Heart rate monitor and calorie counter

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tnp223
tnp223 Posts: 11 Member
in Fitness and Exercise
Anyone know f a good heart rate monitor that counts calories? I want one I can wear all day and see how many calories i actually burn in a day through exercise and sitting at my desk.

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  • laurahamm96
    laurahamm96 Posts: 46 Member
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    I got the polar ft4 and it counts calories. I have been meaning to wear it for a 24 cycle and see what I am "really" burning.
  • YorriaRaine
    YorriaRaine Posts: 370 Member
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    I got the polar ft4 and it counts calories. I have been meaning to wear it for a 24 cycle and see what I am "really" burning.

    Polar ft4 is meant to count calories during a cardio exercise period. It isn't meant to show you your burn for a 24 hour period. For something like that you would need fitbit or another arm band like it.

    I love Polar for figuring out what I'm burning during my workouts, as far as arm bands that estimate calories you burn throughout the day, there is fitbit, nike arm bands, the list goes on and on. They will all be estimations.
  • 3dogsrunning
    3dogsrunning Posts: 27,167 Member
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    That ^^

    It is not designed or intended to estimate calories over the day. It will not be accurate.

    There are other activity monitors like Fitbit that will give you estimates for daily calorie requirements, but they do not (as of yet) include HR.

    ETA - HRMs also do not "count" calories. They monitor HR and will give an estimation for calories burned.
    A great blog on the topic
    http://www.myfitnesspal.com/blog/Azdak/view/the-real-facts-about-hrms-and-calories-what-you-need-to-know-before-purchasing-an-hrm-or-using-one-21472
  • mom2kpr
    mom2kpr Posts: 348 Member
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    Your best bet would be a Fitbit or Body Media type device. HRM are not meant to worn all day, it will give you a highly inflated burn. I have a fitbit & love it. It works best if you have one of each. The Fitbit for all day & a HRM for cardio exercise.
  • laurahamm96
    laurahamm96 Posts: 46 Member
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    I did not know this. Thank you for the link!
  • geebusuk
    geebusuk Posts: 3,348 Member
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    A heart rate monitor will only provide useful information when doing steady state cardio.

    Personally, I'd recommend the motoactv with a HRM strap for when doing cardio.

    It's unfortunately discontinued, but still available new and second hand.

    It works as a pedometer and gives you a figure from that, but it is also a GPS sports watch device - it will connect to Ant+ and bluetooth/BT Smart devices, so you can get better information when doing your cardio.
    It has listings for lots of things.
    It displays a calorie burn for the day and you can get the figures after to show how many it thinks you've burnt in the day.

    So far it seems to be the best overall all-inclusive device you can get, to my mind.
  • asciiqwerty
    asciiqwerty Posts: 565 Member
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    note from a pedant - these machines *estimate* calories often based on the use of empirical formulae

    if they work for you great, if they dont' it may well be that hte estimation is slightly off

    they are likely to be very accurate in giving you an idea of how your activity varies over time (ie the trend), and less accurate in specific values of calories burned
  • rpmtnbkr
    rpmtnbkr Posts: 137 Member
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    Polar now has thier version of the FitBit called Loop. It does have the HRM feature. As with the others it monitors your activity, estimates your calories burned, calculates steps (which I've found to be wildly fluctuating compared to the pedometer I wear). What sold me was the HRM feature along with thier reputation.

    Downside IMO is that there is no easy way to start/stop hrm session other than removing transmitter/strap.
  • TAsunder
    TAsunder Posts: 423 Member
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    Slight correction: The loop requires a heart rate strap/monitor but will incorporate that into its functionality. I believe it only works with the Bluetooth straps (e.g. H7)
  • geebusuk
    geebusuk Posts: 3,348 Member
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    It should also be noted that ANY calorie calculation, be it exercise or food is going to be a bit of a 'guess'.
    It makes sense to get it as accurate as is reasonable without TOO much hassle.

    Of course, the best test is the scales (not always accurate) and better, the trend they show - weigh daily and average over time.

    If you don't have consistent exercise (for instance today I cycled 15 miles, the return trip of that with an extra 15kg of dog food on the back of the bike - something I only do once a month or so), then having something that gives you a decent idea of what you've done helps.

    It also helps if you want to track your fitness generally - see if you're improving your cardio performance and so on.

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