FitBit info
ShelliesTrying
Posts: 85 Member
Does anyone have a FitBit linked to their MyFitnessPal? If so share your experience!
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Replies
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My Charge HR is linked to MFP. It works wonderfully. I set my activity to sedentary, enabled negative adjustments, and just the number of calories that result. I've been maintaining this way for a couple of months now, no issues.0
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Does it log your activity automatically? I bought a used FitBit on eBay, I think the charge, and am waiting for it to arrive. I haven't added exercise into my weight-loss yet. I have just been logging everything and staying under my calories.0
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ShelliesTrying wrote: »Does it log your activity automatically? I bought a used FitBit on eBay, I think the charge, and am waiting for it to arrive. I haven't added exercise into my weight-loss yet. I have just been logging everything and staying under my calories.
It tracks my steps and automatically adjusts my calories. Since it's the HR, when I am exercising, I activate the exercise mode (press a button on the side) and it uses my heart rate to register the calories I burn when I'm running. Even if I didn't press the button, it would still register the steps and increase my calories though.0 -
If you link the accounts and Fitbit sees you using more calories than MFP it will add a Fitbit exercise calorie adjustment to your MFP diary effectively giving you more food.0
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I was wrong it's the FitBit Flex
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It was only $40 so if I like it and feel like it's beneficial I will upgrade later on.0
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So it doesn't actually log that you walked 30 min it will just up your calories a little?0
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ShelliesTrying wrote: »So it doesn't actually log that you walked 30 min it will just up your calories a little?
It will log your steps. If you have linked it with MFP, you will see the adjustment to your calories.0 -
Ok. Well I hope it gets here soon so I can check it out.
Right now I am just logging and eating better. I haven't started adding exercising or anything. My phone has the S Health on it but it just logs that I got xx amount of steps or xx min of activity and you can't always carry your phone on your person for every step you take so it's not a good record of what you're doing.0 -
Mine are connected. Try eating what it tells you to for a few weeks, and then lower/raise calories are necessary for your goals. The numbers have been accurate for me, so far.
If you link them, do not add exercise in MFP- that would be double dipping.0 -
I updated my weight and it dropped me 200 calories. I was still losing with what it was set at so that kind of put a damper on things but I couldn't figure out how to change it back.
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ShelliesTrying wrote: »So it doesn't actually log that you walked 30 min it will just up your calories a little?
Correct. You can opt to log specific exercise and enter the time to avoid double-accounting.0 -
ShelliesTrying wrote: »Does anyone have a FitBit linked to their MyFitnessPal? If so share your experience!
Yep. I use my Fitbit to determine calories out and MFP to log my calories consumed.
When I first started using a Fitbit (started with the Zip) and linked it to MFP, I discovered that I was so Sedentary that I would actually lose calories with MFP set to Sedentary. Only with exercise would I meet what MFP expected a Sedentary person of my stats to burn in a 24 hour period. Which is really sad when you think about it.
I have used both the Flex and Zip. Both underestimated my TDEE (Total Daily Energy Expenditure/24 hr calorie burn) by about 200 calories a day on average. Which was nice, because it meant I could eat all the calories I was given and still lose slightly faster than what I was aiming for.
I am now using the Fitbit Surge. I love it, but I also realize it is not easily affordable. For people who want the HR, I typically suggest going with the ChargeHR. My calorie burn from the Surge seems to be about spot on right now (maintaining my loss will be the true test).
As for what is sent over-
Fitbit sends MFP : weight (if tracked in Fitbit), steps, total calories burned as of last sync, sleep minutes (if tracked), BF% (if tracked in Fitbit)
MFP sends Fitbit : weight (if tracked in MFP), any exercise logged into exercise diary, and calories consumed
**Things like the elliptical, and swimming need to be manually logged. When you link your Fitbit to MFP, MFP will say to manually log exercise here, but it doesn't matter. Where you log the exercise that Fitbit can't track is up to you. I personally prefer to leave all my exercise logging to my Fitbit account.ShelliesTrying wrote: »It was only $40 so if I like it and feel like it's beneficial I will upgrade later on.
Did you buy it new or used?
I'm only asking because you could actually end up getting a defective Flex if you bought it used. I say this, because my first Flex was defective, Fitbit sent me a new one and didn't request the defective one back (left it up to me to get rid of it properly). Since Fitbit does that sometimes, it wouldn't surprise me if people sell the defective ones on ebay.0 -
ShelliesTrying wrote: »I updated my weight and it dropped me 200 calories. I was still losing with what it was set at so that kind of put a damper on things but I couldn't figure out how to change it back.
You have probably set yourself to lose at 2lbs a week. And you are probably set as sedentary when in fact you aren't.
So even through at your new, lower weight, you burn less calories in a day, you are still showing steady weight losses.
MFP lowered your calories because you are telling it you want to follow a very aggressive deficit and it is trying to accommodate you by updating your goals based on your new weight.
The problem is not necessarily that MFP updated your goals based on your new weight. The problem is that your goals may be a bit on the aggressive side (as many new people's goals are).
Fitbit, when connected to MFP, will try to calculate your total daily energy expenditure. And it will send an adjustment to MFP based on the difference between what MFP guesses your TDEE to be and what Fitbit believes it to be.
Most people lose weight optimally when eating at a deficit of between 10% and 20% of their TDEE (if obese 25% off of their TDEE is generally speaking fine)... as long as the resulting net calories remain above BMR.0 -
Mine are connected. Try eating what it tells you to for a few weeks, and then lower/raise calories are necessary for your goals. The numbers have been accurate for me, so far.
If you link them, do not add exercise in MFP- that would be double dipping.
If the accounts are connected correctly, integration is working, and the correct times are entered for the exercise in MFP, all that will happen is that the MFP exercise will flow through and over-ride the Fitbit exercise and the net adjustment will not be affected.
What will happen though is that you will have picked MFP's estimate for that exercise as opposed to the Fitbit estimate for the same.
While many people claim that sometimes MFP exercise estimates are over-blown; very few people make similar claims for Fitbit's exercise estimates.
A fitbit group exists with a very useful FAQ: http://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/group/1290-fitbit-users
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I am pretty sure that if you want to record your walks specifically you can use the Fitbit app's mobile run function as long as you bring your phone with you. You click on exercise, then the little stopwatch icon in the upper right corner and then hit track and it will use your phones GPS to measure steps, actual distance, pace and total time and will estimate calories as it always does but perhaps more accurately as it has an accurate distance and pace measure. Only thing it won't have is heart rate info. You'll be able to go back and review your stats in a handy lists and see what your exercise walks are contributing to overall stats. If you bought it because you are trying to incorporate more activity and actual sustained walks into your life, you might want to use this feature. It will let you see what you gain by doing a 30 min walk (for ex) and how much you progress in endurance and/or pace and that can be inspiring. Of course you can do that in Runkeeper too (that's where I doy runs) but if you're just walking it can be nice to have it all in one place. For just everyday walking as part of your life, what you have is fine and will push you to move more in general, which is as or more important than dedicated exercise0
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ShelliesTrying wrote: »I updated my weight and it dropped me 200 calories. I was still losing with what it was set at so that kind of put a damper on things but I couldn't figure out how to change it back.
You have probably set yourself to lose at 2lbs a week. And you are probably set as sedentary when in fact you aren't.
So even through at your new, lower weight, you burn less calories in a day, you are still showing steady weight losses.
MFP lowered your calories because you are telling it you want to follow a very aggressive deficit and it is trying to accommodate you by updating your goals based on your new weight.
The problem is not necessarily that MFP updated your goals based on your new weight. The problem is that your goals may be a bit on the aggressive side (as many new people's goals are).
Fitbit, when connected to MFP, will try to calculate your total daily energy expenditure. And it will send an adjustment to MFP based on the difference between what MFP guesses your TDEE to be and what Fitbit believes it to be.
Most people lose weight optimally when eating at a deficit of between 10% and 20% of their TDEE (if obese 25% off of their TDEE is generally speaking fine)... as long as the resulting net calories remain above BMR.
Ok, I don't understand all of this. I think I have mine set to 1lb per week bc I didn't plan to tackle this aggressively. For me it is about learning how to eat healthy and getting past sugar cravings and the like. I started at around 265
and I am 5'9 (ish). I have lost 43lb in probably 110-120 days. I lost some weight bf I started logging and I have logged for 100 days as of today. It started at 1900(ish) calories and went down to 1750. I am fairly sedentary. I work 8-5 at a desk and then go home and work some more sitting. I haven't added exercise in for a few reasons. One of the reasons being I want to get the eating healthy to stick and two I am limited on time. I know everyone says "you have to make time" I will when I am ready. I don't do cheat days, I log everything. With the exception of a few days over the past 2 weeks I never exceed my calories. I have the S Health app on my phone which tracks steps but I don't carry my phone 24/7 so it's not really accurate and it I don't know how to equate xx steps into minutes walked even if I was logging exercise. I think I covered all your points! Thanks for the post.0 -
shadow2soul wrote: »ShelliesTrying wrote: »Does anyone have a FitBit linked to their MyFitnessPal? If so share your experience!
Yep. I use my Fitbit to determine calories out and MFP to log my calories consumed.
When I first started using a Fitbit (started with the Zip) and linked it to MFP, I discovered that I was so Sedentary that I would actually lose calories with MFP set to Sedentary. Only with exercise would I meet what MFP expected a Sedentary person of my stats to burn in a 24 hour period. Which is really sad when you think about it.
I have used both the Flex and Zip. Both underestimated my TDEE (Total Daily Energy Expenditure/24 hr calorie burn) by about 200 calories a day on average. Which was nice, because it meant I could eat all the calories I was given and still lose slightly faster than what I was aiming for.
I am now using the Fitbit Surge. I love it, but I also realize it is not easily affordable. For people who want the HR, I typically suggest going with the ChargeHR. My calorie burn from the Surge seems to be about spot on right now (maintaining my loss will be the true test).
As for what is sent over-
Fitbit sends MFP : weight (if tracked in Fitbit), steps, total calories burned as of last sync, sleep minutes (if tracked), BF% (if tracked in Fitbit)
MFP sends Fitbit : weight (if tracked in MFP), any exercise logged into exercise diary, and calories consumed
**Things like the elliptical, and swimming need to be manually logged. When you link your Fitbit to MFP, MFP will say to manually log exercise here, but it doesn't matter. Where you log the exercise that Fitbit can't track is up to you. I personally prefer to leave all my exercise logging to my Fitbit account.ShelliesTrying wrote: »It was only $40 so if I like it and feel like it's beneficial I will upgrade later on.
Did you buy it new or used?
I'm only asking because you could actually end up getting a defective Flex if you bought it used. I say this, because my first Flex was defective, Fitbit sent me a new one and didn't request the defective one back (left it up to me to get rid of it properly). Since Fitbit does that sometimes, it wouldn't surprise me if people sell the defective ones on ebay.
It is used. I cannot afford a new one at this point and assuming this one works it will give me an idea if this is something worth investing in later on. Fingers crossed.0 -
I am looking into a charge HR, so basically if I link it from reading all of these posts it will just log my exercise automatically?
And the calories will show as exercise?
The same as if I were to manually enter calories burned?
I'm hearing about it lowering calories instead of adding calories. I do not eat my "exercise calories" anyways, but I wouldn't wanna see it going lower.0 -
I am looking into a charge HR, so basically if I link it from reading all of these posts it will just log my exercise automatically?
And the calories will show as exercise?
The same as if I were to manually enter calories burned?
I'm hearing about it lowering calories instead of adding calories. I do not eat my "exercise calories" anyways, but I wouldn't wanna see it going lower.
Ash... If you have a seriously lazy day, it does detract calories from you. It's not a bad thing. Saves you eating more than you should be for that day.0 -
I am looking into a charge HR, so basically if I link it from reading all of these posts it will just log my exercise automatically?
And the calories will show as exercise?
The same as if I were to manually enter calories burned?
I'm hearing about it lowering calories instead of adding calories. I do not eat my "exercise calories" anyways, but I wouldn't wanna see it going lower.
It will log calorie burn from step based activity. You'll have to log stuff like cycling.
It will add calories back to what you can eat and stay at/under target based on steps taken.
Based on your settings, you can set it up for negative adjustments (taking calories away from what you can eat) or not. I wasn't sure about this feature either but to me, it's fine. It just helps to make sure you're getting the minimum amount of activity to eat what it allows based on your settings. For example, i have mine set to lightly active in MFP. In order to eat the ~2100 cals today i had to get to around 3k steps before it broke even. Now it's adding back, and will continue to add available calories for the rest of the day as long as i stay somewhat active (i haven't really gotten started yet
). If you don't want this feature, just don't enable negative calories. Just note that if you set your activity level too high, and you have a sluggish day, you may be eating over your goal.
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xXGearheadXx wrote: »I am looking into a charge HR, so basically if I link it from reading all of these posts it will just log my exercise automatically?
And the calories will show as exercise?
The same as if I were to manually enter calories burned?
I'm hearing about it lowering calories instead of adding calories. I do not eat my "exercise calories" anyways, but I wouldn't wanna see it going lower.
It will log calorie burn from step based activity. You'll have to log stuff like cycling.
It will add calories back to what you can eat and stay at/under target based on steps taken.
Based on your settings, you can set it up for negative adjustments (taking calories away from what you can eat) or not. I wasn't sure about this feature either but to me, it's fine. It just helps to make sure you're getting the minimum amount of activity to eat what it allows based on your settings. For example, i have mine set to lightly active in MFP. In order to eat the ~2100 cals today i had to get to around 3k steps before it broke even. Now it's adding back, and will continue to add available calories for the rest of the day as long as i stay somewhat active (i haven't really gotten started yet ). If you don't want this feature, just don't enable negative calories. Just note that if you set your activity level too high, and you have a sluggish day, you may be eating over your goal.
Thank you! It kind of makes sense lol. I guess I'll see when I get it.
I don't have to link them though right? And just log whatever calories my Fitbit says I've burned in exercise and step mode?
Or is mfp calorie estimate more accurate than Fitbit?
I'm so new to this, I'm sorry lol0 -
xXGearheadXx wrote: »I am looking into a charge HR, so basically if I link it from reading all of these posts it will just log my exercise automatically?
And the calories will show as exercise?
The same as if I were to manually enter calories burned?
I'm hearing about it lowering calories instead of adding calories. I do not eat my "exercise calories" anyways, but I wouldn't wanna see it going lower.
It will log calorie burn from step based activity. You'll have to log stuff like cycling.
It will add calories back to what you can eat and stay at/under target based on steps taken.
Based on your settings, you can set it up for negative adjustments (taking calories away from what you can eat) or not. I wasn't sure about this feature either but to me, it's fine. It just helps to make sure you're getting the minimum amount of activity to eat what it allows based on your settings. For example, i have mine set to lightly active in MFP. In order to eat the ~2100 cals today i had to get to around 3k steps before it broke even. Now it's adding back, and will continue to add available calories for the rest of the day as long as i stay somewhat active (i haven't really gotten started yet ). If you don't want this feature, just don't enable negative calories. Just note that if you set your activity level too high, and you have a sluggish day, you may be eating over your goal.
Thank you! It kind of makes sense lol. I guess I'll see when I get it.
I don't have to link them though right? And just log whatever calories my Fitbit says I've burned in exercise and step mode?
Or is mfp calorie estimate more accurate than Fitbit?
I'm so new to this, I'm sorry lol
@ashbee03 - Why don't you want to link them? Your Fitbit calorie burn is your TDEE. Logging all of that on MFP would result in massive double counting of calories. When they are linked you get an adjustment for just the extra calories (the calories you burned above MFP'S prediction).0 -
@shadow2soul I'm not really sure how it works, I don't even have one yet.
I just am reading a lot of posts and it seems very confusing.
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Hey, I have a charge HR and I love it even though i have them linked, i personally prefer MFP as i think it helps me more in terms of tracking what I eat and calorie intake because I can more easily see my daily macros.
As for other fitbit models, I can't say if it would be better to use fitbit or MFP'S calorie estimates for your exercise (mainly because I've sometimes had to track my exercise manually with fitbit, but this was before I used MFP).
The charge and above models all have sleep tracking (not sure what lower models have the feature, if any) which I find super helpful.
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@ashbee03@shadow2soul I'm not really sure how it works, I don't even have one yet.
I just am reading a lot of posts and it seems very confusing.
Well the Fitbit calorie burn is:
BMR + tracked daily activity + exercise
MFP already predicts you will burn a certain number of calories based on your stats and activity level selection. If you log exercise, the calorie burn gets added to this number.
When they are linked, MFP will figure out the difference between what it predicted and what Fitbit tracked.
If your Fitbit calorie burn is higher than MFP's prediction, you get calories added to your exercise diary.
If your Fitbit burn is lower you will either have 0 adjustment or you will lose some calories(only applies if negative adjustments is turned on and MFP won't let the negative adjustment take you below 1200 calories).
Does that help any?
An example would be:
MFP expects me to burn 1856 calories in a 24 hour period based on my activity level setting and stats without exercise.
So yesterday, Fitbit tracked my calorie burn to be 2332.
2332 - 1856 = 476
476 calories were added to my exercise diary as an adjustment. Basically I was more active than what I have my MFP activity level set at.
or if we look at today:
Fitbit has me at 1675 as of 10:03 pm. MFP thinks that by midnight Fitbit will say I have burned 1825 calories for the day.
1825 - 1856 = - 31
31 calories are being taken away today (I have negative adjustments enabled. If I didn't my adjustment would be 0 and my deficit would be 469 instead of 500 for the day.) Today, I wasn't active enough to meet MFP's calorie burn. Actually, chances are with as crappy as I feel, my adjustment will be even worse at midnight. I will probably lose 50 - 100 calories today.0 -
ShelliesTrying wrote: »ShelliesTrying wrote: »I updated my weight and it dropped me 200 calories. I was still losing with what it was set at so that kind of put a damper on things but I couldn't figure out how to change it back.
You have probably set yourself to lose at 2lbs a week. And you are probably set as sedentary when in fact you aren't.
So even through at your new, lower weight, you burn less calories in a day, you are still showing steady weight losses.
MFP lowered your calories because you are telling it you want to follow a very aggressive deficit and it is trying to accommodate you by updating your goals based on your new weight.
The problem is not necessarily that MFP updated your goals based on your new weight. The problem is that your goals may be a bit on the aggressive side (as many new people's goals are).
Fitbit, when connected to MFP, will try to calculate your total daily energy expenditure. And it will send an adjustment to MFP based on the difference between what MFP guesses your TDEE to be and what Fitbit believes it to be.
Most people lose weight optimally when eating at a deficit of between 10% and 20% of their TDEE (if obese 25% off of their TDEE is generally speaking fine)... as long as the resulting net calories remain above BMR.
Ok, I don't understand all of this. I think I have mine set to 1lb per week bc I didn't plan to tackle this aggressively. For me it is about learning how to eat healthy and getting past sugar cravings and the like. I started at around 265
and I am 5'9 (ish). I have lost 43lb in probably 110-120 days. I lost some weight bf I started logging and I have logged for 100 days as of today. It started at 1900(ish) calories and went down to 1750. I am fairly sedentary. I work 8-5 at a desk and then go home and work some more sitting. I haven't added exercise in for a few reasons. One of the reasons being I want to get the eating healthy to stick and two I am limited on time. I know everyone says "you have to make time" I will when I am ready. I don't do cheat days, I log everything. With the exception of a few days over the past 2 weeks I never exceed my calories. I have the S Health app on my phone which tracks steps but I don't carry my phone 24/7 so it's not really accurate and it I don't know how to equate xx steps into minutes walked even if I was logging exercise. I think I covered all your points! Thanks for the post.
You say that you're setup to lose 1lb a week and you log everything and "you don't exceed your calories".
You don't say by how much you "under-eat" your calories.
You may be SET at a deficit of 500 cal a day to lose 1lb a week.
But you REPORT you are losing 2.5lbs a week.
Which implies a deficit of close to 1250 Cal a day.
a sedentary person walks less than 5000 steps in a day.
an active person between 7500 and 125000 -
Connect your Fitbit and MFP accounts and ensure the time zone is correct.
Enable negative adjustments.
Based on the feedback you've given update your MFP account to show you as ACTIVE; you are not sedentary based on your weight loss being much faster than your dialled in deficit.
Eat as per your MFP goals to lose as per your MFP dialled in deficit.
Ignore fitbit's eating plan and eating recommendations.
Do not log step based activities as the Fitbit adequately deals with them.
Log non step based exercise activities on either Fitbit or MFP (I would suggest Fitbit).
Make sure you enter the correct time for the activity as it will over-ride whatever Fitbit recorded during that time frame.0 -
shadow2soul wrote: »
@ashbee03@shadow2soul I'm not really sure how it works, I don't even have one yet.
I just am reading a lot of posts and it seems very confusing.
Well the Fitbit calorie burn is:
BMR + tracked daily activity + exercise
MFP already predicts you will burn a certain number of calories based on your stats and activity level selection. If you log exercise, the calorie burn gets added to this number.
When they are linked, MFP will figure out the difference between what it predicted and what Fitbit tracked.
If your Fitbit calorie burn is higher than MFP's prediction, you get calories added to your exercise diary.
If your Fitbit burn is lower you will either have 0 adjustment or you will lose some calories(only applies if negative adjustments is turned on and MFP won't let the negative adjustment take you below 1200 calories).
Does that help any?
An example would be:
MFP expects me to burn 1856 calories in a 24 hour period based on my activity level setting and stats without exercise.
So yesterday, Fitbit tracked my calorie burn to be 2332.
2332 - 1856 = 476
476 calories were added to my exercise diary as an adjustment. Basically I was more active than what I have my MFP activity level set at.
or if we look at today:
Fitbit has me at 1675 as of 10:03 pm. MFP thinks that by midnight Fitbit will say I have burned 1825 calories for the day.
1825 - 1856 = - 31
31 calories are being taken away today (I have negative adjustments enabled. If I didn't my adjustment would be 0 and my deficit would be 469 instead of 500 for the day.) Today, I wasn't active enough to meet MFP's calorie burn. Actually, chances are with as crappy as I feel, my adjustment will be even worse at midnight. I will probably lose 50 - 100 calories today.
@shadow2soul thank you so much! That did help me get a better understanding. Basically you just have to be as active as you say, otherwise if you're not you should have eaten less calories for that day.
Thank you. I'm excited to get mine. I asked hubby for one for Xmas.0 -
Not sure if this is relevant, but when I synced my Flex to MFP, it says to log all food & exercise on MFP--not onto Fitbit. It will add it over for you. Then it takes your steps & calories burned from your tracker. Works way easier & you only really have to deal with 1 app-except for syncing for your steps.
I've been consistent for 9 days doing this & it's so much less confusing!0
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