Calories burned?

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k900
k900 Posts: 140 Member
in Fitness and Exercise
How accurate is the calories burned tool ? I have noticed that the machine I'm using gives me a different amount of calories burned than mfp does.

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  • sijomial
    sijomial Posts: 19,811 Member
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    For which activities?
    For you?
    For me?
    What machine?

    Every means of estimating calories will give a different result.
  • MeiannaLee
    MeiannaLee Posts: 338 Member
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    Its accurate if a person is very overweight. Otherwise machines tend to overestimate calories burned by about 100. I would recommend a heart rate tracker.
  • louubelle16
    louubelle16 Posts: 579 Member
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    I wouldn't pay much attention to the machines. As someone above has said, a heart rate monitor is the way to go if you want to keep track. Otherwise, as long as you don't eat back more than 50% of the calories MFP or machines say you have burnt, you should be fine :)
  • sijomial
    sijomial Posts: 19,811 Member
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    louubelle16 wrote: »
    I wouldn't pay much attention to the machines. As someone above has said, a heart rate monitor is the way to go if you want to keep track. Otherwise, as long as you don't eat back more than 50% of the calories MFP or machines say you have burnt, you should be fine :)

    But some machines are far more accurate than a basic HRM (which is inappropriate for some activities anyway) - you would be introducing a huge error margin.

    The real answer is pick a method of estimating, try to verify against other sources so that's it's "reasonable", be consistent and adjust based on actual results over time.

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