A Benjamin Franklin habit tracker is a weekly virtue chart: thirteen rows (or fewer, if you modernize), seven day columns, and a black mark each evening for any fault against a focus virtue. Franklin used the grid to practice one virtue at a time across a thirteen-week course – not as a diary of feelings, and not as a biography exercise.
This page is the free DIY template for that chart. If you want the wider story of Franklin’s three journaling habits – including his daily schedule questions and his pro/con decision letter – that lives on the sibling guide to Benjamin Franklin’s journaling method. Here the job is narrower: steal the tracker, copy a printable grid, and run an honest weekly review.
Key Takeaway
Build a Benjamin Franklin habit tracker as a small grid, not a personality overhaul. Focus on one virtue each week. Mark faults in the evening without speeches. On Sunday, count marks, keep or swap the focus, and start the next week cleaner than pride requires.
Franklin sits among the famous people who kept journals for a reason: he turned character work into something you could see on a page. If you are still choosing a format, how to choose a journal style helps you decide whether a tracker, a diary, or a goal loop fits the job. Beginners who want a map of the site can start at start here and come back when they want a virtue chart.
How the Benjamin Franklin Habit Tracker Worked
Franklin described the system in his Autobiography, in the chapter on his plan for “moral perfection.” The mechanics are almost boring – which is why they still travel well.
He made a little book and gave each virtue a page. He ruled seven columns for the days of the week and thirteen lines for the virtues. Each evening he examined the day and marked “a little black spot” wherever he had failed a virtue. The goal for the focus virtue that week was a clean line – fewer spots, then none.
He did not try to master all thirteen at once. One week of strict attention to Temperance, then Silence, then Order, and so on, made a thirteen-week course. Four courses filled a year. Later he admitted that Order stayed hard, that he sometimes scraped pages until they were full of holes, and that he eventually slowed the cycle when travel and business interfered. The frankness is part of the method: the chart recorded faults, not slogans.
In plain terms, the Franklin method is:
- Name a short list of behaviors (his were thirteen virtues with one-line precepts).
- Give one behavior the week’s spotlight.
- Mark misses daily in a grid.
- Review the page at week’s end before you rotate focus.
That is the Benjamin Franklin habit tracker. Everything else on this page is adaptation for a modern notebook.
The 13 Virtues List for a Franklin Method Chart
Franklin’s list, with his own short precepts, appears in the Autobiography (a readable transcription is also on ushistory.org’s Franklin Autobiography pages). Use the original wording if you want historical fidelity. Use the plain-language gloss if you want a 13 virtues journal you will actually mark tonight.
| # | Virtue | Franklin’s precept (short) | Plain-language focus |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Temperance | Eat not to dullness; drink not to elevation. | Stop one notch before overfull. |
| 2 | Silence | Speak not but what may benefit others or yourself. | Skip trifling talk; listen more. |
| 3 | Order | Let all your things have their places; let each part of your business have its time. | Put things away; give work a slot. |
| 4 | Resolution | Resolve to perform what you ought; perform without fail what you resolve. | Finish what you said you would. |
| 5 | Frugality | Make no expense but to do good to others or yourself; waste nothing. | Spend on purpose; cut waste. |
| 6 | Industry | Lose no time; be always employ’d in something useful. | Cut idle loops; do useful work. |
| 7 | Sincerity | Use no hurtful deceit; think innocently and justly. | No clever lies; mean what you say. |
| 8 | Justice | Wrong none by doing injuries, or omitting the benefits that are your duty. | Do no harm; keep owed duties. |
| 9 | Moderation | Avoid extremes; forbear resenting injuries so much as you think they deserve. | Soften extremes and grudges. |
| 10 | Cleanliness | Tolerate no uncleanliness in body, clothes, or habitation. | Body, clothes, and space stay clean enough. |
| 11 | Tranquillity | Be not disturbed at trifles, or at accidents common or unavoidable. | Do not let small accidents run the day. |
| 12 | Chastity | Rarely use venery but for health or offspring… | Keep intimacy from harming peace or reputation. |
| 13 | Humility | Imitate Jesus and Socrates. | Stay teachable; drop the need to win. |
You do not need Franklin’s theology, politics, or household privileges to use the grid. You need behaviors you can spot in a single day. If a precept feels alien, rewrite the focus line in your own words before week one – clarity mattered to Franklin as much as the virtue name. Digitized Franklin materials are also gathered through the Franklin Papers project if you want to browse further primary text later.
Copy-paste starter for a full thirteen-row chart:
Week of: __________ Focus virtue this week: __________
Virtue (abbrev) | Sun | Mon | Tue | Wed | Thu | Fri | Sat | Notes
T Temperance | | | | | | | |
S Silence | | | | | | | |
O Order | | | | | | | |
R Resolution | | | | | | | |
F Frugality | | | | | | | |
I Industry | | | | | | | |
S Sincerity | | | | | | | |
J Justice | | | | | | | |
M Moderation | | | | | | | |
C Cleanliness | | | | | | | |
T Tranquillity | | | | | | | |
C Chastity | | | | | | | |
H Humility | | | | | | | |
Mark: a dot or * = one fault against that virtue that day.
Focus rule: protect the focus row hardest; still mark the others lightly.
A printable PDF can wait. Until then, rule a notebook page with a pen and the table above. That is still a Benjamin Franklin habit tracker.
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A Modern Weekly Benjamin Franklin Habit Tracker (Pick 3-5)
Thirteen rows every night is historically accurate and often too wide for a first month. A modern Franklin method keeps the grid and shrinks the list.
Pick three to five virtues for the next four weeks. Prefer ones you can fail visibly in a normal day – Order, Resolution, Industry, Silence, and Tranquillity tend to show up without special equipment. Leave Chastity, Humility, or Justice for later if their definitions still feel fuzzy; a vague mark teaches nothing.
Rewrite each chosen virtue as one observable sentence. Example: “Order: desk cleared and tomorrow’s top task written before I close the laptop.” If you cannot imagine what a mark would mean by 10 p.m., the definition is still too abstract.
Keep one focus virtue per week even on a short list. The other rows get casual marks. The focus row gets your attention. That singular focus is the part of the benjamin franklin method most people skip when they photocopy all thirteen and quit by Wednesday.
Optional modern substitutes (use only if they replace a Franklin virtue you are not tracking): – Kindness online – no pile-on comments; wait overnight before posting anger – Attention – phone out of reach for one named block – Rest – in bed by a time you chose on Sunday
These are not Franklin’s words. Label them as yours so the page stays honest.
Modern weekly template:
Week of: __________
Focus virtue (1 only): __________
Definition in one sentence: __________
Virtue | Sun | Mon | Tue | Wed | Thu | Fri | Sat
1. | | | | | | |
2. | | | | | | |
3. | | | | | | |
4. | | | | | | |
5. | | | | | | |
Evening mark rule: one * per clear miss. No essays in the cells.
If your real need is goal progress rather than character marks, pair this later with a productivity journal template for weekly outcomes. The virtue chart watches how you behave; the productivity loop watches what you finish. They cooperate. They are not the same page.
Evening Marks and Sunday Review for Your 13 Virtues Journal
Franklin’s examination belonged to the evening. That timing still works: the day has evidence, and morning energy is not wasted on scorekeeping.
Evening marks (2-5 minutes)
- Open the week’s grid.
- Ask only: where did I clearly miss a virtue I am tracking?
- Put a mark in the matching cell. One mark per clear miss is enough; do not invent a grading scale.
- If the focus virtue is clean, leave it blank and stop. Blank is the win.
- Optional one line under the grid: “Tomorrow’s guard for [focus] is _____.”
Do not write a defense of each mark. The black spot is the record. Franklin transferred tables to ivory leaves later so he could wipe marks with a wet sponge and reuse the page – proof that the point was the habit of examination, not a scrapbook of shame.
Sunday review (10 minutes)
Treat Sunday (or whatever day ends your week) as the course checkpoint.
Sunday review - week of __________
Focus virtue: __________
Marks on focus row this week: __
Marks on other rows (total): __
What pattern showed up? (one sentence)
What will I keep the same next week?
What definition needs a clearer rewrite?
Next week's focus virtue: __________
One small guardrail for Monday: __________
Rules that keep the 13 virtues journal usable: – Fewer marks is progress, not proof of sainthood. Franklin never claimed a permanently clean book. – Repeat a focus week if the row is still noisy. The thirteen-week calendar is a scaffold, not a moral law. – Rotate on purpose. Do not chase a new virtue every time you feel bored; finish the week’s data first. – Missed days get a date, not a makeup essay. Leave the empty column and continue.
How to start a Benjamin Franklin habit tracker this week:
- Choose full thirteen virtues or a modern set of 3-5.
- Write one-sentence definitions.
- Rule a seven-day grid in any notebook.
- Name this week’s focus virtue.
- Mark faults each evening for seven days.
- Run the Sunday review before you rotate.
Related: Daily Schedule and Routine (Optional Spoke)
Franklin’s little book also held a scheme for the twenty-four hours of the day, plus the morning and evening questions “What good shall I do this day?” and “What good have I done today?” That schedule material belongs with the sibling Franklin journaling method post and with any future dedicated routine spoke – not as a second biography here.
For this tracker page, borrow only what supports the grid: – Give the evening examination a fixed slot (after dinner, after teeth, before phone charging). – If Order is your focus, a loose day plan helps you see misses; a rigid 5 a.m. wake time is optional and often irrelevant. – Keep schedule redesign out of the virtue cells. Redesign on Sunday; mark during the week.
Curious readers who want the fuller Franklin toolkit – schedule lessons, decision letter, and historical context – should stay with the sibling article. This URL stays the DIY habit-tracker / virtue-chart spoke.
Start This Week
You do not need Franklin’s century, his household, or a special printed product. You need a ruled page, a focus virtue with a clear definition, evening marks, and one Sunday review.
Copy the modern 3-5 virtue template if thirteen rows feel heavy. Run one full week before you judge the Benjamin Franklin habit tracker. If the grid still fits, expand toward the classic list. If you outgrow character tracking and want outcome tracking instead, step sideways into the productivity template without treating either page as a failure.
If you want a short email with journaling research, techniques, and small experiments – including template updates when new printables are ready – subscribe here. The first email arrives within the hour.
Want a DIY virtue/habit chart based on Franklin’s method? See the Franklin habit tracker.
Daily identity lines instead of a weekly grid? Compare Bruce Lee’s affirmations. Letters to a later self live in future-self journaling.
