New to FitBit and need help understanding the calculations please!

nmb0717
nmb0717 Posts: 130 Member
edited November 2024 in Health and Weight Loss
I bought and connected my Fitbit Flex to MFP yesterday. Today was my first full day using the tracker. My daily calories are set at 1850. So far, I have 1632 food calories logged. Fitbit ADDED 650 calories to my daily total yet somehow it is coming out to -432 calories. I am completely baffled by this math. Can anyone explain? I noticed Fitbit doesn't really come with good support/instructions and their website says they can't really answer specific questions in regards to linking it with MFP. Big thanks!

Replies

  • editorgrrl
    editorgrrl Posts: 7,060 Member
    You can learn more in the Fitbit Users group: http://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/group/1290-fitbit-users

    Your Fitbit burn is TDEE (aka your maintenance calories). Adjustments are the difference between your Fitbit burn & your MFP activity level.

    If you enable negative calorie adjustments http://www.myfitnesspal.com/account/diary_settings and eat your adjustments, you're eating TDEE minus your deficit.
  • earlnabby
    earlnabby Posts: 8,171 Member
    edited March 2015
    Are you looking at the Fitbit site or at MFP? Fitbit adds calories burned as the day goes on so it is accurate to the last sync.

    I only look at MFP. i have the negative calorie adjustment turned off because I have calculated my calories via MFP's NEAT method and ignore Fitbit's TDEE method. This way, the MFP calorie target is my only target to look at. As soon as I get enough steps in for Fitbit to give me extra calories (usually when I get over 5,000), it adds them to my MFP target. I will not eat less than my base MFP target so it doesn't make sense to have Fitbit take calories away, only to have them add them back in later in the day.
  • editorgrrl
    editorgrrl Posts: 7,060 Member
    earlnabby wrote: »
    I only look at MFP. i have the negative calorie adjustment turned off because I have calculated my calories via MFP's NEAT method and ignore Fitbit's TDEE method. This way, the MFP calorie target is my only target to look at.

    Disabling negative calorie adjustments means you never eat at a true deficit on days you burn fewer calories than your MFP activity level.
  • nmb0717
    nmb0717 Posts: 130 Member
    Thanks. I am still lost though because with my calories set at 1850 (not far from my recommended calorie intake per the Scooby calculator), I am still at -149 exercise calories despite 2 hours of dancing, a 25 minute dog walk and a 30 minute HIIT strength training class. What I see from other posts is that the strength aspect of the workout isn't necessarily logged by Fitbit because it only measures steps. Is that correct?
  • editorgrrl
    editorgrrl Posts: 7,060 Member
    Fitbit tracks step-based activity. Non-step exercise (like swimming or biking) can be logged either in Fitbit or on MFP—never both. Exercise logged in MFP overwrites your Fitbit burn during that time.

    Click on your adjustment to see the math MFP used to calculate it.
  • earlnabby
    earlnabby Posts: 8,171 Member
    edited March 2015
    editorgrrl wrote: »
    earlnabby wrote: »
    I only look at MFP. i have the negative calorie adjustment turned off because I have calculated my calories via MFP's NEAT method and ignore Fitbit's TDEE method. This way, the MFP calorie target is my only target to look at.

    Disabling negative calorie adjustments means you never eat at a true deficit on days you burn fewer calories than your MFP activity level.

    Actually you do if you used NEAT because NEAT calculates your average daily expenditure based on overall lifestyle activity level. It is what you would lose on if you did no additional exercise. When using NEAT to calculate calories, you need to eat back exercise calories or else you would go into too deep of a deficit. TDEE calculates based on lifestyle activity level PLUS exercise so you don't eat back if you use that.

  • earlnabby
    earlnabby Posts: 8,171 Member
    nmb0717 wrote: »
    Thanks. I am still lost though because with my calories set at 1850 (not far from my recommended calorie intake per the Scooby calculator), I am still at -149 exercise calories despite 2 hours of dancing, a 25 minute dog walk and a 30 minute HIIT strength training class. What I see from other posts is that the strength aspect of the workout isn't necessarily logged by Fitbit because it only measures steps. Is that correct?

    Log any targeted exercise except walking into MFP so you get the credit for it. Fitbit will still count the steps, but the exercise logged and calories burned doing it will be over written on Fitbit (so you don't get double credit).

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