Are the MFP Weightloss Projections Accurate?

briegirl28

You know how you complete your daily diary entry and a little message pops up saying that if you continue eating the way you ate that day, you would be a certain weight in 5 weeks?

Where are they getting that calculation from? I'm thinking it has to do with BMR possibly?

And has anyone ever actually tracked to see if MFP was correct? Did you keep up a certain way of eating and you did reach or nearly reach or lost more weight than MFP projected?

senecarr

Weightloss isn't linear. Everyone goes through spurts of retaining and dropping water that ends up covering up the fat loss when stepping on the scale.

The calculation is based on the fact that a pound of fat holds about enough triglycerides (fat storage molecules) that it would release 3,500 calories to use it up. Rather than BMR, which is only the calories you'd burn staying alive in a sleeping state, MFP uses their estimate of TDEE for that day based on what you setup as your daily activity, plus any exercise calories you've burned.

The feature is considered a complete shot in the dark, and you'd probably get only slightly less accurate results diving your weight loss with animal entrails.