bf%

zoohockey

hey everyone, I've been slowly gaining weight but I wasn't sure what to do to check my BF% any suggestions

s2mikey

The official/proper way to do it is to get a caliper and take certain measurements of certain areas of the body. Or, a tape measure will give you a ballpark figure. I believe for men its your waist size, wrist size and maybe chest size? Then, you put in your weight in lbs along with height. Google it for more info but thats what I know. It'll give you a rough idea.

terizius

My first bulk, I used calipers but from what I've read, they tend to read lower than what the actual BF is. I experienced the same thing and a few of my friends on here agree. Now, I use on Omron handheld body fat analyzer. It costs about $40 on amazon and its great. Both I and my wife use it. I even bring it to work to do body fat measurements for coworkers. It seems to run about 1-2% higher than calipers, so the reading it gives should be a bit closer to what you are actually at, even if it isn't perfect.

Brolympus

Pretty much the only way to get an accurate reading is through a body scan. I'm not talking about one of those electronic scales either, those are terrible, they can be off by over 10% depending on your hydration level. Calipers will get you to about only about 5% accuracy. Dexascan, hydrostatic weighting, or BodPod are the true standard measurement techniques, which you can get done at a clinic for $40-$80 depending whats available to you. Even those are only accurate to about 1%.

For purposes of planning your TDEE, you really only need about 5% accuracy, unless you are on a tight timeline and want to spend less time calibrating your TDEE. Regardless of how you calculate it, it will almost always require at least a couple of weeks of calibrating to until you hit the calorie goal where you start seeing results.

Wheelhouse15

Calipers, tape measure and the mirror unless you really need to know more precisely and want to pay for a scan or water tank. Most people really only need to know relatively where they are so don't worry too much about it.

zoohockey

thanks everyone!!!

Edwardshar

get a DXA scan.