How to adjust MFP so I don't go in red

I think this is what you're looking for:

On the website, go to "My home" in the top left corner
Then select "Goals" from the ribbon/banner below My Home
Then edit Daily Nutrition Goals and manually set your daily calorie goal there and save changes


I have not yet tried this myself, so I'll be watching this thread to see if someone else gives you a better answer

When I did this I found I had to force the app to sync before the new customised goal copied over. Assuming you have an iPhone, you tap the More icon in the bottom right corner, scroll to the bottom and hit Sync.

If I shave off 20 years from my age (33 vs. 53) using the MFP Guided Goals (Sedentary + Maintenance), I get an extra 120 Calories per day. Maybe you could try that?

clgaram720 wrote: »

CyberTone wrote: »

If I shave off 20 years from my age (33 vs. 53) using the MFP Guided Goals (Sedentary + Maintenance), I get an extra 120 Calories per day. Maybe you could try that?

Won't that mess up your macros/micros though? I don't know I'm just curious how smart the app is. And I was under the impression macro/micronutrient goals changed rather a lot from age 30 to age 50 and up. I suppose that wouldn't matter if you weren't tracking them. I ask cause my mom will be on here shortly and she's 53 also. She'll be asking me, rather than the forum *cringe*, so I should probably know.

I haven't really changed my age for my goals, so I have not yet looked at the actual changes to the DRIs. A quick look at the linked chart shows that there are no significant changes to the average recommendations for 31 years old and older, except for an increase in calcium and a decrease (females only) in iron - those individual changes can be custom set in MFP. There would be more significant changes for individuals older than 30 years old thinking of setting their MFP goals using younger than 30 for their age.

Reference:
nal.usda.gov/fnic/DRI/DRI_Tables/estimated_average_requirements.pdf

CyberTone wrote: »

clgaram720 wrote: »

CyberTone wrote: »

If I shave off 20 years from my age (33 vs. 53) using the MFP Guided Goals (Sedentary + Maintenance), I get an extra 120 Calories per day. Maybe you could try that?

Won't that mess up your macros/micros though? I don't know I'm just curious how smart the app is. And I was under the impression macro/micronutrient goals changed rather a lot from age 30 to age 50 and up. I suppose that wouldn't matter if you weren't tracking them. I ask cause my mom will be on here shortly and she's 53 also. She'll be asking me, rather than the forum *cringe*, so I should probably know.

I haven't really changed my age for my goals, so I have not yet looked at the actual changes to the DRIs. A quick look at the linked chart shows that there are no significant changes to the average recommendations for 31 years old and older, except for an increase in calcium and a decrease (females only) in iron - those individual changes can be custom set in MFP. There would be more significant changes for individuals older than 30 years old thinking of setting their MFP goals using younger than 30 for their age.

Reference:
nal.usda.gov/fnic/DRI/DRI_Tables/estimated_average_requirements.pdf

Cool:) Thanks

@rabbitjb I was looking back through this, I don't see in here what you currently have your MFP goal at and what your FItBit says TDEE is (average burn), and what MFP thinks your maintenance number is?

I'm recently into maintenance and similarly trying to make sure the numbers are plausible so that I don't end up gaining some back. I don't log my natural weight fluctuations within my maintenance range on here so I've been tracking them, (along with my average FitBit cals burned for the last week and the average gross cals consumed so I can see trends) separately. A weekly CICO check if you will.

For what it's worth here are my numbers:
FitBit TDEE - 2200
MFP NEAT maintenance - 1900
Have my Net goal set at 1750 (I like a buffer and don't weigh my food - gasp)

I eat back all my cals though so my weekly gross cals consumed was 2180 average.

Same exact weight as last Monday.

rabbitjb wrote: »

Current MFP goal is maintenance

MFP @sedentary NEAT gave me 1740 cals

I generally 'earn' 3-600 calories on top of that - I eat them all - so Fitbit TDEE = 2040-2340

I was still losing weight over time so I added an extra 100-200 on top which seemed to stabilise me a little more

Have just changed activity level to lightly active and been given NEAT of 1970

Thanks for sharing. I think I misunderstood your original question and now that I am better understanding it, I'm not sure my advice to change your activity level will necessarily help. In theory, you should still have the same TDEE from the FitBit - the increased NEAT baseline to 1970 just means that your exercise adjustments will be smaller but would still cap you out at whatever FitBit says your calories burned that day are. I think I understand better now - that FitBit TDEE is lower than actual because you are still losing even with eating back all those cals, so you think your actual TDEE is a couple hundred higher, and you don't want to go into the red when you add in the extra calories.

I really don't know a way to override the systems for a higher number, short of setting a custom goal that is higher than your TDEE but then if you have negative adjustments enabled it would keep trying to get you to eat less.

I think your choices might be either:
Ignore the red...
OR
Drink a glass of wine (or eat a treat) and not log it every day.

Changing your MFP activity level won't help a bit.

Actually - depending on when you go inactive in the evening (couch/sleep) and when you last think you've met your goal - a higher activity level leaves more room for going over goal upon review the next day.

Because when you view your eating goal at night, say 8 pm, MFP is using the Fitbit daily burn up to that point - but it's estimating the final 4 hrs based on MPF activity level.
And if on the couch and sleeping - even Sedentary is higher burn rate than reality, which Fitbit is going to share the reality the next morning on first sync.
Which will make prior day appear like you went over goal.

So you are really saying that even with Fitbit adjustment - it's estimate of daily burn is too low also - you actually burn even more than what is shown.

That can be adjusted better by changing your height on Fitbit's site to increase your BMR they use.
That causes your resting metabolism figure to be higher, and that also effects your moving calorie burn given.

If you want to get a decent estimate of what it could be changed to - based on BF% rather than normal BMR stats - let me know.

It'll require using the spreadsheet on my profile page. First one shown.
Simple Setup tab - just delete everything in yellow cells and get your own stats in that you have - don't worry about the Activity Calc.
The resulting BF% that is shown in BF Calc - do enter that in the cell asking for it.

Then go to Fitbit/BodyMedia tab and delete the tested RMR sample stat.
Now you can see the difference between Katch and Mifflin BMR, and the height change needed on Fitbit to cause the Katch to be used.

The root of the problem is that the way MFP and Fitbit sync doesn't work with custom-set calorie goals in MFP. It only works if you use the automatically set calorie (and macro) goals. Frustrating as all heck.

I started a thread about this in the Fitbit users group. What's happening is that Fitbit is sending your observed TDEE back to MFP, and MFP is comparing that to its calculated NEAT for you (based on your selected activity level) and adjusting from there.

If your Fitbit is off from your actual observed results, you pretty much have three options:

1. Unlink Fitbit and MFP, and manually log an exercise adjustment each day based on what you feel it should be.
2. Keep them linked, but manually log some sort of additional exercise on Fitbit each day to bring your TDEE on Fitbit in line with what you feel it should be.
3. Keep them linked, but adjust your height on Fitbit the way @heybales suggested.

None of the three options are great. #3 is probably the most convenient since you don't have to manually log something each day; it's sort of once and done. But it depends where you think the discrepancy comes from. Is Fitbit off for you in BMR, or in exercise burn estimates? i.e. on sedentary days when you don't work out, is Fitbit's calorie estimate more or less accurate? I realize this is hard to know unless you've had a long period of time with no workouts to compare against.

yarwell wrote: »

On fitbit.com dashboard the 1/4 hour slices show calorie burn overnight ie effectively BMR - mine is 17 kcal/15 mins aka 1632 kcal/day. MFP thinks 1663 kcal/day.

That's because Sedentary NEAT isn't equivalent to BMR.

BMR (what Fitbit measures) is essentially what you'd burn if you were in a coma.

Sedentary NEAT (what MFP estimates if you set your profile to "sedentary") is BMR plus the small amount of activity that most sedentary people do in their day -- sitting at a desk, answering the phone, walking around the house or to the washroom, etcetera.

yarwell wrote: »

segacs wrote: »

Is Fitbit off for you in BMR, or in exercise burn estimates? i.e. on sedentary days when you don't work out, is Fitbit's calorie estimate more or less accurate? I realize this is hard to know unless you've had a long period of time with no workouts to compare against.

On fitbit.com dashboard the 1/4 hour slices show calorie burn overnight ie effectively BMR - mine is 17 kcal/15 mins aka 1632 kcal/day. MFP thinks 1663 kcal/day.

If logged exercise is overridden by fitbit it isn't logged properly with times.

I have custom goals and fitbit adjusts my cals in a sensible way ?

I cant find that bit either. I've got a zip too if that makes a difference?