Net Calorie Help

Fitness_1208
Fitness_1208 Posts: 3 Member
edited November 18 in Health and Weight Loss
Hey guys, I'm new here, and I have a question, and I would really appreciate it if someone could help me. I don't really have a clear picture of what net calories are and how to increase, reduce or maintain them. All I do know (from doing some research) is that if your net calories are at a negative number, you will lose weight, so does that mean as long as my net calories are at a negative number I will still be losing weight? (or calories)

Replies

  • galaxyeyed
    galaxyeyed Posts: 98 Member
    This is the theory behind CICO: as long as your calories in (CI) is less than your calories out (CO), you will lose weight. So you want the amount of calories to be less than the amount your body spends to keep you alive + any exercise burns.

    When using MFP, they calculate your calories based on if you were sedentary and didn't work out (and how many pounds you want to lose down to some mininum number). When you exercise you burn calories, which then lowers your net calorie intake. So say your calorie goal is 1700 calories. You've eaten 1500 calories, but burned 500, leaving you with 1000 net calories, and MFP will tell you you have 700 calories left to eat. The way MFP works, you should be eating back some of your exercise calories (not all, since calorie burns are likely overestimated). You should definitely not be trying to get negative net calories on MFP! Hope that makes sense :smile:
  • Christine_72
    Christine_72 Posts: 16,049 Member
    You don't ever want to see -200 or whatever number under your net calories.
  • Merci4u
    Merci4u Posts: 41 Member
    To add on to the above, MFP has calculated how many calories you need to eat a day to loose weight. So, to maintain you might need 2200cal a day. To loose weight you need to eat less than that so MFL calculate into your net calories a deficit of 500cal (depending on your weightloss goals). So the number in your diary to aim for would be 1700cal. If you exercise, MFL adds these calories to your NET calories so your deficit stays at 500cal.
  • Fitness_1208
    Fitness_1208 Posts: 3 Member
    catieraney wrote: »
    This is the theory behind CICO: as long as your calories in (CI) is less than your calories out (CO), you will lose weight. So you want the amount of calories to be less than the amount your body spends to keep you alive + any exercise burns.

    When using MFP, they calculate your calories based on if you were sedentary and didn't work out (and how many pounds you want to lose down to some mininum number). When you exercise you burn calories, which then lowers your net calorie intake. So say your calorie goal is 1700 calories. You've eaten 1500 calories, but burned 500, leaving you with 1000 net calories, and MFP will tell you you have 700 calories left to eat. The way MFP works, you should be eating back some of your exercise calories (not all, since calorie burns are likely overestimated). You should definitely not be trying to get negative net calories on MFP! Hope that makes sense :smile:

    Oh okay, yes you do make a lot of sense I understand now :smile: or I knew about the CICO theory all along it was just the net calories that confused me a bit. But thanks guys for the info, appreciate it! :smile:
  • Machka9
    Machka9 Posts: 25,627 Member
    edited May 2015
    christinev297 wrote: »
    You don't ever want to see -200 or whatever number under your net calories.

    Why not?

    Or wait ... maybe I'm misunderstanding you. My net calories are almost always below my calorie limit ... often well below. But they don't fall into the negatives. Is that what you meant ... that they aren't supposed to fall into the negatives?

  • Christine_72
    Christine_72 Posts: 16,049 Member
    Machka9 wrote: »
    christinev297 wrote: »
    You don't ever want to see -200 or whatever number under your net calories.

    Why not?

    Or wait ... maybe I'm misunderstanding you. My net calories are almost always below my calorie limit ... often well below. But they don't fall into the negatives. Is that what you meant ... that they aren't supposed to fall into the negatives?

    Yes there shouldn't be a minus before your net calories. e.g. this would happen if you ate 1000 calories but burnt 1200 calories' you would be -200.

  • TimothyFish
    TimothyFish Posts: 4,925 Member
    MFP has a goofy way of calculating net calories because it doesn't subtract out the calories you burn doing stuff other than exercise, so your MFP net should equal your goal calories at the end of the day. If it does, you will have a negative net that matches the calorie deficit you setup.
  • Sued0nim
    Sued0nim Posts: 17,456 Member
    This is how it works

    You put in your information, including an activity level (excluding exercise) and an exercise target

    MFP ignores your exercise target completely and gives you a number of calories to eat daily based on your gender, height, weight, activity level and goal weight loss per week

    Let's say that's 1500 calories

    eat that daily (or averaged over the week) and you will lose weight over time .. 6-8 weeks

    Log exercise on top because you jogged for 30 minutes at high intensity and earned yourself another 300 calories

    and you get to eat them

    because you had 1500 calories to eat, plus now you have an additional 300 calories to eat from your jogging - so you eat 1800 calories to achieve your goal weight loss (the 1500 +300)

    if you don't eat them then you will have only have netted 1200 calories that day eg 1500-300 calories - 1200 calories and your rate of weight loss will / should be higher than targetted which is NOT necessarily a good thing
  • pinkteapot3
    pinkteapot3 Posts: 157 Member
    TimothyFish wrote: »
    MFP has a goofy way of calculating net calories because it doesn't subtract out the calories you burn doing stuff other than exercise, so your MFP net should equal your goal calories at the end of the day. If it does, you will have a negative net that matches the calorie deficit you setup.

    ^^ This.

    Say your MFP calorie goal is 1,800 per day. You eat 2,000 cals but 'earn' (burn) 200 cals with exercise. MFP will say your net is 1,800 (ie 2,000 minus 200). And that means you're bang on your goal.

    So with the MFP net, you shouldn't see a net below your goal, let alone negative!

    That's assuming you eat back everything your earn from exercise. I do - I eat my daily goal plus my burns - but a lot of people don't eat back what they earn from exercise. Try it out - see if you lose weight while eating back. I do, but a lot of others don't so choose to only eat some of their exercise cals on top of what they're allowed normally.

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