How accurate are MFP exercise calories?

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  • smalls9686
    smalls9686 Posts: 189 Member
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    Lol, This for sure!
    I wonder why folks think a HRM calorie reading is accurate. How do you know?

    Because there's quite a large body of science establishing the relationship between MHR, VO2 max and calories burned during exercise and regressing predictive formulae from large samples of actual experimental observations. There's also a lot empirical confirmation of the math by a lot of HRM users out there, from casual dieters all the way up to professional athletes.
  • rwhawkes
    rwhawkes Posts: 117 Member
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    I cycle quite a bit and use my garmin 405cx to track distance etc. If I am wearing the heart rate monitor the calorie burn it estimates is about a third of what it estimates when I am not wearing it. With the hrm it can tell how hard I am working because all 60 minute rides are not the same because of wind, hills, speed etc.

    Incidentally the estimated burn without hrm is quite close to mfp's
  • amg394
    amg394 Posts: 18 Member
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    bump!

    for example: if the arc cybex trainer says I burned 400 calories, MFP says I burned like 322. Should I count MFP or the machine?
  • rileyscoutko
    rileyscoutko Posts: 38 Member
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    i've actually found that i'm burning more calories than what MFP says. during an hour of zumba i burn 580 calories (i also push myself extremely hard). MFP says I only burn 511.

    This has happened with a few other exercises as well.

    Hope this helps!
  • eidnahenri2
    eidnahenri2 Posts: 21
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    I've checked 2 different calorie burning calculators online, my treadmill, and the app RunKeeper....
    MFP was lower than all of those.... so I use MFP. *shrugs*

    Like most things in the world, it works for some and doesn't for others I guess.

    This was very similar to my experience, back when I logged any exercise calories at all. Now I don't bother with that and try to only eat maintenance calories for my goal weight (only 20-ish pounds away), regardless of exercise/activity. This may not work for anybody else, but even though it's very slow, it has been working for me, without all the number crunching I used to do before.

    :ohwell:

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