If everyday were like today... is it accurate?

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AngieM476
AngieM476 Posts: 5
in Health and Weight Loss
I finished my log today and it told me if every day were like today I'd way 105 pounds in 5 weeks. I'm 118 pounds right now. 5 ft 2. I eat 1,200 calories and burn about 900 calories a day, seven days a week. Is this accurate? That seems like a lot of weight to drop in just 5 weeks. How does their system calculate that? Has anyone's results matched up with what their system predicts?

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  • Mokey41
    Mokey41 Posts: 5,769 Member
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    Every day is never like today so it may or may not be close. You'd have to eat and do exactly the same thing for those 5 weeks to even test it out.
  • TheRealParisLove
    TheRealParisLove Posts: 1,907 Member
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    It's not accurate at all. It is a basic math formula based on your height, weight, gender and age to calculate your BMR, then counts every pound of fat lost at 3500 calories under BMR.

    But it is still a good motivator to see how much you are over eating and how long you reasonably have before any serious damage is done on your progress.
  • WhitR86
    WhitR86 Posts: 25 Member
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    So you only have a net 300 cals? Don't think that's good from what I've read so far. You are sposed to eat back most of the cals burn off in exercise...
  • demilade
    demilade Posts: 402 Member
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    Lol I marked one of those in my diary, I will see in 2 weeks if it's accurate
  • 77tes
    77tes Posts: 7,758 Member
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    On the days you have a big deficit, the message will predict huge losses. On days you go way over, it will predict gains. When I was very close to my calorie goal for 5 weeks, it was actually spot on.
  • Juashmom
    Juashmom Posts: 55
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    I'd say no its not accurate but then again you would have to do exactly the same thing every day and I would think that would be incredibly boring.
  • elisa123gal
    elisa123gal Posts: 4,287 Member
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    I don't know..but it sure is a happy way to end the day.
  • ohyousillygirl
    ohyousillygirl Posts: 76 Member
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    I think it’s accurate if you eat the exact same thing (or calorie amount, maybe) every day for the 5 weeks. Most people obviously wouldn’t be doing that. The weight it gives me varies every time, haha. Especially if I’ve gone over / eaten under my given calories.
  • lenoresaari
    lenoresaari Posts: 500 Member
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    Like others have mentioned you would have to have all the days the same in exercise and intake of food. I have had a chance to test it and find that its pretty accurate over the last 120 or so days. It seems that the pounds are slowly dropping if I stick to it. SLOWLY I say but the deficit is enough to make the scale go down. Nice how that works!!
  • alexandraei
    alexandraei Posts: 2 Member
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    I believe that it is somehow accurate. It takes into consideration that 3500 calories in deficit per week would mean you will lose 1 lb. That means that each day during that week, you would have a deficit of 500 calories. Now, I think that you need to take into consideration all the others factors that could influence your body and weight loss goals (stress, or maybe your body will adapt with the condition you created to accomplish weight loss).
  • jpofit
    jpofit Posts: 10 Member
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    Its accurate and its not. If you were to get that EXACT Intake and EXACT burn everyday, then yes - the math works and you would be spot on -- but depending on how quick your body responds to food and exercise habits will change the amount of calories you actually burn, so in order to get intake/burn exact, what you track for food and exercise in your diary should be changing over time. ex. If you ran everyday at the same pace for the same amount of time, the amount you burn will gradually decrease as your body gets comfortable running that pace for that duration (myfitnesspal cannot determine those differences). But it does help as a marker :)
  • Huzke
    Huzke Posts: 97 Member
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    It will be accurate for some and inaccurate for others. It's been close for me, actually.
  • foleyshirley
    foleyshirley Posts: 1,043 Member
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    So you only have a net 300 cals? Don't think that's good from what I've read so far. You are sposed to eat back most of the cals burn off in exercise...

    This! Why would you do this if you weigh 108. Doesn't make sense. I truly think you need to re-think things.
  • lirr10185
    lirr10185 Posts: 37 Member
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    I was wondering the same thing last night, so I marked it in my calendar. Good way to keep me motivated for 5 weeks to see if it does work because I ate pretty good yesterday and I liked what the number was.
  • AnvilHead
    AnvilHead Posts: 18,344 Member
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    It's not accurate because:

    1) Every day is not like every other day unless you eat the exact same things, do the exact same exercise and have the exact same daily routine every single day.

    2) Weight loss is not a linear process. The weight isn't going to come off at a steady rate week after week. There will be plateaus and "whooshes" mixed in due to a number of factors (hormonal fluctuations, water balance, etc.).

    3) Energy balance (calories in vs. calories out) is a game of approximations. Unless you're hooked up to a machine to measure your energy expenditure 24 hours a day and are eating absolutely nothing but lab-quality foods and liquids which are meticulously weighed and measured for each meal/snack, what you're logging is a rough estimate within a couple/few hundred calories either way.

    The MFP estimate is a "snapshot" based upon the energy balance (in vs. out) you logged for that particular day. It doesn't know anything about yesterday, nor does it know anything about tomorrow, next Tuesday, or that big birthday party coming up three Saturdays from now. If you write it down today and it comes out to be accurate five weeks from now, call it serendipity - but don't count on it as an accurate indicator.
  • nutroll1
    nutroll1 Posts: 5
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    It's not accurate because:

    1) Every day is not like every other day unless you eat the exact same things, do the exact same exercise and have the exact same daily routine every single day.

    2) Weight loss is not a linear process. The weight isn't going to come off at a steady rate week after week. There will be plateaus and "whooshes" mixed in due to a number of factors (hormonal fluctuations, water balance, etc.).

    3) Energy balance (calories in vs. calories out) is a game of approximations. Unless you're hooked up to a machine to measure your energy expenditure 24 hours a day and are eating absolutely nothing but lab-quality foods and liquids which are meticulously weighed and measured for each meal/snack, what you're logging is a rough estimate within a couple/few hundred calories either way.

    The MFP estimate is a "snapshot" based upon the energy balance (in vs. out) you logged for that particular day. It doesn't know anything about yesterday, nor does it know anything about tomorrow, next Tuesday, or that big birthday party coming up three Saturdays from now. If you write it down today and it comes out to be accurate five weeks from now, call it serendipity - but don't count on it as an accurate indicator.

    This is by far the best answer given.

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