garmin, Fitbit, Whoop or Oura. To start, take a free trial, or ask the team to set things up for you with the free white-glove build described below.

Step 1. Ask the screening questions at booking

Add intake questions to your booking page so you know before the first call whether coaching is a good fit. For a mood-focused programme, ask what the client hopes to change, whether they are currently working with a therapist or doctor, and whether they agree that coaching is not a replacement for that care. Answers land on the Intakes page and the client record. Our health coaching intake form template has wording you can adapt.

Step 2. Get the agreement signed before the first call

Send your coaching agreement with e-signature before the first session, with the scope statement and the referral plan written in. It is stored on the client record under Agreements. Coachful's coaching contracts page explains the flow.

Step 3. Turn the daily log into an evening check-in

Programs in Coachful support morning and evening check-ins. Use the evening check-in for the daily log: mood rating, mood words, sleep, movement, social time, stress and one thing that helped. Keep it to the same questions every day so the answers compare. This short video shows how check-ins are set up:

Step 4. Add one or two habits from the weekly experiment

When the weekly review produces an experiment, such as "15-minute walk at lunch", add it as a habit so the client ticks it off in the app and sees a streak. That keeps the experiment visible between sessions without adding to the daily log.

Step 5. Use goals and weekly reflections for the review

Set a goal in the client's words ("more steady weekdays") and link the habits to it. The goal page has daily and weekly reflection tabs, which is where the weekly review prompts go.

Step 6. Read the patterns before each session

Check-ins, habits and notes sit on the client record, and each client shows a status of thriving, active, quiet or at risk. A client going quiet is often the first sign to reach out. Michelle, the built-in AI assistant, can brief you before a session from the client's live data, which saves scrolling through a week of entries. Treat the status as a prompt to look, never as an assessment of the client's mental health.

What the client sees

The client opens your branded app inside Coachful and sees their program, sessions, progress and documents on one page, with the check-in waiting for them in the evening. They do not need a separate tracker app, a shared spreadsheet or your email address to send photos of paper sheets.

Invoices and payments

Payments run through your own Stripe or Razorpay account, with an invoice per transaction and manual invoices if you need them. Coachful charges a 0% platform fee; only processing fees apply.

Why Coachful stands out: a free white-glove service. From Create, choose "We'll build it for you · FREE" and describe what you want: for example a 12-week wellness program with an evening mood check-in, a weekly reflection and a welcome form. You can attach up to 8 reference links and up to 10 files, such as this template. The Coachful team builds it inside your own account, usually within about 24 hours. Nothing is invented for you: no fake credentials, testimonials or prices, and gaps are left for you to fill. It does not include recording videos, logo design or ad management. Read more about the free white-glove service.

If you coach in this space, the Coachful page for health coaches and the page for mindset coaches show how other parts of the platform fit, and the free progress tracker tool lets you sketch your tracker before you build it.

What mistakes do coaches make with mood trackers?

The most common mistakes are tracking too much, reading the data like a clinician, and having no plan for what happens when the numbers go down and stay down.

• Too many items. Fifteen daily questions get abandoned in a week. Start with mood plus three things and add one only when the client asks.
• No anchors. Without written meanings for the scale, a 6 in week one and a 6 in week eight are not comparable.
• Interpreting instead of asking. "Your mood dips every Sunday, that sounds like anxiety" is a diagnosis. "What happens on Sundays?" is coaching.
• Reviewing alone. The client should look at the grid first and say what they see. Their reading is the point.
• Treating a missed day as failure. Blank cells are information too. Ask what got in the way, not why they did not do it.
• Back-filling. A week filled in from memory on Sunday night tells you about Sunday night.
• No referral plan. Deciding what to do about a worrying entry at 10 pm on a Friday is too late. Write the triggers and steps in the first session.
• Commenting on medication. Even a casual "maybe you don't need it" is outside your scope. Any change is between the client and their prescriber.
• Keeping the data forever in your inbox. Agree where it lives and how long you keep it, and delete it when the engagement ends if that is what you promised.
• Making the tracker the goal. Ten weeks of perfect entries with no experiments is busywork. Every review should end in one small change to try.

For setting the goals that experiments feed into, see our SMART goals template and the wellness wheel template, which helps a client choose which three things to track in the first place.

Is this mood tracker template legal, medical or financial advice?

No. This template and article are general information for coaches, not legal, medical or financial advice. A mood tracker is a coaching tool for noticing patterns; it cannot tell anyone whether they have a mental health condition, and it is not a substitute for care from a doctor, psychologist or other licensed professional.

Ask a clinician to review your referral triggers and safety wording if you coach clients with a history of mental illness, if you work with young people, or if you offer this tracker as part of a group programme where you cannot follow every entry closely. Ask a lawyer to review your agreement, consent and data-handling wording if you coach across borders, store health-related data in the EU or UK, or also hold a clinical licence. Laws and professional rules vary by state, province and country.

Frequently asked questions

Is this mood tracker template free to use?

Yes. Copy it into any document, form or app and adapt the wording for your clients. The scale anchors, prompts and safety box are meant to be edited, but keep the crisis numbers and the scope line in every version you send.

How often should a client fill in a mood tracker?

Once a day at a fixed time works for most clients, with a weekly review together. Some clients prefer a morning and an evening rating when mood shifts a lot through the day. Fewer than four entries a week usually makes patterns hard to see.

Should I use a 1 to 5 or 1 to 10 mood scale?

Either works if the client writes anchors for what the numbers mean. A 1 to 10 scale shows small changes; a 1 to 5 scale is quicker and suits clients who find ten points fussy. Do not switch scales mid-month, or the grid stops making sense.

Can a coach use a mood tracker with clients who see a therapist?

Yes, with the client's agreement and clear roles. Coaching can focus on habits and goals while therapy handles clinical work. Ask the client whether they want to share the tracker with their therapist; never contact the therapist without written consent.

When should a coach refer a client based on mood tracking?

Refer when entries suggest risk or a pattern outside coaching: any mention of self-harm or suicide (share 988 in the US or 9-8-8 in Canada that day), low mood most days for two weeks or more, sharp swings to very high mood with little sleep, or coping by drinking more or eating very little. Write these triggers into your agreement before you start.

What should a mood tracker include besides mood?

Three changeable factors chosen by the client, most often sleep, movement and social time, plus stress and a short note. Add others, such as caffeine, alcohol, daylight or menstrual cycle, only if the client thinks they matter.

Is Coachful suitable for storing mood data?

Coachful stores check-ins on the client record, offers a full data export and is GDPR-ready, which suits coaching. It is not HIPAA-certified and does not sign a BAA, so licensed clinicians should keep clinical records in a clinical system.

What is Coachful's free white-glove service?

It is a build service included on every plan. You describe what you want, for example a wellness program with an evening mood check-in and a weekly reflection, attach references, and the Coachful team builds it inside your account, usually within about 24 hours. It does not include video recording, logo design or ad management.

Can I print this mood tracker?

Yes. The monthly grid prints well on one landscape page, and the daily log fits on a half page. Paper suits clients who want less screen time, but ask them to photograph the grid before each weekly review so you can look at it together.

How long should a client track their mood?

Three to four weeks is usually enough to see a first pattern. After that, keep tracking while you are testing experiments, then drop to a lighter version or stop when the client feels they understand their patterns.