Ignore Weight-loss forecast

Dancedinny

The "in 5 weeks time, you should weigh XXX" message is simply rubbish and unnecessarily time-consuming.
I have diligently completed food consumption and exercise details most days and have noted the estimated weight loss in 5 weeks time with some scepticism. I attend a local gym maybe 5 times a week and today went on the scales for a full report (weight, BFM, FFM, visceral fat level etc) which followed the previous report 27 days ago.
The result? In 27 days, I have lost 1.4kg which equates to less than 1 pound per week, compared to the My Fitness Pal estimate of some 5Kg or so.
Don't waste too much time with this program. Maybe the food consumption information is useful but the rest should be taken with a pinch of salt.

tomcustombuilder

You may be underestimating your calorie intake and/or your maintenance calories are lower than you think

cmriverside

Data is only as good as the recording and the verification.

Yes, that little thing is pretty gimmicky, but not for the reason(s) you are thinking.

The calculations MFP uses are a starting point based on the input you provided and whether or not your Goals are realistic for your current activity and weight.

Then, your results are also dependent on whether you are using accurate food and exercise logging.

There are a lot of moving parts, and yeah, I haven't clicked "Complete This Entry" in over ten years, it's not a necessary part of this system.

Retroguy2000

I've never clicked "complete this entry" either, never seen this prediction once, never worried about it.

Maybe the first weeks prediction was extrapolating future gains based on week one, which would be high loss due to water weight? You admit you didn't track diligently every day, that could be off. Your workout estimates could be off. Your tracking of individual meals and drinks and portion sizes could be off. Lots of variables.

cwolfman13

Retroguy2000 wrote: »

I've never clicked "complete this entry" either, never seen this prediction once, never worried about it.

Maybe the first weeks prediction was extrapolating future gains based on week one, which would be high loss due to water weight? You admit you didn't track diligently every day, that could be off. Your workout estimates could be off. Your tracking of individual meals and drinks and portion sizes could be off. Lots of variables.

Nah, it's an oversimplified equation that just assumes every day will be exactly like today for five weeks...same exact CI and same exact CO and also assumes your inputs are perfect. It doesn't take into account your weigh-ins or extrapolate anything from a current rate of loss...just that everyday will be exactly the same and perfect.

For the OP...any and all of these calculators simply provide a reasonable estimate of your calorie needs based on population statistics and whatever data you've input for your stats and activity, as well as the accuracy of the database entries you're using...eyeballing servings rather than using weights or measures...over/under estimating energy expenditure from exercise or NEAT, etc. Ultimately these calculators provide a good starting point and you need to make adjustments as per your real world results.

Wynterbourne

Dancedinny wrote: »

The "in 5 weeks time, you should weigh XXX" message is simply rubbish and unnecessarily time-consuming.

It should probably be pointed out that it says "If every day were like today..." and that means literally, exactly, food in, calories burned, liquid ingested, liquid and solids excreted, steps taken, hours awake, hours asleep, sodium ingested, etc. Everything. Identical. That is never going to happen. However, if your day to day is fairly consistent, it might give you ballpark, but most of us that have been here a while know that no one is ever going to have "every day like today" so we tend to never even click that button.

AnnPT77

On top of all of the above, BMR (basal metabolic rate), the data point upon which all these estimates build, is itself an estimate. What MFP or some other calculator spits out is essentially the average for a population of people who are similar to you based on the very few data points we give it: Age, height, weight, activity level . . . .

Most people are close to average. A few people will be a noticeable bit off average, either high or low. A very rare few will be surprisingly far off average. That's the nature of statistical estimates.

It seems that BMR is a normal distribution (bell curve), with most people near the central peak (i.e., there's a relatively small standard deviation, i.e., it's a pretty tall, narrow bell curve) . . . but some few people will still be out in the tails of the curve, with calorie needs noticeably lower or higher than average.

IOW, the accuracy of the calorie estimate is as much about how average we each are, not just about how accurate MFP (or some other calculator) is. Can't really blame them if we're not exactly average (or if we're logging imprecisely, or having compliance problems, or what-have-you).

After multiple weeks of accurate, consistent logging, we can get a hint how close to average we individually are to average. Going forward, that's much more valuable than some dumb "If every day were like today, in 5 weeks" number.

paperpudding

Also, regardless of what the app feature says, OP it is worth considering whether 5kg in less than a month was a realistic goal at all

You have lost 1.4 kg in 4 weeks - that is a good rate of loss for most people.

I lost at around a kg a month, roughly 1/2 pound per week - sustainable pace and then kept it off.

Don't aim for fast, aim for winning the marathon, not the sprint.