Fitbit exercise calorie questions?

NicoleDavis1977

I have had my Fitbit for a few weeks now and love it! Today I synced it to MFP and it said that I earned 600 calories. I am at about 15,000 steps but only went for a 2 mile run (jog with alternate sprints) and took a couple walks at work because most of the time I sit. These numbers seem high to me. Normally I would only count the run as exercise since the rest seems like just regular activity.

What do you guys think? I don't want to over eat and all my hard work goes to waste. But I don't want to under eat either.

Thanks :-)

Railr0aderTony

What do you have your activity level set at on MFP and Fitbit, they should match. Also that is not to bad for 15000 steps. Fitbit uses a different formula than MFP so they seem to give a few more calories. I really love my fitbit but do not always eat all the calories back. But do not ignore them either as you will need fuel if you ran two miles. Best thing is to verify your settings on both sites. Then enjoy your earned calories as much as possible.

just4nessa

If you allow fitbit calorie adjustments, I believe the recommendation is that your settings are "sedentary" on both sites. I have mine set up that way and have been very happy with the results for the past few months. Good luck!

Happylady123

Make sure you to log your two mile run on mfp under the correct time that you did it. Don't log it again on Fitbit as it will already show up on its own. You may already know this... just making sure that is not what is happening to give you more steps than you thought you should have.

MzOnree

Hi Nicole! I agree with the post above. I love my FitBit Zip and wear it all the time. I normally don't eat my calories back unless I had a larger burn than normal. I think in time you will develop a system with what works best for you.

scrapjen

I'm just shy of 17,000 steps today and have a calorie credit of 870. I did 80minutes/8miles/resistance8 on the elliptical. My machine gave me 798 as the credit burn, which is a little higher than what Fitbit actually gives me, which is still a bit higher than what my HRM reads. Other than that, I did a small walk, and then was somewhat active (making dinner).

I have MFP set to sedentary, because Fitbit is giving credit for EVERYTHING, all the standing, walking ... not just dedicated exercise. The other stuff does add up. As you check your day on the Fitbit site, you can see how active you were (looking at the different colors for fairly, moderately, very active). Sometimes you may be more active than you think (or the opposite, Fitbit is good at pointing out sedentary time too!)

I'm set to a 500 calorie deficit here at MFP, but I TRY not to eat back all my exercise calories, just to give myself a bit of a buffer, in case of overestimation. Some days I might have a 1000 deficit (per these numbers), that's not my daily goal, but I know it is for some people! I don't go to the effort to log any activity/exercise unless I know my Fitbit estimate is off. You can check what Fitbit estimated by making an "activity record" for the stats for a specific time frame. Fitbit does overestimate when I attach it to my sock for a bike ride ... not sure why, but it does it consistently (so I do log my bike rides manually).

Another number to watch is your total burn on the Fitbit site - this is your TDEE. I really try to keep my "total burn" and my "total intake" numbers in mind - and Fitbit has a graph (as you click on your picture taking you to your profile page), I want to keep those lines from crossing.

... and I failed miserably today!

NicoleDavis1977

Thank you for all the responses. I know I have my MFP account set to sedentary but I am not sure about my Fitbit account. I will go online and check on that.

Based on your responses, I am assuming that I am getting such a calorie bump from exercising because the account is set to sedentary. 15,000 steps is not sedentary I guess :-)

How many of the exercise calories do you recommend eating back? My daily goal is 1200 cal before exercise.

JaimeLoves2run

I have my Calorie goal at 1200 as well and sedentary. This is what I have been doing. My hrm or garmin usually gives me higher burns or sometimes even a bit lower than what fitbit gives. I stopped logging the exercise into mfp and just using the fitbit adjustment as a guide. I do however create a post on the newsfeed reflecting my workout and calorie burn so that my friends don't think I am a slug : ) Normally at about 10,000 steps I get about a 360 calorie adjustment. I look at my Fitbit calorie burn and make sure I leave a 500 calorie deficit. Normally by dinner time if you go under exercise in mfp and click on that little icon next to the fitbit adjustment it opens up a box and explains how they are calculating the calorie deficit. It will say (as example) calories burned as of 5:00 pm 1400, Estimated full day projection 2200. So fitbit is telling you what they expect your calorie burn for the entire day to be. So I look at that number and say ok, I want to make sure I eat 500 calories less then what they are projecting. So I make sure I do not eat anymore than 1700 calories. But I also make sure that I have earned most of those calories. So If I only "worked out" and burned 450 then I would really want to eat closer to 1650. Which is my 1200 base plus the 450 I know I earned even if Fitbit says I could eat the 1700 and still have that 500 calorie deficit. Its trial and error but there are days I do tons of walking and not a real purposed workout and you should benefit from some of those calories too even if you only eat a few hundred extra. I hope this is not completely confusing. It makes perfect sense to me but trying to type it out it difficult hoping I am making sense to you : )

scrapjen

I am generally quite active ... on Fitbit, my average total burn is usually close to 3000 (and that's what I aim for each day).

On MFP, BEFORE exercise, I have a calorie allotment of 1350 (which I don't think I could ever stick to).

I usually get about a 1000 calorie credits from Fitbit (after a couple hours of dedicated exercise). Of course, sometimes less, but also sometimes even more, when I do some additional exercise.

As a general goal, I TRY to keep my calories in around 2000 ... because that is a totally reasonable number. I really SHOULD be able to always stay around there. On a day where I don't get in my usual exercise, 2000 should still be about maintenance for me, but I will try to control myself and eat less and have my 500 deficit.

On days I have oodles of calorie credit, I don't feel like I NEED to eat 2500 calories just because the numbers say I can. I never feel the need to get my NET at goal - I know I'm eating plenty. The occasional day I won't be super hungry (or just so busy I don't eat much) and I have a really big deficit. I've even had a day here and there where I've had a negative net (I had as many exercise calories as I ate total). It sure doesn't happen often, but I figure people who do the intermittent fasting have negative net days too, and everyone once in a while it won't hurt (and can help average out my overages).

I guess I'm saying is that I'm a little flexible, going by what I'm feeling (if I'm really hungry, or not hungry ... if I'm in a situation where where I want to splurge a little, or if I feel the need to be very hard on myself and have an extremely low day after eating too much the day before). I know that wouldn't work for everyone, some people need to go just by the numbers without any wiggle room or rationalization.

Good luck and enjoy your Fitbit!

mkess1986

How were u able to see your calories burned (credits) from fitbit in ur myfitnesspal app?

moni_tb_192

If you set your MFP to sedentary, lightly active, very active or whatever, Fitbit only calculates the difference between what you expected to burn via BMR during the day and what they calculate you burned, based on how many steps you took. The more active you set your account here, the lesser amount of "credit calories" Fitbit will give you but your amount of calories burned at the end of the day will be the same. Also, Fitbit can tell from a walk or a run; so you'd burn more calories if you take 3000 steps running, than if you were walking.

If you think the number's too high... It might be because you're getting "false steps". Do you drive, take the bus or train to go to work? Fitbit usually credits me with 400-500 steps for a 25 minute ride on the bus... and in order to keep my step count as real as possible, I log "riding the bus" in the fitbit site so that they substract those steps that weren't really steps. It was just the fitbit picking up on the movement.