Endomondo: HRM calorie calculations (huge leap in estimates)

chairperson

Whaaaat?

In summary:
Same time, same HR today as yesterday and Endomondo thinks I burned 418 kcal vs 252 kcal yesterday. What is going on?

In length:
I currently own a Zephyr XRM. It's an opensource bluetooth capable heart rate strap that syncs with Android devices. 3rd party vendors can provide apps to read the data.

The best app I can find for tracking my heart rate while working out is the Endomondo app. I have yet to upgrade to the pro version. The nice thing about the app is that it also has a website that shows more detail.

Sooooo. When I first purchased the HRM, I ran across a few reviews that mentioned Endomondo, and then sadly pointed out that the damn thing doesn't actually take your heart rate into account when calculating calories. I lucked out though. Only a few weeks after my purchase, Endomondo released an upgrade to the website that recalculated the calories once the recorded workouts had been uploaded. There was some suggestion that old data might need to be opened, sport changed and changed back and then resaved, but imported data was supposed to be accurate.

Fab. It seemed to be working. The numbers were much lower than MFP, which I was taking as a sign of accuracy? I tested the new system by changing sports, changing back, and resaving. It held the same calories, so I was assuming it was working.

Today something is out of whack. Or...I've been burning nearly twice as many calories for the last month as I though I had.

Yesterday:
time: 29 min
avg hr: 151
max hr: 185
kcal: 252 (updated to 455 after test editing 'sport')

Today:
time: 26 min
avg hr: 154
max hr: 184
kcal: 418

Me:
Female
26
SW: 238.5
CW: 217.25

Me explaining things to myself: Endomondo was never actually using my HRM data and finally just started to. This probably makes sense since the estimates must be based on the effort an average person would put in...and I'm obese, so the same workout should, theoretically, have me burning substantially more calories. Right...maybe?

I shall use all of the bold

smileybooliz

Sounds like you got a pretty decent workout. I'm close to the same weight at you but I'm 44 so my numbers are very similar to you. I use my HRM to get an average heart rate for my workout. Then I take that number and go to shapesense.com and use their heart rate calorie burner calculator. I went and entered your info and it came up with burning 236 calories if your average heart rate was 154 for 26 minutes.

Hopefully after a few days you'll get a better idea of how the app works and you'll know what your average calorie burn is :flowerforyou:

theNurseNancy

The problem with online calculators and calories burned via average HR is that it doesn't take into account how many calories you burned at the higher HRs. Ive found that my HRM (which tracks calories cumulatively) is very accurate and is displaying more calories burned than I would have gotten plugging my numbers into some online calculator. However, it shouldn't be such a huge difference as you have there.

chairperson

A glitch in the system. Looks like somebody screwed up some math on the backend or something. I just went to test it again. Pressed edit, pressed save, and it recalculated to a much more normal number.

New estimate is 237.

Azdak

It all depends on how the software is calculating the calories. That's really what makes it accurate or not. Any device can measure your heart rate. That's just a matter of having a receiver for the signals transmitted by the chest strap.

But those signals are just raw data--they mean absolutely nothing except counting your heart beats. Estimating calories is done by the software and the accuracy depends on how the software is programmed.

Companies like Polar, Suunto, and Firstbeat Technologies, have spent years and years and years researching this subject and validating their algorithms. These are proprietary. That's why models from these companies are more accurate than other brands. If you are not using an HRM or other device from one of these companies, then you have no idea how they are determining their estimates. They could be accurate, they might not--unless someone publishes a validation study on one of those devices, there is no way to tell.

The only thing I can say to to try walking on a treadmill at 3.0 miles per hour for 45 minutes. Total calories should be about 225-235. If it is way different than that, then it is likely that your setup or the program itself is not accurate.