How accurate are mfp's tdee calculations?

pursuitofoblivion
pursuitofoblivion Posts: 21 Member
in Goal: Maintaining Weight
Can anyone give me any information about the accuracy of mfp's tdee calculations? I have been looking at the calories I am said to be burning on an average sedentary day, and they seem a bit high to me. Does anyone have any input?

Replies

  • Whiskeytub
    Whiskeytub Posts: 96 Member
    I think their calculations are accurate enough, the trick is figuring out where you qualify on the scale of sedentary to active. They don't offer a lot of variation, so you have kind of a lot to figure out:

    First off, do your workouts vary or are they consistent? For example, I am a very active person and have a part time strenuous job and a part time sedentary job. My workouts vary drastically from day to day - sometimes I do hiit, other days a long slow run, and always a certain amount of walking in the woods, at different paces depending how tired or energetic I am. I chose "Lightly Active" while losing weight and simply added all of my excersizes in as I did them (always eating back excersize calories). However, if you had a job that was the same every day and your workouts didn't vary too much, you might want to choose moderately active or active and just not log your extra calories from excersize.

    If you are maintaining, you may have to experiment a little bit and set your calories manually as there is a rather drastic difference between each activity level.
  • rbiss
    rbiss Posts: 422 Member
    From what I read, mfp doesn't use TDEE its something else. It doesn't take exercise into account but it takes lifestyle. NEAT maybe. Mine is set up for 2 lbs a week and I routinely loose 3-4 so its off for me. I am afraid to change my activity level because I have a desk job. Anyways, for me its way off but I am loosing weight so I don't really care. In 3 months if it's still wrong, I will re-calculate.

    I have a fitbit and I am going to start comparing what it says I burn in a normal day to mfp and probably go off the fitbit.
  • LivingtheLeanDream
    LivingtheLeanDream Posts: 13,342 Member
    I also think they are accurate enough, I have a Fitbit now and that gives me a similar TDEE to here. I lose or did lose pretty consistently going by that. (am pretty much at maintenance weight now)
  • sijomial
    sijomial Posts: 19,809 Member
    Myfitnesspal isn't a TDEE calculator. Are you really sedentary every day?

    It's just an estimate that will be too low for some, too high for others and accurate for a number of people - think of a bell curve.
  • BoxerBrawler
    BoxerBrawler Posts: 2,032 Member
    I calculated my TDEE of IIFMY.com and then plugged my numbers into MFP. I don't log my exercise calories but it works differently for different people based upon their stats, activity level, goals, etc. Mine works great for me and I also have a Fitbit and a Nano that both track steps and calories burned. I did an average once between the numbers on the ARC machine I was using, my Fitbit, my Nano and the number MPF gave me and believe it or not they were all very close... I'd say within 15 to 20 calories.

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