Activity tracker necessary?

cfredz

Hi! Do you guys use a fitness tracker? If so, which one? I used to use a polar HRM to track all workouts and I logged them. I stopped logging my exercise as you're not supposed to eat back exercise calories. And then I had a Fitbit for a while just to track my steps during the day. Do you think it's important to log you activity? Or is it important how much you burn in a workout if you're meeting your macros/calories?

NorthCascades

If your calorie goal comes from MFP your very much supposed to eat your exercise calories. You're also supposed to try to find a reasonable estimate for what you actually burned, though.

Activity tracker are convenient but not strictly necessary. And you can use a phone app if you can stand being tethered to your phone. Hence the convenience of the smaller device with a longer battery life.

I use a Garmin Fenix 5X.

Tacklewasher

Not necessary, but I've sure found mine helpful. Just need to take it off when I'm renovating as I cracked mine and had to replace it last week.

spiriteagle99

All you really need to do is pay attention to how much time you spend at your exercise of choice. No need for a tracker, and a tracker can confuse things because it combines daily activity with exercise activity. I have a gps watch I use for running. I don't sync it with mfp, I just manually log any intentional exercise I do, i.e. 45 minutes walking at 3 mph + 60 minutes running at 10 mph. I eat back those calories, but not the steps I take around the house or the grocery etc.

cfredz

NorthCascades wrote: »

If your calorie goal comes from MFP your very much supposed to eat your exercise calories. You're also supposed to try to find a reasonable estimate for what you actually burned, though.

Activity tracker are convenient but not strictly necessary. And you can use a phone app if you can stand being tethered to your phone. Hence the convenience of the smaller device with a longer battery life.

I use a Garmin Fenix 5X.

My calories are based on my TDEE - 20%, not MFP, so I am not eating back any activity calories.

DX2JX2

Not really necessary but they're fun to play with. I use one mainly to maintain a record of my running stats and will generally ignore anything else it tells me about steps, calories expended, etc.

I didn't have one throughout most of my time losing weight and didn't miss it. In fact, I think I actually had an easier time than many who leaned too much on the activity tracker. I knew exactly what I was doing because I was forced to do it manually, whereas activity trackers tend to 'hide' a lot of their logic which makes understanding and/or troubleshooting very difficult (just take a look at how many "device X says this, website says that..." threads there are on the boards).

StarvingDiva

I use a Polar HRM only to just get an idea of what I may have burned and it is a weird accountability thing for me. I don't eat back exercise calories.

NorthCascades

cfredz wrote: »

NorthCascades wrote: »

If your calorie goal comes from MFP your very much supposed to eat your exercise calories. You're also supposed to try to find a reasonable estimate for what you actually burned, though.

Activity tracker are convenient but not strictly necessary. And you can use a phone app if you can stand being tethered to your phone. Hence the convenience of the smaller device with a longer battery life.

I use a Garmin Fenix 5X.

My calories are based on my TDEE - 20%, not MFP, so I am not eating back any activity calories.

Your a special case then, and for you a tracker will be less valuable than for other people.

MelanieCN77

Not necessary at all but I find data very motivating and helpful for long term thinking.

Thick_n_Fit_Mom

cfredz wrote: »

Hi! Do you guys use a fitness tracker? If so, which one? I used to use a polar HRM to track all workouts and I logged them. I stopped logging my exercise as you're not supposed to eat back exercise calories. And then I had a Fitbit for a while just to track my steps during the day. Do you think it's important to log you activity? Or is it important how much you burn in a workout if you're meeting your macros/calories?

Depends on your goals! I utilize the polar , mapmyfitness, and I don't add back my calories burned, I follow IF and am focused on dropping BF% .. Hence: my goals.. fitness trackers aren't 100% correct, more like " round about" idea. So you know what your burns are , steps etc! It's mainly on what you are looking at as far as your own goals!