Are the MyFitnessPal calorie and weight projections actually accurate?

purpletunic

I'm on a 1200 calorie plan. I am 55 calories over that in food for the day. Before I added the food that put me over, it was saying in 5 weeks I'd weigh 146 lbs (down from 155). After adding the food (gluten free animal cookies) it projected my weight in 5 weeks as 150 lbs. That seems a little high for consuming only 1255 calories.... Any thoughts?

Chef_Barbell

If you eat the same exact way every day, yes.

usmcmp

Those predictions are not really that accurate overall. Most people are so inaccurate with counting calories that it ends up being less.

patpatepat

Hi, dear!

I don't know if I understood well your point, but let's try..

First point is to remember that to lose or gain weight is not related only with calories, it's a combination between carbs, protein, fat.. if you eat 1255 calories with a high percent of fat, probably your weight will increase more than if you balance carbs, protein and fat, for example.

Second is to take care about the food in Mfp's system you choose to include in your diary, some values are not that accurate, I've been noticing since the beginning that some people upload just the calories of the food, not the other values (like carbs, protein..).

And for the last, take care about eat less than you need of each group of nutrition, it can slow down your metabolism and make you lose less weight than you want (:

Anyway, to eat healthy is a challenge, 1200 calories is a small value, but not impossible. Just search about low calories and healthy recipes and have fun building your meals!

The secret is to balance!

Good luck, hope I had helped!

kiss, pat.

aliem

I agree. That does not seem right. That's less than 2000 calories over 5 weeks (55 calories*7 days*5 weeks). That's not 4 pounds. However, I have not found the you will weigh X amount in 5 weeks very accurate. It is an estimate and probably the least accurate of the estimates on the site. It can't factor in water weight, muscle or fat gain/loss. In general, it takes a net loss of 3500 calories to lose a pound. But if you eat less salty foods, you might retain less water and see a huge loss. Alternatively, you could work out a bunch and gain some muscle, which weighs more than fat. So you would see less loss on the scale, but more loss in inches. Bodies are complicated. If you are eating in a deficit, you will get there eventually.

akf2000

I always think of that complete diary > weight projection thing as a bit of fun, never bothered myself about it for a single minute.

AJF230

I went and got my base metabolic rate tested, and it was 200kcal per day lower than MFP thought it would be. So I just recalibrated my daily goals. I need to drop fat and not weight, at this point. So I'm working things differently now.

RoxieDawn

Yes when you added that last bit of calories for the day, that 5 week projection went down as in 5 weeks essentially those extra calories would add up and equal less of loss than planed.

That 5 week thing -- not accurate at all.

Blondieee00

Wildly inaccurate for me... It says I won't even lose 5 lbs until november...and I'm more or less on a track to lose 3lbs per week... It doesn't realize for the 1200 calorie suggestion that some people just naturally burn way more calories than others...I'm taller than 95% of women at 5'9" and so I burn more. I also have well under 20% bf which puts my burn much higher... I just use the website here as a tool..but I definitely don't strictly follow it. I seem to be doing okay

JeromeBarry1

Five weeks ago my food diary ended with promising I'd weigh 183.6 today. Today I actually weigh 193.2. So, no.

markrgeary1

It's a projection based on how many calories you ate at the time you press the button compared to how many MFP thinks you burn.

It's not accurate at all.

crzycatlady1

For me personally I don't find MFPs calorie recommendation to be accurate in itself, let alone their projections. Now that I'm back in a short weight loss period I entered my stats here and it put me at 1,200 calories before exercise, for a 1lb week loss. Another site put me at 1,389 calories before exercise, for 1lb loss. I'm following the other site's calorie recommendation and I'm down 1.5lbs this week (with exercise factored in I'm eating around 1,500 calories). I'm going to stick with the higher calories

linda45ll837h

I am 69 and eating 1200 cal a day walk 1mile in 22 mintues once a day is that enough calories for me to lose weight. trying fitness pal because i can not afford weightwatchers anymore please suggest

Aaron_K123

patpatepat wrote: »

Hi, dear!

I don't know if I understood well your point, but let's try..

First point is to remember that to lose or gain weight is not related only with calories, it's a combination between carbs, protein, fat.. if you eat 1255 calories with a high percent of fat, probably your weight will increase more than if you balance carbs, protein and fat, for example.

Second is to take care about the food in Mfp's system you choose to include in your diary, some values are not that accurate, I've been noticing since the beginning that some people upload just the calories of the food, not the other values (like carbs, protein..).

And for the last, take care about eat less than you need of each group of nutrition, it can slow down your metabolism and make you lose less weight than you want (:

Anyway, to eat healthy is a challenge, 1200 calories is a small value, but not impossible. Just search about low calories and healthy recipes and have fun building your meals!

The secret is to balance!

Good luck, hope I had helped!

kiss, pat.

This is wrong. Weight gain and loss is only about calories in and out and has nothing to do with macro balance. Macro balance is about getting sufficient nutrition and can aid in your feeling satiated for a given amount of calories....but you don't get fatter by eating fat (unless you are in caloric surplus), that is wrong.

newheavensearth

I know those numbers are off but just seeing them help. A gain tells me to stop playing around. A good loss tells me I'm doing something right.

Evamutt

the projection isn't real accurate, sometime i lose more, sometime i lose less, but i'm loosing!

ogtmama

It's as accurate as your logging.

Red_Pill

Forget about the "in x amount of weeks you'll be this" do you really thing an app can accurately calculate such feats with pin point precision? Not to sound like I'm going on a rant but my advice would be to just eat at the calorie count you've set up, use http://www.iifym.com/iifym-calculator/ if you don't trust mfp, and just watch the weight drop weekly without buying into what the app says you'll lose in x amount of weeks. It's less hassle.

duddysdad

Not really. I always lose much faster than what it projects. I think I have a medical problem, because I can eat at a 1k daily deficit and lose 3-4 pounds per week consistently. I suspect an over-active thyroid, but my insurance will only pay for blood work every six months so it will be a while before I know.

Unknown

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JDixon852019

Don't put a lot of stock in the projections. Some weeks your body is going to fight you.

tomteboda

They're accurate if you are a statistically average person who logged with 100% accuracy and calculated your energy output perfectly.

GottaBurnEmAll

They're as accurate as a Magic 8 Ball.

Weight gain/loss patterns aren't linear. This doesn't mean that the idea behind calories in/out is flawed it just means that it's more complex than a simple little thing that pops up based on one day's data.

WendyLaubach

I got curious a month or two back about whether I'd ever hit the projected 5-week loss mark, because it always seemed too optimistic. I started putting my projected weight on my calendar 5 weeks out. Sure enough, when I got there, I typically weighed 5 lbs. or so more than it had projected. I suppose I'm undercounting my food or overcounting my exercise, or should have chosen a more "sedentary" base rate, or all three. It doesn't bother me. As long as I'm losing reliably, I don't need the program to predict accurately for me.

b3achy

The weight projections are wildly inaccurate and I'm still trying to figure out the algorithm they are using to make them. I've tried a number of different things and nothing really makes sense yet based on the numbers it provides me, especially since I'm not sure it takes into account whether or not you are already eating at a deficit. I want to dig more into it at some point. However, I suspect it's more for fun or as a general guideline than accuracy.

I'm not a huge fan of the calorie intake estimates either, so I built my own estimate that is working for me. Seems like too many females are given the blanket 1200 minimum calories, so I researched and figured out what was best for me. I'm sure it's good enough to get results for those that don't want to really understand what all the calculations are behind it, and just want an app to give them a number. But I personally prefer to understand a little bit more of the calculations and try to do something a little bit smarter for myself (which is more of a TDEE estimate than the MFP NEAT estimate). But to each their own.

lynn_glenmont

aliem wrote: »

I agree. That does not seem right. That's less than 2000 calories over 5 weeks (55 calories*7 days*5 weeks). That's not 4 pounds. However, I have not found the you will weigh X amount in 5 weeks very accurate. It is an estimate and probably the least accurate of the estimates on the site. It can't factor in water weight, muscle or fat gain/loss. In general, it takes a net loss of 3500 calories to lose a pound. But if you eat less salty foods, you might retain less water and see a huge loss. Alternatively, you could work out a bunch and gain some muscle, which weighs more than fat. So you would see less loss on the scale, but more loss in inches. Bodies are complicated. If you are eating in a deficit, you will get there eventually.

But you're assuming that she was at 1200 before she ate the last "food that put her over" at 1255 (but she never said that). For all we know, she was at 900 calories consumed or net for the day, looking at a projection of weighing 146 pounds in five weeks, and ate a 355-calorie snack or meal, and landed at 1255 calories consumed or net for the day, and was then looking at a projection of weighing 150 pounds in five weeks. That's a daily swing of 355 calories, X 7 days X 5 weeks, for a five-week difference of 3.55 pounds, which MFP would round to 4 lbs for that projection feature.

In short, OP hasn't given us enough information to know whether the projection feature was malfunctioning.

SusanMFindlay

b3achy wrote: »

Seems like too many females are given the blanket 1200 minimum calories, so I researched and figured out what was best for me.

I think that happens because too many people choose the "lose 2 pounds/week" option and sedentary. That's a 1000 cal/day target deficit and very few sedentary women burn more than 2200 cals/day.

I think it would be helpful if the page on which we choose our target rate of weightloss had some data on what rate was recommended base on the amount of weight to lose. (e.g. Someone with only 5 pounds to lose should not be aiming for more than 0.5 pounds/week.)

sardelsa

Not accurate... Especially for me since I enter my own cal goal. I don't think my predictor ever said I would lose weight... It always always says I'm going to gain... Oh noes