Myfitnesspal vs OTHERS (Serious Question)

Calories = a unit of energy, right?

So if you eat 1200 calories you may be ok nutritionwise but if you eat 1200 calories and burn an extra 500, probably not so much.

The 1% you mentioned is perfect, as it takes into account the size of the person.

Thanks for that. I'm really the only person I've ever seen on here touting that piece of advice.

But eating 1200 and burning 1200+x is how you lose weight. Calories exist in our stored body fat at the rate of 3500ish per pound. Nutrition comes from food. Calories can come from today's food or stored fat in our cells. That's how we lose weight. It's what the fat is there for-- times of deficit.

1% is fine and lovely. I'm just saying 2lbs/week is not unhealthy according to weight loss and medical authorities. For most of us 1-2% IS 1-2 lbs/week because we weigh between 100 and 200. So it's kind of splitting hairs.

Your body burns a certain number of calories per day even if you're in a coma. Probably around 1300 calories. Therefore, if you only eat 1200 calories a day and are in a coma, you'll lose weight. When you start walking around, watching tv, working, you burn more. Probably a total of 1800-2200. Therefore, if you eat 1200 and do nothing else, you'll lose weight.

If you're only eating 1200 calories and then burning an extra amount (on top of the say 1800 you burn already) by working out. You can, potentially, be eating too little--depending on the amount of stored fat you have.

To determine which is best depends on how active you are and how much weight you're trying to lose.

If you're sedentary and have a lot of weight to lose then Lose It is the best way to go. Because it has a more accurate suggested daily calorie intake than MyFitnessPal. Lose It gives you about 250 more calories a day for sedentary users than MyFitnessPal does and Lose It works. So if you aren't into cardio and just wanna lose weight by eating less, then Lose It is the best bet. I lost 20 pounds in my first 2 months using Lose It and almost 50 pounds total.

Now when you start doing a lot of calorie burning exercises MyFitnessPal becomes more useful. I use FitBit One to track my walking. I actually end up with more calories to spend per day using MFP when I walk than I do with Lose It.

So in end your preference should be based on your lifestyle. If you're just gonna lose weight by counting calories then Lose It is the best. If you're gonna go through more calorie burning exercises then you go with MyFitnessPal. And if you're like me and have a lot of weight to lose but like to walk you start out with Lose It and then switch over to MyFitnessPal.

I now use both. MyFitnessPal when I walk a lot and Lose It when I can't walk a lot.