Fitbit Flex and eating all my calories...

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Miss_Mae3
Miss_Mae3 Posts: 27 Member
in Health and Weight Loss
I just purchased a fitbit flex and synced it to MFP. I am wondering if I am supposed to eat all the calories the fitbit adds? I feel like I'm going to be eating too much. For example-Today I earned 584 calories from my fitbit tracker- my calorie goal for food has jumped from 1350 (my daily goal) to almost 2000 calories... I guess I am not sure if I should be eating all of those calories or not? What does everyone else do? Will I still lose weight eating all of the calories?...Let me know what you think-

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  • my_2_cents
    my_2_cents Posts: 109 Member
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    Those are calories you burn through movement, you will still have the calorie deficit you set on your plan.

    One thing I find is that my wife's flex gives her many more steps than my Fitbit one gives me, so I don't trust hers. To combat this fear, many people on here eat their calorie goal, plus 50% of their exercise calories. This means you can earn yourself treat foods that you want by running or walking more.
  • RHachicho
    RHachicho Posts: 1,115 Member
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    Fitbit's calorie adjustment is only an estimate but in my experience it's not that inaccurate. Or at least it isn't with me. The only real way to know for sure is to eat back your calories and see what happens. If you gain weight for a couple of weeks then fine. Cut back a bit.
  • lemurcat12
    lemurcat12 Posts: 30,886 Member
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    It's pretty accurate for me. It's also what convinced me that it was silly to be at sedentary, because I wasn't really. Often when you get significant Fitbit calories, it's related to being on too low an activity setting with MFP.
  • Hybrice
    Hybrice Posts: 117 Member
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    It's pretty accurate for me. It's also what convinced me that it was silly to be at sedentary, because I wasn't really. Often when you get significant Fitbit calories, it's related to being on too low an activity setting with MFP.

    You're always better setting it to sedentary as Fitbit will offset the difference if you exercise more. Otherwise on days where you do little/nothing MFP will be telling you that you have 2000+ cals to eat, when you don't.
  • sticky130
    sticky130 Posts: 101 Member
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    I have MFP set at sedentary and negative calories from FitBit, so each morning I start off in a negative. At the end of the day I'll have an extra 2-300 over my sedentary calories through all the walking I've done and any other manually recorded exercise. Therefore if I have a day where I don't even get off my bum I'll have less than bare minimum calories to spend!!
  • DR2501
    DR2501 Posts: 661 Member
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    I've fond my flex to be accurate also, but as a general principle I don't eat back all my exercise/fitbit calories even though that's how MFP is set up.
  • mfp2014mfp
    mfp2014mfp Posts: 689 Member
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    I had my account set to sedentary and I ate back ALL of my calories, I found it to be pretty spot on :flowerforyou:
  • Miss_Mae3
    Miss_Mae3 Posts: 27 Member
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    I have mine set a sedentary because i work an office/desk job during the week. Maybe I just had that many exercise calories to eat back because I am so much more active on the weekends. That day I had gone for a 25 min bike ride and probably an hour and a half hike too. With so much luck from everyone else I will consider eating most of them back :) THANK YOU!!
  • Karla48
    Karla48 Posts: 1 Member
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    I did the same thing today, and linked Fitbit with myfitness pal, and was wondering about the same question. So Thank you for asking it, and I don't understand it either. So maybe we will get some good replies that can explain it.
  • lemurcat12
    lemurcat12 Posts: 30,886 Member
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    It's pretty accurate for me. It's also what convinced me that it was silly to be at sedentary, because I wasn't really. Often when you get significant Fitbit calories, it's related to being on too low an activity setting with MFP.

    You're always better setting it to sedentary as Fitbit will offset the difference if you exercise more. Otherwise on days where you do little/nothing MFP will be telling you that you have 2000+ cals to eat, when you don't.

    That's what negative adjustments are for.

    I know it works either way, but I prefer feeling compelled to get the activity in. The bigger point is that if you are getting big adjustments it's often evidence that you were at too low an activity setting. Once you are using the Fitbit it doesn't matter, if you eat them back, of course.
  • 12bfree
    12bfree Posts: 67 Member
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    I have a Fitbit Flex but I only use it to document trends. I never "eat back" exercise or daily activity calories

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