What if you don't track exercise?

I am wondering if I eat my allocated calories per day and exercise but don't log it if I will lose weight or not?

Yes, if your origional goal is set correctly exercising and not eating back those calories would cause you to lose more weight than expected since you are creating a larger deficit.

I used to log my exercise 3 times a week as I did running but have fallen out with that so now do exercise dvds at least 5 times a week but am a bit confused as on the 'my goals' section it says something about my gial for calorie burning is 290 even though I have set my work outs per week all to 0?

The calorie burning and exercise plan in your profile does not actually affect the calorie goal MFP gives you, it is more just for your planning benefit. You can just ignore it.

You could change your activity level to light active or active, depending on how often you do them.

As long as you are actually doing the exercise 5x per week for at least a half hour, and have it set for 290 calories of exercise included in your goals, there should be no problems whatsoever if you dont log the actual calories and dont change anything. In fact, this would probably be a great way to compensate for the inevitable poor logging of food that everyone does! Just adjust your food intake based on what you see over the next few weeks: if you are losing too fast, increase cals a bit, if too slow, decrease, etc.

*edit..I would not log those DVDs as circuit training as has been suggested, circuit training estimates will be high for most people, for most DVDs, but of course there are variations in both directions...

As long as you are actually doing the exercise 5x per week for at least a half hour, and have it set for 290 calories of exercise included in your goals, there should be no problems whatsoever if you dont log the actual calories and dont change anything.

She doesn't have it set for 290 calories in her goals. There's no way to do that other than by adding it on manually to the goal you get (doing custom goals and not guided). I believe what she's saying is that when MFP asked what exercise she planned to do, she gave an amount and that's the projection it came up with. People get confused by this all the time, but it doesn't actually affect the calorie goal at all.

Just adjust your food intake based on what you see over the next few weeks: if you are losing too fast, increase cals a bit, if too slow, decrease, etc.

Agree, although if she has it on sedentary I'd start by changing that (or just increasing the existing goal a bit).

As long as your creating a calorie deficit your gonna lose weight no matter what, so if you don't wanna log you don't have to I just like to be as accurate as possible so I use a hrm for my workouts, and weigh and measure all my foods. I do know nothing is an exact science but it helps me to feel better.

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The rule of thumb is that cardio exercise does not burn a lot of calories,

Actually, the rule of thumb is the opposite of that.

ETA: OP, I don't log exercise here either. I eat a percentage of TDEE based on 3x/week. No calculating of exercise necessary.

Uhm, cardio burns tons of calories. Well, at least the way *I* do it.

Here, here :drinker: Me, too, that's why I don't need to do more than 30 minutes a day of it. Running (higher than jogging pace esp.), climbing stairs, vigorous jump roping, road cycling (sprint pace), incline hiking, elliptical on high resistance, etc. are all types of cardio with high burn rates. There are many more, but those are the kinds *I* have done.

To the OP, if you have a set weekly workout schedule (example, MWF 45min-1hr of mixed exercise), calculating your TDEE based on your planned exercise, less 15-20% (more than 20% is too aggressive, generally). Eat that number every single day (even rest days) for weight loss.

Uhm, cardio burns tons of calories. Well, at least the way *I* do it.

Well it has to be done for long periods of time, or if you're in great shape you can do it more intensely. But for someone who is trying to get IN shape, they might not be able to do it as hard. All I'm saying is some exercise is not has hard as people think and doesn't burn thousands of calories.

Who's trying to or claiming to burn "thousands of calories" in a "standard" cardio session?

The rule of thumb is that cardio exercise does not burn a lot of calories, so in order for you to utilize calories, you have to do lots of it. Cardio that involves complete motion of the legs will be the best. I think 60 to 90 minutes a day is recommended for fat loss. That and a sensible diet. So I could see how just doing a half hour of something won't have an effect.

Ummm this is so wrong! Cardio is what burns calories, and how much you burn depends on your weight and intensity level. Heck I can burn almost a 1000 calories doing one hour of cardio especially in beast mode. A 30 minute workout is a great start, when I first started I could only do 20 minutes you will build up your endurance as you go along.

Well according to Steve Turano, the average person only burns 70 calories through 15 minutes of exercise. So, sometimes I feel we overestimate how much we are burning.

Uhm, I call B.S. that the average person burns 280 cals in an hour of cardio. When I was obese I burned 700-800 cals an hour doing Zumba. Now I do 300-350 because I'm not that tall or wide. And I don't "need" to lose weight, I lean out towards races at 117-118 lbs at 5'4". Anyone who needs to lose weight will burn plenty in an hour of cardio. The bigger you are, the more you burn.

Well according to Steve Turano, the average person only burns 70 calories through 15 minutes of exercise. So, sometimes I feel we overestimate how much we are burning.

I don't know who these Steve Turano is or what he considers average people, but the more you weigh the more you burn. I can't speak for others, but I use a HRM with strap, and nothing is exact but it's close enough to accurate without me having to worry about overestimating.

Since losing weight means one's sedentary TDEE goes down, my plan is to keep my calories steady but up my activity until that doesn't work anymore. I need to lose weight. I also need to move more. I love to eat and I'm not left hungry at 1750 cal. Seems like a no-brainer.

Ignore that I'm only 4 pounds down right now. That's due to avoiding MFP, eating to excess, and being a total couch potato. When I'm on the ball, I lose 1 to 1 1/2 pounds a week like clockwork. See, the problem's really between my ears.

Well according to Steve Turano, the average person only burns 70 calories through 15 minutes of exercise. So, sometimes I feel we overestimate how much we are burning.

Uhm, I call B.S. that the average person burns 280 cals in an hour of cardio. When I was obese I burned 700-800 cals an hour doing Zumba. Now I do 300-350 because I'm not that tall or wide. And I don't "need" to lose weight, I lean out towards races at 117-118 lbs at 5'4". Anyone who needs to lose weight will burn plenty in an hour of cardio. The bigger you are, the more you burn.

Maybe you're right. I'm just going by what he said. But here is his video about Zumba.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c6feTIQDGW4

Eh, maybe I would have learned something if I had finished it but I stopped pretty early on when that video showed a link to a fat loss pill website and the website has one of his videos on their main page.