TDEE or mfp maintenence calories?

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coryrood
coryrood Posts: 100 Member
in Goal: Maintaining Weight
Would you recommend doing TDEE or mfp maintenence calories with excersize calories? My only issue with TDEE is it assumes I'm going to set a strict number of workouts a week. Some weeks I workout 3 times others 6 and everything inbrtween. My concern with mfp and excersize calories is how accurate it is ( I use a hrm for workouts)

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  • IvyRose8
    IvyRose8 Posts: 25 Member
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    I was just going through this very thing. I have TDEE data based on rest days (less carbs and calories) and workout days (a little more). Since I don't think we can have two different types of days here, I just averaged them and entered that information as my daily goals.
  • Ericdanielkwong
    Ericdanielkwong Posts: 18 Member
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    if you want to be safe, you can hit your TDEE and assume that anything you do in the gym puts you in a deficit. thats what worked for me to get shredded. plus, what Ivyrose8 said is also a really good idea.
  • maxit
    maxit Posts: 880 Member
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    I have had MFP set at maintenance/sedentary with calories out inputted via Fitbit. Calories-out amounts vary day to day but my appetite mirrors the variation so it has been working fine. It's been about 7 weeks, with calories in/out being virtually identical over a rolling 30 day horizon. I have lost a little over a pound in that time so my calories out may be a bit higher than FB thinks. So far so good, though.
  • ahoy_m8
    ahoy_m8 Posts: 3,053 Member
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    TDEE simplifies maintenance **IF**, as you point out, your burns are consistent over some discrete interval of time, like 7 days or 10 days or 3 or whatever. If there is a lot of variety there, the computations you would do to compensate for variability could be more complex than just tracking intake and output separately. What is simplest for your exercise pattern?
  • coryrood
    coryrood Posts: 100 Member
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    Simplest would be to track my excersize and add it to mfp goal. I'm just concerned about the accuracy if the numbers I'm getting from my hrm (polar m400) i.e. today I did a 5.1 mile run with an avg. Hr of 149 bpm (77%) for 63 minutes and it says I burned 775 calories.
  • ahoy_m8
    ahoy_m8 Posts: 3,053 Member
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    I see what you mean. It seems high to me as a 115lb 50 yr old, but it might be accurate for a big guy your age. Maybe you could try it 4 weeks and see if you maintain or, as you suspect, gain? Then adjust if needed?
  • 999tigger
    999tigger Posts: 5,235 Member
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    Use whichever method suits you. the exeercise calories you cna use your hrm instead of mfp and the calories it sets as long as its steady state cardio. its all estimates anyway, so you adjust as needed.
  • sijomial
    sijomial Posts: 19,811 Member
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    If you do a significant amount of exercise but it's irregular then MFP eat back exercise calories makes more sense.

    There's plenty of running calorie calculators around to see if your HRM estimate is reasonable if that's your primary form of exercise.
  • lesliezimmer
    lesliezimmer Posts: 85 Member
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    Ericdanielkwong wrote: »
    if you want to be safe, you can hit your TDEE and assume that anything you do in the gym puts you in a deficit. thats what worked for me to get shredded. plus, what Ivyrose8 said is also a really good idea.

    This makes the most sense out of everything I've read on MFP regarding what to set cals at when starting out. I'm so confused about it, but according to this logic I can eat up to 2200 calories a day and as long as I am working out I will lose weight.
  • RaspberryTickleChicken
    RaspberryTickleChicken Posts: 629 Member
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    I would use the TDEE number as a guide for what MFP suggests because I feel a lot of times MFP is too generalized for the "average" person. And the TDEE calculators out there seem to be tailor more to me and my individual lifestyle.

    And tbh, after I reached goal I've pretty much just relied heavier on TDEE and use MFP primarily to keep an eye out on my macros.

    Good luck!

  • Anonycatgirl
    Anonycatgirl Posts: 502 Member
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    I prefer the MFP method because while I get some exercise every day, some days it's a short walk or a half hour of yoga and others I'll spend 4 hours hiking or 2 hours in dance practice. Easier just to admit my schedule and lifestyle are erratic.

    That said, my maintenance calories are higher than what MFP suggests for me.
  • Timorous_Beastie
    Timorous_Beastie Posts: 595 Member
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    Personally, I prefer a TDEE approach, but I'll still allow some wiggle room. If I know I did far more exercise than usual and I'm really hungry, I'll eat a little more. If my pants start getting too tight, I'll either start exercising more or eating less.
  • nxd10
    nxd10 Posts: 4,570 Member
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    I think it depends how regular your schedule is. Mine varies a lot. I bought a fitbit when I hit maintenance and have used that 3 years with no problems using MFP.

    What I like about the variable calories every day is that my appetite varies a lot with my activity and that fits better with MFP + exercise than with a stable amount every day. I do go by the week but work closely with my daily goals for guidance.
  • editorgrrl
    editorgrrl Posts: 7,060 Member
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    nxd10 wrote: »
    I bought a fitbit when I hit maintenance and have used that 3 years with no problems using MFP.

    What I like about the variable calories every day is that my appetite varies a lot with my activity and that fits better with MFP + exercise than with a stable amount every day. I do go by the week but work closely with my daily goals for guidance.

    I second getting a Fitbit activity tracker. If (and only if) you enable negative calorie adjustments in your diary settings, eating back your adjustments means you're eating TDEE minus deficit every day. (So in maintenance, you're eating TDEE.)

    I've maintained for a year using MFP + Fitbit + Trendweight. It's a free website that plots a moving average of your Fitbit weight, and gives you a target range around your goal weight.
  • pmm3437
    pmm3437 Posts: 529 Member
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    I use TDEE as my baseline, and let MFP up convert my macros and calories based on recorded exercise calories. I only record my cardio, based on HRM estimates. I usually don't eat back 100% of the calories, but I do try to hit the protein target.

    I calculate TDEE based on my goal weight, and enter it manually in setup. This causes a natural deficit when I am higher, and a natural surplus when lower.
  • AsISmile
    AsISmile Posts: 1,004 Member
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    I am kinda going for the TDEE method, although I'm finding my own TDEE through calorie counting. Since I think my weight was already pretty stable before I started tracking and I'm eating the same I kind of figure that this is my TDEE. Therefore I track all my exercise as 1 calorie.
    My exercise is pretty much the same every week so TDEE should work well.
  • cwolfman13
    cwolfman13 Posts: 41,868 Member
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    coryrood wrote: »
    Would you recommend doing TDEE or mfp maintenence calories with excersize calories? My only issue with TDEE is it assumes I'm going to set a strict number of workouts a week. Some weeks I workout 3 times others 6 and everything inbrtween. My concern with mfp and excersize calories is how accurate it is ( I use a hrm for workouts)

    the thing is, nobody has a TDEE of exactly XXXX calories...that's what people need to wrap their head around. your true TDEE is really a range.

    also, by this point I would imagine you would have all kinds of your own data to work off of...look at what you've been losing on average and do the math...you don't need some calculator to tell you at this point. Your own data is far more reliable than any of these calculators.

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