What does MFP mean by Activity Level

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KayTeeOne
KayTeeOne Posts: 122 Member
in Getting Started
I don't understand what does the app consider to be light activity etc

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  • Clobern80
    Clobern80 Posts: 714 Member
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    If you’re lightly active, your daily activities include:
    1. Activities of daily living only, such as shopping, cleaning, watering plants, taking out the trash, walking the dog, mowing the lawn and gardening.
    2. Daily exercise that is equal to walking for 30 minutes at 4mph. For an adult of average weight, this amount of exercise will burn about 130-160 additional calories.
    3. More intense exercise can be performed for less time to achieve the same goal. For example, 15-20 minutes of vigorous activity, such as aerobics, skiing or jogging on a daily basis would put you in this category.
    4. Spending a good part of the day on your feet (e.g. teacher, salesman)
  • kirstinlee
    kirstinlee Posts: 152 Member
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    @clobern80 so is it any of the four? Or a combination? I've always wondered. I'm on my feet all day for my job, but don't exercise regularly. Would that put me in Sedentary or Lightly Active?
  • NewOR2015
    NewOR2015 Posts: 1,018 Member
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    I'm wondering too.
  • malibu927
    malibu927 Posts: 17,565 Member
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    clobern80 wrote: »
    If you’re lightly active, your daily activities include:
    1. Activities of daily living only, such as shopping, cleaning, watering plants, taking out the trash, walking the dog, mowing the lawn and gardening.
    2. Daily exercise that is equal to walking for 30 minutes at 4mph. For an adult of average weight, this amount of exercise will burn about 130-160 additional calories.
    3. More intense exercise can be performed for less time to achieve the same goal. For example, 15-20 minutes of vigorous activity, such as aerobics, skiing or jogging on a daily basis would put you in this category.
    4. Spending a good part of the day on your feet (e.g. teacher, salesman)

    Except for the fact that MFP does not consider exercise in activity level (which is why it gets logged separately), this is spot on.
  • NewOR2015
    NewOR2015 Posts: 1,018 Member
    edited January 2016
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    Is it any or all 4 of the criteria?
  • veganbaum
    veganbaum Posts: 1,865 Member
    edited January 2016
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    The activity level is based on daily activity without exercise. Read the examples MFP provides and choose the one you think is most appropriate. Most people don't work 7 days a week, so just choose the activity level that most closely describes your job. Log intentional exercise and eat around 50-75% of those calories. Do that for about 6 weeks. If your average weekly loss does not equate to what it should (provided you haven't set a goal that's too aggressive and your food logging is largely accurate), then adjust your activity level up or down. You might think you're sedentary, but then end up losing more than expected, or think you're highly active, but lose less than expected. It's all estimates. Those estimates will be better for some than others. You just have to go with it and give it an appropriate time within which to determine how close an estimate it is for you.
  • srecupid
    srecupid Posts: 660 Member
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    clobern80 wrote: »
    If you’re lightly active, your daily activities include:
    1. Activities of daily living only, such as shopping, cleaning, watering plants, taking out the trash, walking the dog, mowing the lawn and gardening.
    2. Daily exercise that is equal to walking for 30 minutes at 4mph. For an adult of average weight, this amount of exercise will burn about 130-160 additional calories.
    3. More intense exercise can be performed for less time to achieve the same goal. For example, 15-20 minutes of vigorous activity, such as aerobics, skiing or jogging on a daily basis would put you in this category.
    4. Spending a good part of the day on your feet (e.g. teacher, salesman)

    MyFitnessPal should really clarify this themselves so that people don't keep asking. I'm not sure where you got that from but, I would hardly call walking 30 minutes at 4mph particularly active. That sounds like something I would do just on a morning coffee run. I could probably be considered lightly active on some days like I work at a grocery store running all over the place putting stuff back on the shelves that people didn't want at the end of the day and bringing all the carts in before the store closes. But, I still use sedentary. Then again i'm losing weight rather rapidly compared to predictions. One of these days I'm going to chose a setting and stick to it for an entire week and see what happens
  • veganbaum
    veganbaum Posts: 1,865 Member
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    srecupid wrote: »
    clobern80 wrote: »
    If you’re lightly active, your daily activities include:
    1. Activities of daily living only, such as shopping, cleaning, watering plants, taking out the trash, walking the dog, mowing the lawn and gardening.
    2. Daily exercise that is equal to walking for 30 minutes at 4mph. For an adult of average weight, this amount of exercise will burn about 130-160 additional calories.
    3. More intense exercise can be performed for less time to achieve the same goal. For example, 15-20 minutes of vigorous activity, such as aerobics, skiing or jogging on a daily basis would put you in this category.
    4. Spending a good part of the day on your feet (e.g. teacher, salesman)

    MyFitnessPal should really clarify this themselves so that people don't keep asking. I'm not sure where you got that from but, I would hardly call walking 30 minutes at 4mph particularly active. That sounds like something I would do just on a morning coffee run. I could probably be considered lightly active on some days like I work at a grocery store running all over the place putting stuff back on the shelves that people didn't want at the end of the day and bringing all the carts in before the store closes. But, I still use sedentary. Then again i'm losing weight rather rapidly compared to predictions. One of these days I'm going to chose a setting and stick to it for an entire week and see what happens


    MFP does clarify:

    Sedentary: Spend most of the day sitting (e.g. bank teller, desk job)
    Lightly Active: Spend a good part of the day on your feet (e.g. teacher, salesman)
    Active: Spend a good part of the day doing some physical activity (e.g. waitress, mailman)
    Very Active: Spend most of the day doing heavy physical activity (e.g. bike messenger, carpenter)

    MFP's definition focuses on "normal daily activities," without exercise. That daily 30 minute walk would be added separately. What more do you want?
  • srecupid
    srecupid Posts: 660 Member
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    veganbaum wrote: »
    srecupid wrote: »
    clobern80 wrote: »
    If you’re lightly active, your daily activities include:
    1. Activities of daily living only, such as shopping, cleaning, watering plants, taking out the trash, walking the dog, mowing the lawn and gardening.
    2. Daily exercise that is equal to walking for 30 minutes at 4mph. For an adult of average weight, this amount of exercise will burn about 130-160 additional calories.
    3. More intense exercise can be performed for less time to achieve the same goal. For example, 15-20 minutes of vigorous activity, such as aerobics, skiing or jogging on a daily basis would put you in this category.
    4. Spending a good part of the day on your feet (e.g. teacher, salesman)

    MyFitnessPal should really clarify this themselves so that people don't keep asking. I'm not sure where you got that from but, I would hardly call walking 30 minutes at 4mph particularly active. That sounds like something I would do just on a morning coffee run. I could probably be considered lightly active on some days like I work at a grocery store running all over the place putting stuff back on the shelves that people didn't want at the end of the day and bringing all the carts in before the store closes. But, I still use sedentary. Then again i'm losing weight rather rapidly compared to predictions. One of these days I'm going to chose a setting and stick to it for an entire week and see what happens


    MFP does clarify:

    Sedentary: Spend most of the day sitting (e.g. bank teller, desk job)
    Lightly Active: Spend a good part of the day on your feet (e.g. teacher, salesman)
    Active: Spend a good part of the day doing some physical activity (e.g. waitress, mailman)
    Very Active: Spend most of the day doing heavy physical activity (e.g. bike messenger, carpenter)

    MFP's definition focuses on "normal daily activities," without exercise. That daily 30 minute walk would be added separately. What more do you want?

    Not sure. That is a pretty good explanation. I guess for days with shifts 6 hours or more I'll do lightly active and for off days of shorter shifts I'll do sedentary

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