Fitbit users...general question

Mine seemed to underestimate a lot of my workouts but overestimate a run so I got a heart rate monitor for my workouts. I just record the activity on my fitbit and then adjust the difference. Any HIIT workout or strength training is usually very low on the fitbit. At least on mine. I wanted to get the most accurate numbers which is why I got the hrm.

Except HRMs aren't accurate for strength training, only elevated heart rate cardio...
The fitbit seems pretty accurate for day to day activity level type measurements for me. I use a Polar HRM for cardio.

I think my FitBit is very accurate - but it depends on how you have your activity setting. If I have it set to sedentary it will give me a lot more calories than if I say I'm active. I get about 50-200 calories a day or so.

I never actually use my HRM anymore - just let FitBit do its thing. Strength training doesn't burn enough calories for me to care about the few calories FitBit is missing.

I find my Fitbit extremely accurate...to the point where I tell people that I think it might be magical! Seriously! Ok...not seriously :-)

I work on my feet and have had days where I have walked 10,000 steps (and sometimes even more!) at a fast, rushed pace. My Fitbit will give me about 1000 extra calories to eat on those days. However, I went to a festival on one particular day off, and walked 10,000 steps at a very slow pace as I meandered through the crowds. The Ftbit gave me only 500 extra calories to eat that day. Meaning, not only does it count steps, but it adjusts for speed too. It knows what it's doing! Also, I have counted steps manually up to 500, and the Fitbit was off by one singly step. If you connect it to MFP, you can feel safe in knowing that the calculations it gives you are accurate.

Just a note based on a previous post. The Fitbit doesn't use the TDEE -20% formula. It uses the same formula as MFP, which is total daily calories burned and then subtracts a number based on what you set it for....500 for 1 pound weight loss a week, 1000 for 2 pounds a week etc. Just make sure you have both programs set to the same goal. Also, the way the Fitbit dashboard tells you how many calories you can eat is approached differently as the days goes by, so the number of calories you can eat often looks very different, but as the days comes to an end, the numbers slowly start to match up.

Just remember, the Fitbit is meant to calculate your baseline activities. It replaces the guesswork in MFP when you have to choose between sedentary, lightly active, active, very active ect. by giving MFP an exact number in real time. It is NOT meant to give you a way to record your exercise*. For that, you have to use the MFP database, or use a heart rate monitor. When you do this, just remember to add a start time so that Fitbit knows when this increased activity occurred, and it can adjust your dashboard and goals accordingly.

I set MFP to sedentary and watch the Fitbit give me more and more calories as I do more activities.

There seems to be a LOT of confusion on these forums about how Fitbit works, and a lot of this stems from the fact that people don't understand how MFP works either. You need to make sure you know exactly how MFP calculates the number of calories you should be eating every day, and why it does it that way. Once you know this, you will easily be able to see what variable MFP is replacing with the Fitbit. It also doesn't hurt to learn exactly what the Fitbit is calculating, how it calculates it, and how it's predicting your calories for the day. It's much easier to blindly trust the Fitbit when you understand all these items.

There are a million posts on these forums with people explaining the math/calculations/process of the Fitbit in a million different ways. Read a few of these, and I'm sure it will all make sense.

*Apparently, you can use the Fitbit to record running, treadmills, and any exercise that has a similar motion to walking.

i dont eat back my fitbit calories, because i dont count walking around work to be exercise.

that said, i find the actual step count very accurate. i wear mine on my bra like you, and a few times i've been about to hop into bed and realised i'm ridiculously close to my step goal, so i'll count out those steps around the house, and the fitbit always counts them exactly the same

Hard to judge accuracy of something without a known-accuracy benchmark. But you can compare to expected outcomes.

I use MFP exercise cals for my cardio and strength, plus Fitbit adjustments for NEAT. I eat to those requirements to make a 500 calorie deficit. My weight has been consistently dropping by 1 pound a week. [note that my FB has been lost for a few weeks, if you look at my diary]

So for me at least, the actual outcome meets that predicted by the data. Implying that the data is accurate.

There is one place you can create errors. If you wear you fitbit when you workout, and then log the workout separately, you must enter the correct start time and duration. Otherwise you will double up on the burned cals and the Fitbit adjustment.

I use mine as an overview of my daily exercise. as for the calorie adjustments, it makes me confused so I dont pay mind to the changes it makes. I make sure I hit my calorie goal as well as I can. If i was a hard core exerciser then I would adjust my calorie intake per my work outs.

I've been very active with my Fitbit for years, but still putting on weight (even with it saying I'm hitting 3000 calories a day with consistency) ... it wasn't until I started tracking my food here on MFP that I realized I probably WAS still eating more than I was burning. If you don't track (and eat junk food) it does really add up quickly.

I have MFP set to sedentary even though I'm anything but ... as the Fitbit catches ALL activity (not just your exercise) I figure I'll get calorie credit for anything other than just sitting, and I've found it to be quite accurate. As I workout, I write down what my machines say (and I know they can't be trusted 100% either) and IF I've recorded a workout as an activity (starting/stopping the timer, which I only do every so often to double check the numbers) the Fitbit estimate is generally just a little lower than the machine readout. But at the end of the day, the total l seems pretty close to what I would have estimated by adding it all up on my own.

Thus far, (since I've been tracking my food and being better) all the numbers seem to line up perfectly with the calories in/calories out idea and the scale is finally moving in the right direction.

I love the Fitbit so much I talked my mom into getting one, and we're getting one for my dad for Father's day. I got one for my 14 year old (not to encourage activity, just to SEE how active he is, and he has been beating me on a regular basis even with my 100min of elliptical each day). My 17 year old wanted the Flex, but as it has been hard to find, he got a JawboneUp.

I am so grateful for MFP and the Fitbit sites working together, as Fitbit on it's own wasn't working for me.

Fitbit is adding every calorie from your daily activity to your BMR. Every step counts because for every step you burn calories.
I use mine for 4 months. My main exercise is ...walking and fitbit one is built for this. It's VERY accurate, at least for me.

I've lost these months 15.5 kgr/34 lbs simply subtracting from my everyday burned calories 750 in the beginning, then 500 and the last month 250 and eat the rest.
Walking, log food intake with accuracy -and honest- and that did the trick for me.
So after 1580 km/980 miles walking and 4 months -following my fitbit numbers - i am at my goal weight.

A random's week report (the amount of weight loss is exactly my calorie deficit):



PS. Sorry for my English

Fitbit is adding every calorie from your daily activity to your BMR. Every step counts because for every step you burn calories.
I use mine for 4 months. My main exercise is ...walking and fitbit one is built for this. It's VERY accurate, at least for me.

I've lost these months 15.5 kgr/34 lbs simply subtracting from my everyday burned calories 750 in the beginning, then 500 and the last month 250 and eat the rest.
Walking, log food intake with accuracy -and honest- and that did the trick for me.
So after 1580 km/980 miles walking and 4 months -following my fitbit numbers - i am at my goal weight.

A random's week report (the amount of weight loss is exactly my calorie deficit):



PS. Sorry for my English

Well done on your progress

jjx

I order mine waiting for it to come.

I just got my FitBit 4 days ago, but I love it so far!

One thing, for me, is that I turned on the 'allow negative' calories feature. Because I sync with my iPhone, I have no issues syncing on a regular basis. I don't love that it 'takes calories away from me,' but it gives me motivation to get up and walk around at work, and I think it's a more accurate picture of actual calories burned. We have 2 bathrooms on our hall - one is 30 steps further away. I walk to that one now, just so I can get those extra 60 steps in! I think the negative calories is helpful, especially if you work out really hard, but then sit at your desk all day.

For example, this morning I burned 650+ calories in a fitness class (calculated using my HRM). So I added that to MFP. But my FitBit has me at -103 calories right now (650-103=547 additional calories I can eat) because I haven't been that active the rest of the day. My guess is that it will be in a positive place by the end of the day, but that negative makes me go move some more!

The other thing that is important is if you track your workouts (I track when I do planned activity, using my HRM - so Insanity = yes. Walking around the mall = no) make sure that you record it with a time and a duration. That way your fitbit knows that you already added that specific time and spike in activity, and it will adjust accordingly so you're not recording the same event twice. Hopefully that makes sense.

So, I've looked at the Fitbit site and think the Flex would work best for me. My only question is whether or not it's really worth $100 as an adjunct to MRP?

Totally worth the price. It makes matching you intake to your output so much easier. I lost mine a couple of weeks back, and it's been a complete pain in the butt.

Not to mention that although the price is high, the customer service is stellar. I told them I lost my FB1 (entirely my own fault) and they are sending me another - free of charge. How many companies do that?