Check Child Growth (0–5 Years)
Gender
Child's age
How was height measured?
MUAC & oedema (optional)
Enter gender, age, weight and height,
then tap Check Nutrition Status.
Poshan Calculator – Free Online Child Growth & Malnutrition Checker
The Poshan Calculator on this page checks the nutrition status of a child from birth to 5 years using the official WHO Child Growth Standards – the same standards used by the Poshan Tracker app, Anganwadi centres, ICDS and the National Family Health Survey in India. Enter the child's gender, age, weight and height, and the tool instantly calculates the Z-scores for weight-for-age, height-for-age, weight-for-height and BMI-for-age. It then tells you whether the child is growing normally or shows signs of underweight, stunting, wasting, SAM or MAM.
This online Poshan calculator is built for Anganwadi workers (AWW), Anganwadi helpers, ASHA and ANM workers, supervisors, CDPOs, nutrition students and parents who want a quick, reliable growth check on a mobile phone. It works in any browser, needs no app download or login, and all calculations happen privately on your device – no child data is sent to any server.
How to Use the Poshan Calculator (Step by Step)
- Select the gender – boys and girls have separate WHO growth curves, so this matters.
- Enter the age – either the date of birth and the date of measurement (most accurate), or the age in completed months if the exact date of birth is not known.
- Enter weight in kg – use a calibrated baby weighing scale or Salter scale and record to the nearest 0.1 kg.
- Enter height or length in cm – to the nearest 0.1 cm using an infantometer (lying down) or stadiometer (standing).
- Choose how height was measured – "As per age" assumes length lying down under 2 years and standing height from 2 years. If you measured differently, pick the right option and the tool applies the WHO 0.7 cm correction.
- Optional: add MUAC and oedema – for children aged 6–59 months, the MUAC tape reading and bilateral pitting oedema are used to confirm SAM or MAM.
- Tap "Check Nutrition Status" – you get the overall status, all four Z-scores with colour-coded categories, the healthy weight range for the child's height, and a report you can copy into a register or WhatsApp.
What Is a Poshan Calculator?
"Poshan" means nutrition. A Poshan calculator is a child growth calculator that compares a child's measurements with international reference values to find out whether the child is well nourished. In India the term became popular with POSHAN Abhiyaan (the Prime Minister's Overarching Scheme for Holistic Nourishment, launched in 2018) and the Poshan Tracker app, in which Anganwadi workers record the monthly growth measurements of every child under six. The app calculates the growth status automatically, and a Poshan calculator lets you do the same check outside the app – for practice, cross-checking, home monitoring or training.
Instead of just saying "the child weighs 9 kg", the calculator answers the more useful question: is 9 kg normal for a girl of this age and this height? It does that by converting each measurement into a Z-score.
WHO Child Growth Standards Explained
The WHO Child Growth Standards were published in 2006 after the WHO Multicentre Growth Reference Study, which followed around 8,500 healthy, breastfed children from Brazil, Ghana, India, Norway, Oman and the USA. Because these children grew in good conditions, the standards describe how children should grow, not just how an average population grows. India adopted the WHO standards for ICDS growth monitoring in 2008, and they are used in the Mother and Child Protection Card, the Poshan Tracker and NFHS surveys.
The standards are published as LMS tables: for every age (in days) or every length/height (in 0.1 cm steps) and for each sex, WHO gives three numbers – L (skewness), M (median) and S (coefficient of variation). This calculator uses those official tables from the WHO Anthro software, so the Z-scores you see here match the WHO Anthro and Poshan Tracker results.
What Is a Z-Score (SD Score)?
A Z-score tells you how far a child's measurement is from the median (the middle value) of healthy children of the same age and sex, measured in standard deviations (SD). A Z-score of 0 means the child is exactly at the median. A Z-score of −1 means one SD below the median, and so on. About 95% of healthy children fall between −2 and +2 SD, which is why −2 SD is the main cut-off used to identify a nutrition problem.
For weight-based indicators WHO uses the LMS formula Z = ((X ÷ M)L − 1) ÷ (L × S), with a small adjustment beyond ±3 SD so that extreme values are not exaggerated. The calculator applies exactly this method.
| Z-score | Meaning | Colour on growth chart |
|---|---|---|
| Above +2 SD | Above normal – check for overweight | Above the green band |
| −2 SD to +2 SD | Normal range | Green |
| −3 SD to below −2 SD | Moderate malnutrition | Yellow |
| Below −3 SD | Severe malnutrition | Red |
The Four Growth Indicators and Their Cut-offs
1. Weight-for-Age (WAZ) – underweight. Compares weight with age. It is the indicator plotted on the growth chart in the Mother and Child Protection Card and is easy to measure, but a low value can mean either a short child or a thin child, so it should be read together with the other two indicators.
2. Height-for-Age (HAZ) – stunting. Compares length or height with age. A low HAZ (stunting) reflects long-term, chronic undernutrition, repeated infections or poor feeding over months or years. Stunting in the first 1,000 days is linked to lower school performance and adult earnings.
3. Weight-for-Height (WHZ) – wasting. Compares weight with the child's own length or height, regardless of age. A low WHZ (wasting) shows recent, acute weight loss and is the main indicator used to identify SAM and MAM. Weight-for-length is used below 2 years (45–110 cm) and weight-for-height from 2 to 5 years (65–120 cm).
4. BMI-for-Age (BAZ). Body mass index adjusted for age. For under-5 children it gives almost the same picture as weight-for-height and is useful for spotting overweight and obesity.
| Indicator | Below −3 SD | −3 to −2 SD | −2 to +2 SD | Above +2 SD |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Weight-for-age | Severely underweight | Moderately underweight | Normal | Check weight-for-height |
| Height-for-age | Severely stunted | Moderately stunted | Normal | Normal (very tall above +3) |
| Weight-for-height | Severe wasting (SAM) | Moderate wasting (MAM) | Normal (+1 to +2 = risk of overweight) | Overweight (above +3 = obese) |
| BMI-for-age | Severely wasted | Wasted | Normal | Overweight / obese |
SAM and MAM: How Severe and Moderate Acute Malnutrition Are Identified
Acute malnutrition is identified with three simple checks, used together in community programmes (CMAM), Nutrition Rehabilitation Centres (NRC) and the Poshan Tracker:
| Status | Weight-for-height | MUAC (6–59 months) | Oedema |
|---|---|---|---|
| SAM – Severe Acute Malnutrition | Below −3 SD | Below 11.5 cm | Bilateral pitting oedema = SAM |
| MAM – Moderate Acute Malnutrition | −3 SD to below −2 SD | 11.5 cm to 12.4 cm | No oedema |
| Normal | −2 SD or above | 12.5 cm or more | No oedema |
If any one of the SAM criteria is met, the child is classified as SAM. A SAM child with medical complications, poor appetite or oedema should be referred to the nearest NRC or hospital immediately. A SAM child without complications can often be managed in the community under the guidance of the health system. MAM children need extra food, counselling on feeding practices and close follow-up so they do not slide into SAM.
Stunting vs Wasting vs Underweight
These three words are often mixed up, but they describe different problems:
- Stunting – the child is too short for their age (low height-for-age). It develops slowly and shows chronic undernutrition.
- Wasting – the child is too thin for their height (low weight-for-height). It can develop within weeks, for example after diarrhoea, and is the most dangerous form in the short term.
- Underweight – the child weighs too little for their age (low weight-for-age). It is a mix of stunting and wasting.
A child can be stunted but not wasted, or have normal weight-for-age but still be stunted. That is why this calculator reports all indicators instead of weight alone. According to NFHS-5 (2019–21), 35.5% of Indian children under five are stunted, 19.3% are wasted and 32.1% are underweight – regular growth monitoring is the first step to change these numbers.
How to Measure Weight, Height and MUAC Correctly
A Z-score is only as good as the measurement behind it. An error of 1 kg or 2 cm can change the result from "normal" to "moderate". Follow these tips used in Anganwadi training:
- Weight: use a calibrated digital scale or Salter scale. Remove heavy clothes, shoes and diapers. Set the scale to zero before each child and read to 0.1 kg.
- Length (under 2 years): measure lying down on an infantometer. One person holds the head against the headboard, the other keeps the knees straight and the feet flat against the footboard.
- Height (2 years and above): measure standing on a stadiometer, without shoes, with heels, buttocks, shoulders and head touching the board and the child looking straight ahead.
- MUAC: find the midpoint between the shoulder and elbow on the left arm, wrap the MUAC tape snugly (not tight) and read in cm. The red, yellow and green colours on the tape match SAM, MAM and normal.
- Oedema: press both feet with your thumbs for three seconds. If a dent remains on both feet, bilateral pitting oedema is present.
- Age: always use the date of birth from the birth certificate or MCP card. Guessing the age leads to wrong weight-for-age and height-for-age results.
Why the 0.7 cm Length/Height Correction Matters
Children measured lying down are about 0.7 cm longer than when measured standing. WHO growth tables use length (lying) until the second birthday and height (standing) after it. If a child under 2 was measured standing, this calculator adds 0.7 cm; if a child aged 2 or more was measured lying down, it subtracts 0.7 cm. This small step keeps your result consistent with the Poshan Tracker and WHO Anthro.
Worked Example
A girl aged 3 years (36 months) weighs 9.0 kg and is 88.0 cm tall, measured standing. Her MUAC is 11.3 cm. The calculator gives: weight-for-age −3.5 SD (severely underweight), height-for-age −1.9 SD (normal, but close to stunting), weight-for-height −3.5 SD (severe wasting) and MUAC in the red zone. Overall status: SAM. The healthy weight range for her height is roughly 10.2 to 14.6 kg, so she needs urgent referral and nutrition support.
By comparison, a boy aged 12 months who weighs 9.6 kg with a length of 75.7 cm has Z-scores close to 0 for all indicators – he is right at the WHO median and growing normally.
Poshan Calculator vs Poshan Tracker App
The Poshan Tracker is the official Government of India application used by Anganwadi workers to record attendance, take-home ration (THR), hot cooked meals and monthly growth measurements, and to send data to supervisors and the Ministry of Women and Child Development. A Poshan calculator like this one does only the growth calculation. It is useful for:
- Cross-checking a result before entering it in the Poshan Tracker.
- Training new Anganwadi workers and nursing or nutrition students.
- Parents who want to understand the growth status written on the MCP card.
- Doctors, dieticians and NGOs working in community nutrition programmes.
- Growth checks when the official app is not available or has no network.
For official records, always enter the measurements in the Poshan Tracker app as instructed by your supervisor.
What to Do After the Result
Normal: continue monthly growth monitoring, exclusive breastfeeding for the first 6 months, then timely complementary food with continued breastfeeding till 2 years, full immunisation and deworming as per schedule.
Moderate (MAM, moderately underweight or stunted): counsel the family on feeding frequency, energy-dense foods (add oil or ghee, pulses, eggs, milk), hygiene and handwashing; make sure the child receives take-home ration or hot cooked meals from the Anganwadi; re-measure every 2 weeks.
Severe (SAM or severely underweight): refer the child to the health system – ANM, PHC or the nearest Nutrition Rehabilitation Centre (NRC) – for a medical check and treatment. Do not wait for the next monthly weighing.
Overweight: review the family's diet, reduce sugary drinks and packaged snacks, and encourage active play.
Poshan Calculator Height and Weight Chart (WHO Median and −2 SD)
The table below shows the WHO median weight and height for boys and girls at common ages, with the −2 SD value in brackets. A child below the bracketed value is moderately underweight or stunted for that age. Lengths up to 18 months are measured lying down; from 24 months the values are standing height. Use it as a quick reference – the calculator above gives the exact Z-score for any age in days.
| Age | Boys – weight | Boys – height | Girls – weight | Girls – height |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 0 months | 3.3 kg (2.5) | 49.9 cm (46.1) | 3.2 kg (2.4) | 49.1 cm (45.4) |
| 3 months | 6.4 kg (5.0) | 61.4 cm (57.3) | 5.8 kg (4.5) | 59.8 cm (55.6) |
| 6 months | 7.9 kg (6.4) | 67.6 cm (63.4) | 7.3 kg (5.7) | 65.8 cm (61.2) |
| 9 months | 8.9 kg (7.1) | 72.0 cm (67.5) | 8.2 kg (6.5) | 70.1 cm (65.3) |
| 12 months | 9.6 kg (7.7) | 75.7 cm (71.0) | 8.9 kg (7.0) | 74.0 cm (68.9) |
| 18 months | 10.9 kg (8.8) | 82.3 cm (76.9) | 10.2 kg (8.1) | 80.7 cm (74.9) |
| 24 months | 12.2 kg (9.7) | 87.1 cm (81.0) | 11.5 kg (9.0) | 85.7 cm (79.3) |
| 36 months | 14.3 kg (11.3) | 96.1 cm (88.7) | 13.9 kg (10.8) | 95.1 cm (87.4) |
| 48 months | 16.3 kg (12.7) | 103.3 cm (94.9) | 16.1 kg (12.3) | 102.7 cm (94.1) |
| 60 months | 18.3 kg (14.1) | 110.0 cm (100.7) | 18.2 kg (13.7) | 109.4 cm (99.9) |
Remember that weight-for-age alone does not tell you whether a child is thin or short. A child at the −2 SD weight for age may be perfectly proportionate but short (stunted), or of normal height but thin (wasted). Always enter the height too.
Growth Monitoring Schedule at the Anganwadi
Under the ICDS and POSHAN Abhiyaan guidelines, every child should be weighed and measured regularly so that growth faltering is caught early:
- Birth to 3 years: weighed every month and plotted on the growth chart of the MCP card.
- 3 to 6 years: weighed at least once a quarter under the traditional ICDS norms.
- Poshan Tracker: under POSHAN Abhiyaan, the height and weight of every child under six are measured and entered in the app every month, using infantometers, stadiometers and digital weighing scales supplied to Anganwadi centres.
- SAM and MAM children: measured more often – usually every 1–2 weeks – until they recover.
- After illness: weigh the child again after diarrhoea, measles or pneumonia, because these often cause sudden weight loss.
A single measurement is a snapshot. The real warning sign is a flat or falling growth curve over two or three months, even if the child is still in the green zone. Keep the MCP card updated and compare each month's result with the previous one.
Feeding Tips for Healthy Growth by Age
- 0–6 months: start breastfeeding within one hour of birth and give only breast milk – no water, honey or other feeds – for the first six months.
- 6–8 months: continue breastfeeding and start soft, mashed complementary foods 2–3 times a day, such as dal-rice khichdi, mashed banana or suji kheer.
- 9–11 months: give 3–4 meals a day plus 1–2 snacks, with finely chopped family food, eggs, curd and seasonal fruits.
- 12–24 months: family food 3–4 times a day plus 2 snacks, one katori (about 250 ml) per meal, and continue breastfeeding.
- 2–5 years: three main meals and two healthy snacks. Add a spoon of oil or ghee to meals, include pulses, milk, eggs or other protein daily, and use iodised salt.
Hot cooked meals and take-home ration (THR) from the Anganwadi, iron and folic acid syrup, vitamin A, deworming tablets and full immunisation all support healthy growth.
Limitations of This Calculator
The tool follows WHO methods closely, but it is a screening aid. It does not examine the child, check for illness, anaemia or micronutrient deficiencies, or look at the growth trend over several months – a single reading can be misleading. It covers children from birth to 5 years (60 months); for children aged 5 to 19 years WHO uses separate growth references. Always combine the result with clinical judgement.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is a Poshan calculator?
A Poshan calculator is a child growth calculator that uses WHO Child Growth Standards to work out Z-scores for weight-for-age, height-for-age and weight-for-height, and classifies the child as normal, underweight, stunted, wasted, MAM or SAM.
Is this the same as the Poshan Tracker app?
No. The Poshan Tracker is the official Government of India app for Anganwadi services. This free online calculator only performs the growth assessment, using the same WHO standards, so you can check results quickly in a browser.
Which age group can I check?
Children from birth to 5 years (0–60 months). MUAC cut-offs apply only to children aged 6–59 months.
What does −2 SD mean in a growth chart?
−2 SD means the child's measurement is two standard deviations below the median of healthy children of the same age and sex. Below −2 SD is moderate malnutrition and below −3 SD is severe malnutrition.
How is SAM identified?
A child aged 6–59 months has SAM if weight-for-height is below −3 SD, or MUAC is below 11.5 cm, or there is bilateral pitting oedema. Any one of these is enough.
What is the MUAC cut-off for MAM?
MUAC from 11.5 cm up to 12.4 cm indicates Moderate Acute Malnutrition. 12.5 cm or more is normal.
Can I use this calculator without the date of birth?
Yes. Choose "Age in months" and enter the completed months. Using the exact date of birth gives a more precise result because WHO tables are based on age in days.
Why do I need both weight and height?
Weight alone gives only weight-for-age. With height you also get stunting (height-for-age), wasting (weight-for-height) and BMI-for-age, which are needed to identify SAM and MAM.
Is my child's data saved?
No. All calculations happen inside your browser. Nothing you type is stored or sent to our server.
Can this replace a doctor's advice?
No. The Poshan calculator is a screening tool. If the result shows moderate or severe malnutrition, please consult the Anganwadi worker, ANM, ASHA or a doctor.
Sources: WHO Child Growth Standards (2006) and WHO Anthro LMS tables; WHO/UNICEF joint statement on child growth standards and identification of SAM (2009); Ministry of Women and Child Development – POSHAN Abhiyaan and Poshan Tracker; National Family Health Survey (NFHS-5), 2019–21.