Fitbit adding a lot of calories for exercise?
Evil_Girl12
Posts: 3 Member
I have linked my mfp account to my Fitbit but everyday it adds around 400-500 calories which seems like a lot. I end up eating 1200 calories but don't really know what my net calories are anymore. I'm thinking of just disconnecting the Fitbit. Do these calorie adjustments sound right when today I have walked to school and walked home (15 mins altogether) and gone on a 50 min walk but not much else today but still had just over 500 cals added by Fitbit? I have walked 15,000 steps today according to the Fitbit.
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What is your MFP activity level set to? Based on 15k steps a day I'd say you are active. So if you're set to sedentary or lightly active, its reasonable that you're earning more calories.
MFP takes your stated level and assumes it to be true. If you pick sedentary but you're active, then you are burning more than MFP assumes.
Fitbit measures your actual activity level based on steps taken and approximates your calorie burn. For me, 10k-11k steps is lightly active.
On the other hand, if you've walked a total of 1 hour, 20 minutes today and sat around the rest of the time: is 15k steps accurate? If walking a brisk pace of 4.0 miles per hour that would be less than 6 miles, or roughly 12k-13k steps. If slower, less. Only you can judge if the step count is accurate for what you've done.0 -
What is your activity level set to on MFP? Your adjustment is the calorie difference between what MFP expects you to burn (based on the activity level you picked and any logged exercise) and what Fitbit tracked your calorie burn to be approximately.
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Well, the Fitbit isn't just logging your exercise. I don't know your stats and settings but here's how it is supposed to work. You tell MFP your goal, say two pounds per week. You tell it you are sedentary. Based on that, MFP tells you eat 1200. But then you strap on the Fitbit which determines that you've actually burned 2600 calories today. That's greater than a 1000 calorie deficit, so it will tell you to eat 400 more calories to bring the numbers in line.0
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That sounds pretty accurate. If it bothers you, you can change your activity level so it more closely matches your burn. It sounds as if your level is set to sedentary but you are more active. That is why your fitbit is giving you additional calories. You earned them so I would definitely eat at least 1/2 of them.
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15000 steps is a lot, definitely highly active0
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Hey guys, so to clarify. I put my fitness pal at lightly active because my job is not very active. I definitely don't sit around all day but I'm not going all the time (when I am not working). So I can eat back my exercise calories that Fitbit gives me??0
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Do you have negative calorie adjustments enabled? Also, when I linked my Jawbone, I was told to put my activity level to sedentary and let the tracker do the rest.0
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nosebag1212 wrote: »15000 steps is a lot, definitely highly active
Disagree with this - unless a lot of those steps were made running this is a great way to end up stalled with an unintentionally blown deficit.0 -
Mine was adding too many so I changed from "sedentary" to "active" and now it is a lot more reasonable.0
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nosebag1212 wrote: »15000 steps is a lot, definitely highly active
Disagree with this - unless a lot of those steps were made running this is a great way to end up stalled with an unintentionally blown deficit.
Agreed, I hit 15,000 most week days and that's just walking too and from the train and work, and walking on my lunch break. I'm 100% not highly active. I wouldn't even consider me "active", lightly active at best.0 -
I'm averaging 25,000 steps or 11 miles a day and upped my activity level from sedentary to lightly active yesterday, I also enabled the negative calorie adjustments. Not sure if that was right or wrong, i'll go with the flow and see what happens 0
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christinev297 wrote: »I'm averaging 25,000 steps or 11 miles a day and upped my activity level from sedentary to lightly active yesterday, I also enabled the negative calorie adjustments. Not sure if that was right or wrong, i'll go with the flow and see what happens
25k steps is pretty awesome. Have you thought about taking up jogging?0 -
christinev297 wrote: »I'm averaging 25,000 steps or 11 miles a day and upped my activity level from sedentary to lightly active yesterday, I also enabled the negative calorie adjustments. Not sure if that was right or wrong, i'll go with the flow and see what happens
25k steps is pretty awesome. Have you thought about taking up jogging?
It has crossed my mind. Not ready yet, I've only just taken up walking (as purposeful exercise).
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Alatariel75 wrote: »nosebag1212 wrote: »15000 steps is a lot, definitely highly active
Disagree with this - unless a lot of those steps were made running this is a great way to end up stalled with an unintentionally blown deficit.
Agreed, I hit 15,000 most week days and that's just walking too and from the train and work, and walking on my lunch break. I'm 100% not highly active. I wouldn't even consider me "active", lightly active at best.
I can't remember what I set mine to on MFP, lightly active maybe, but it gave me an expected TDEE that was right in line with what Fitbit tells me I burn on a regular basis. So play with your settings maybe until you find that level. Then your adjustment won't be much. And as said, if you turn on negative adjustments and have a lazy day, it can take away calories and tell you to eat less.
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Alatariel75 wrote: »nosebag1212 wrote: »15000 steps is a lot, definitely highly active
Disagree with this - unless a lot of those steps were made running this is a great way to end up stalled with an unintentionally blown deficit.
Agreed, I hit 15,000 most week days and that's just walking too and from the train and work, and walking on my lunch break. I'm 100% not highly active. I wouldn't even consider me "active", lightly active at best.
I can't remember what I set mine to on MFP, lightly active maybe, but it gave me an expected TDEE that was right in line with what Fitbit tells me I burn on a regular basis. So play with your settings maybe until you find that level. Then your adjustment won't be much. And as said, if you turn on negative adjustments and have a lazy day, it can take away calories and tell you to eat less.
That's a good point, only last night I was playing with a couple of different TDEE calculators and noted that they lined up really well with my FitBit calculations now.0 -
nosebag1212 wrote: »15000 steps is a lot, definitely highly active
Disagree with this - unless a lot of those steps were made running this is a great way to end up stalled with an unintentionally blown deficit.
Hmm. I reached goal weight and never had this issue. I always ate all of my calories given to me.
Maybe it's dependent on each person, but I have myself at sedentary and am not sedentary at all based on steps and lost weight and maintaining just fine by following it.
OP, eat back a little of those and see what happens. Add more each week. If you gain or stall then push back a bit. I was able to eat at the fitbit added calorie level just fine.
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Most people find the calorie burns from Fitbit to be accurate(ish) if their fitbit is counting steps correctly. Their have been instances of the fitbit not counting steps correctly.
If the step count is accurate(ish) and you've taken most of the steps at a rate of 100 steps a minute or more, or uphill, or in grass, gravel, sand, and they were purposeful I would eat them all back (subject to cross verification by actual weight loss).
If the majority were from shuffling while standing or from typing on your keyboard, I would not eat back nearly as many!
Fitbit is guessing on your tdee based in the inputs you've entered. Mfp the same. When you connect the two, the one with the highest calories becomes your burn for the day.
For most people a count of 15k steps would correspond to an active+ level of activity.0 -
When I walk 15000 steps I burn in the 500 calorie range so that sounds about right. I generally eat back 50% of my exercise calories
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Don't get hung up on the definitions of "sedentary" or "lightly active" or "active". What matters is the calorie number. If you eat the calorie number that Fitbit suggests you eat, and you lose rate at an average pace that matches what you input into Fitbit (e.g. 1lb/week), then you're all good. If you're losing weight too slowly, then eat back fewer calories. Too quickly, eat back more calories.0
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If you normally earn extra calories from your tracker, negative enabling doesn't really matter. If you're constantly seeing no calories added, you have your activity level set too high. (Like choosing active when you're sedentary.) Then turning on negative calories can show you how far under you are from what MFP expects. If MFP thinks you're burning 2000, so tells you to eat 1500 but you're only burning 1700: you might want to know.Liftng4Lis wrote: »Do you have negative calorie adjustments enabled? Also, when I linked my Jawbone, I was told to put my activity level to sedentary and let the tracker do the rest.
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