Accuracy of the Polar HRM with the chest strap

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sweetpea813
sweetpea813 Posts: 112 Member
in Health and Weight Loss
I did a cardio with weights class this morning and my HRM said I burned 437 calories for the hour. I immediately did a 3 mile walk after that and it said I burned 387 ?? Am I burning more calories from the walk because I just did that class right before? Are these things accurate?

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  • janetennet
    janetennet Posts: 143 Member
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    I'm interested too, I did a 15km walk yesterday and blasted 1800 calories on my Polar, a friends Iwatch only logged 700calories at the exact same pace etc as I was.
  • halimaiqbal00
    halimaiqbal00 Posts: 288 Member
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    Apparently it's accurate for steady state cardio and not so much for interval or weight training so your walk will have logged the calories accurately whereas the weights class way not have, I have a polar ft4 that I use for cardio for 7 years now and it's always seemed accurate next to my Fitbit charge hr which gave the same reading all the tome
  • Ready2Rock206
    Ready2Rock206 Posts: 9,488 Member
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    Not accurate unless you have steady elevated heart rate cardio - so probably not for either of your activities.
  • yarwell
    yarwell Posts: 10,477 Member
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    sweetpea813 wrote: »
    I did a cardio with weights class this morning and my HRM said I burned 437 calories for the hour. I immediately did a 3 mile walk after that and it said I burned 387 ?? Am I burning more calories from the walk because I just did that class right before? Are these things accurate?

    they accurately measure heart rate. If configured with your detailed stats (VO2max etc) they are pretty good on calories too. If they're working off your age or age, height & weight then they don't know your personal fitness level and are consequently less accurate.
  • yirara
    yirara Posts: 9,560 Member
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    Ready2Rock206 wrote: »
    Not accurate unless you have steady elevated heart rate cardio - so probably not for either of your activities.

    And they only work somewhat for calorie counting if you know your maximum heart rate. And I don't mean the 220-age equation but your actual maximum heart rate. But high heart rate doesn't equal higher calorie burn anyway. You don't burn more calories because you do the same walk at 100F compared to 50F, yet your heart rate will be higher. You won't burn tons of calories just because you sit in a sauna. Or any other reason that might give you an elevated heart rate. Sorry, doesn't work like that

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