Fitbit HR Users come in
10BlueDoves
Posts: 33 Member
How reliable is the calorie tracker on the Fitbit HR?
I have been wearing the Fitbit HR for just three days, but it is logging a ton of calories burned. I have double checked the settings are right, and I know I haven't given it a lot of time. I am also aware that a wrist HR monitor is not as good as a chest one, but I thought it would be good enough.
I have been wearing the Fitbit HR for just three days, but it is logging a ton of calories burned. I have double checked the settings are right, and I know I haven't given it a lot of time. I am also aware that a wrist HR monitor is not as good as a chest one, but I thought it would be good enough.
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Replies
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I just started wearing mine and tracking this week, I noticed my numbers are really high too. Yesterday for example I worked out and got in 10,000 steps. On MFP I got 1393 exercise calories for that... that seems way to high! Looking at fitbit it says I burned 663 in my 45 min. tabata circuit training class which seems a little high too (but I am 5'7" 264 lbs so maybe possible).
One day last week I didn't exercise at all just got in 10,000 step and MFP gave me 1077 exercise calories.
Both of these seem way to high. So for now I am keeping them linked but just eating my daily calories and dipping into the exercise by maybe 200 calories depending how hungry I am.0 -
Im following this post because I as well find the fitbit calories especially just for getting in the 10,000 steps is high and Im afraid to eat them.0
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I have had a fit bit for 3 years. The Charge HR for a year. Honestly, I have never paid attention to the calories burned function. I have never eaten back all of my exercise calories, nor will I ever eat them back.
This morning, I used the elliptical for 65 minutes, went for a walk for 40 minutes, and @ 10:17 am CST, I have 18,636 steps in. I had to look, (I never have paid attention to calories burned) and it says 1673). I think that includes the total calories burned for the day so far, which includes the calories you burn just by being alive. Not sure though, really not an issue for me. I just use it to motivate me to move more.0 -
I have had a Charge HR since Christmas and have found the calorie count to be pretty accurate. I've been losing steadily eating back most of the exercise calories. I use the stats FitBit gives me for any cardio exercise, and manually change the calories for weight lifting to about 50%.0
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I don't track my FitBit steps on MFP because it grossly inflates my calories burned. Instead, I log my food in to MFP and then link that to my FB. The calculation on my FB seems more accurate, so some days it may appear on MFP that I've overeaten, but I'm actually going by the calories on my FB.0
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I have been eating back all my activity adjustments since July of last year. I have lost and maintained as expected.0
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I've had my charge HR since Christmas and it seemed a little wonky at first but I read that it needs time to get used to you.
I eat back most of my exercise calories and sometimes more (sometimes less too) and I just hit my goal weight today.
Your burn is a lot higher than mine but my current weight is 148 so that is probably why.
If you're uncomfortable with the high calorie allowance then eat only back a portion and see how your weight loss is impacted. I was weirded out by the high calories at first too but I was also hungry so I decided to give it a try. Lol. Good luck!0 -
Remember that your fitbit counts all calories burned. Including when you sleep, even if you aren't wearing it. I am 260lbs, 5'6" and I get about 7-8k steps per day. I consistently "burn" (use) 3k calories or more.
It's always seemed spot on for me. I gained weight because I was eating more than 3k calories on weekend days and jot enough deficit on weekdays to counter balance, so I found I was gaining at the rate suggested by the data from my fitbit. I trust it, but have not yet actually been successful in losing weight because I'm not eating right.0 -
snowflake930 wrote: »I have had a fit bit for 3 years. The Charge HR for a year. Honestly, I have never paid attention to the calories burned function. I have never eaten back all of my exercise calories, nor will I ever eat them back.
This morning, I used the elliptical for 65 minutes, went for a walk for 40 minutes, and @ 10:17 am CST, I have 18,636 steps in. I had to look, (I never have paid attention to calories burned) and it says 1673). I think that includes the total calories burned for the day so far, which includes the calories you burn just by being alive. Not sure though, really not an issue for me. I just use it to motivate me to move more.
and I have been on maintenance for a little over 2 years.
I looked on fit bit's site and it says that the calories burned are the total calories burned, starting @ midnight.
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I just started wearing mine and tracking this week, I noticed my numbers are really high too. Yesterday for example I worked out and got in 10,000 steps. On MFP I got 1393 exercise calories for that... that seems way to high! Looking at fitbit it says I burned 663 in my 45 min. tabata circuit training class which seems a little high too (but I am 5'7" 264 lbs so maybe possible).
One day last week I didn't exercise at all just got in 10,000 step and MFP gave me 1077 exercise calories.
Both of these seem way to high. So for now I am keeping them linked but just eating my daily calories and dipping into the exercise by maybe 200 calories depending how hungry I am.
I'm 243lb and get similar reported burns, been wearing my Charge HR since before Christmas and while I never eat all my calories back (I get around 1500 extra) I am consistantly losing weight over and above my target 1lb/week in line with what Fitbit says. (Around 1lb for each extra 3500 calories)0 -
It is total calories burned. I have it linked to MFP so it accounts for my total calories burned to come up with my suggested daily calorie intake. Like yesterday, it gave me an extra 600 calories which seemed like a lot since I didn't really do any type of full work out. I am carrying a lot of relatively new weight around all day, I get that, but dang, 600 extra calories just from doing housework a little faster than usual??? I feel like if that were the case, I wouldn't be in the position I am in now.
FYI- I lost over 80 lbs not even two years ago, can't believe I gained 60 back. A lot of tries to get remotivated have failed, so I am really trying to get back on track this time. Seeing daily numbers from the fitbit helps. I used a different wristband monitor last time that eventually kind of died. I swear it was diet soda that did me in.0 -
they are having all kinds of issues.I woke up this am and my time was wrong,calories burned was way off(I had just gotten out of bed). so I had to reset the trackers,uninstall and reinstall the app and restart my tracker and sync again. so far it seems to be working. so if it doesnt seem right to you then its possible that there is an issue. BUT,it will tell you all the calories you burned for the day if its working correctly,whether you exercise or not,it doesnt show you on the tracker what you exercise calories are it will show on your app though how long you exercised and how much you burned.otherwise it adds everything in together on the tracker0
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I just started wearing mine and tracking this week, I noticed my numbers are really high too. Yesterday for example I worked out and got in 10,000 steps. On MFP I got 1393 exercise calories for that... that seems way to high! Looking at fitbit it says I burned 663 in my 45 min. tabata circuit training class which seems a little high too (but I am 5'7" 264 lbs so maybe possible).
One day last week I didn't exercise at all just got in 10,000 step and MFP gave me 1077 exercise calories.
Both of these seem way to high. So for now I am keeping them linked but just eating my daily calories and dipping into the exercise by maybe 200 calories depending how hungry I am.
Your problem stems from the fact that Fitbit-MFP integration erroneously names your Fitbit total daily calorie (TDEE) adjustment an "Exercise" adjustment and you think you are eating "exercise" calories.
You are also suffering from an extremely common perceptual problem: You are setup on MFP as sedentary.
A person who takes 10,000 steps is not called sedentary. At 10,000 steps a day you are what MFP, and every other step based activity level definition, considers "ACTIVE".
If you were to change your MFP setting to ACTIVE the "exercise" calories you get from Fitbit would disappear... because your MFP allowance has increased.
All you are currently doing is creating an extremely large deficit.
Large deficits while fun for short periods of time while you're obese create a whole slew of longer term problems.
One of the problems is un-necessary loss of lean mass. Another is a higher probability of ending up with gallstones and gallbladder removal surgery. Another is making the weight loss process more miserable than it has to be and lowering your chances of long term adherence.
And more...
Do yourself a favour and connect your fitbit.com account to www.trendweight.com.
Connect your fitbit to MFP and enable negative adjustments (which will make things a bit wonky in the morning and will also make things a bit wonky in the evening if you go to bed/become less active before midnight because calories will disappear instead of getting added)
Eat as per what MFP-Fitbit integration suggests (i.e. eat -500, or -750 off of your Fitbit TDEE). Limit your deficit to 25% of your TDEE while obese, 20% when you become overweight.
Evaluate every month or so how you are doing in terms of your logging deficits (as per MFP-Fitbit) matching what you see happening in trendweight and adjust.
If you have a high degree of water retention associated with TOM, you may also want to use www.weightgrapher.com (also free, also integrates with Fitbit.com; but usually requires that you click a button to manually update). WG allows you to superimpose the graph of a previous user selectable period so you can visually match how you are doing this 28 day period compared to the previous 28 day period while accounting for TOM water weight variation.
Note: that whether you are setup on MFP as sedentary, active, or superwoman, when you enable full Fitbit integration including negative adjustments, simple math happens, and you get an adjustment such that at the end of the day, at midnight, your eating allotment was based on the calories out that Fitbit calculated that you spent by midnight.**
**if you are extremely inactive MFP will now stop at 1200 Cal, even though Fitbit would blithely continue to 0.
**during the day estimates will change and vary. The more your true activity level as estimated by Fitbit and the level you are setup on MFP diverge, the larger the total SIZE of the adjustment, whether negative or positive.1 -
I have always been a Fitbit person and got the Charge HR for Christmas. It took a while to figure out the small changes. If you use the timer option for exercise and you log your exercise on MFP it will double count your calorie burn. Aside from that mine works fine so long as I log my food and exercise into MFP using the "Starting" time and duration of the exercise. Fitbit will only report the over/under on calories burned.0
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I started out with Fitbit Flex a year ago and now Fitbit HR since December. I eat most of my calories burned and lose weight every week.0
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Mine occasionally has syncing issues and will multiply any adjustments it makes. Overall I tend to ignore them.0
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I just started wearing mine and tracking this week, I noticed my numbers are really high too. Yesterday for example I worked out and got in 10,000 steps. On MFP I got 1393 exercise calories for that... that seems way to high! Looking at fitbit it says I burned 663 in my 45 min. tabata circuit training class which seems a little high too (but I am 5'7" 264 lbs so maybe possible).
One day last week I didn't exercise at all just got in 10,000 step and MFP gave me 1077 exercise calories.
Both of these seem way to high. So for now I am keeping them linked but just eating my daily calories and dipping into the exercise by maybe 200 calories depending how hungry I am.
Your problem stems from the fact that Fitbit-MFP integration erroneously names your Fitbit total daily calorie (TDEE) adjustment an "Exercise" adjustment and you think you are eating "exercise" calories.
You are also suffering from an extremely common perceptual problem: You are setup on MFP as sedentary.
A person who takes 10,000 steps is not called sedentary. At 10,000 steps a day you are what MFP, and every other step based activity level definition, considers "ACTIVE".
If you were to change your MFP setting to ACTIVE the "exercise" calories you get from Fitbit would disappear... because your MFP allowance has increased.
All you are currently doing is creating an extremely large deficit.
Large deficits while fun for short periods of time while you're obese create a whole slew of longer term problems.
One of the problems is un-necessary loss of lean mass. Another is a higher probability of ending up with gallstones and gallbladder removal surgery. Another is making the weight loss process more miserable than it has to be and lowering your chances of long term adherence.
And more...
Do yourself a favour and connect your fitbit.com account to www.trendweight.com.
Connect your fitbit to MFP and enable negative adjustments (which will make things a bit wonky in the morning and will also make things a bit wonky in the evening if you go to bed/become less active before midnight because calories will disappear instead of getting added)
Eat as per what MFP-Fitbit integration suggests (i.e. eat -500, or -750 off of your Fitbit TDEE). Limit your deficit to 25% of your TDEE while obese, 20% when you become overweight.
Evaluate every month or so how you are doing in terms of your logging deficits (as per MFP-Fitbit) matching what you see happening in trendweight and adjust.
If you have a high degree of water retention associated with TOM, you may also want to use www.weightgrapher.com (also free, also integrates with Fitbit.com; but usually requires that you click a button to manually update). WG allows you to superimpose the graph of a previous user selectable period so you can visually match how you are doing this 28 day period compared to the previous 28 day period while accounting for TOM water weight variation.
Note: that whether you are setup on MFP as sedentary, active, or superwoman, when you enable full Fitbit integration including negative adjustments, simple math happens, and you get an adjustment such that at the end of the day, at midnight, your eating allotment was based on the calories out that Fitbit calculated that you spent by midnight.**
**if you are extremely inactive MFP will now stop at 1200 Cal, even though Fitbit would blithely continue to 0.
**during the day estimates will change and vary. The more your true activity level as estimated by Fitbit and the level you are setup on MFP diverge, the larger the total SIZE of the adjustment, whether negative or positive.
Thank you, this was very helpful! I will change my activity setting and look into trendweight.0 -
It will take some time for fitbit to get used to your version of normal. I'm sedentary unless I force myself up and doing things. My fitbit barely gives me 1000 calories a day, I'm always over as I use the MFP 1200 anyway. Mostly I got the HR to keep track of my heart rate during activity. I have a tendency to go overboard sometimes.0
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I've only had my Fitbit hr for two weeks. I've also noticed it seems to give a lot of calories for just basic everyday walking (I'm getting 10k+ a day). I ignore they extra calories it inputs into mfp. I look at the calories I burn from deliberate exercise and will eat some (50-75%) of those back only.0
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I just started wearing mine and tracking this week, I noticed my numbers are really high too. Yesterday for example I worked out and got in 10,000 steps. On MFP I got 1393 exercise calories for that... that seems way to high! Looking at fitbit it says I burned 663 in my 45 min. tabata circuit training class which seems a little high too (but I am 5'7" 264 lbs so maybe possible).
One day last week I didn't exercise at all just got in 10,000 step and MFP gave me 1077 exercise calories.
Both of these seem way to high. So for now I am keeping them linked but just eating my daily calories and dipping into the exercise by maybe 200 calories depending how hungry I am.
Your problem stems from the fact that Fitbit-MFP integration erroneously names your Fitbit total daily calorie (TDEE) adjustment an "Exercise" adjustment and you think you are eating "exercise" calories.
You are also suffering from an extremely common perceptual problem: You are setup on MFP as sedentary.
A person who takes 10,000 steps is not called sedentary. At 10,000 steps a day you are what MFP, and every other step based activity level definition, considers "ACTIVE".
If you were to change your MFP setting to ACTIVE the "exercise" calories you get from Fitbit would disappear... because your MFP allowance has increased.
All you are currently doing is creating an extremely large deficit.
Large deficits while fun for short periods of time while you're obese create a whole slew of longer term problems.
One of the problems is un-necessary loss of lean mass. Another is a higher probability of ending up with gallstones and gallbladder removal surgery. Another is making the weight loss process more miserable than it has to be and lowering your chances of long term adherence.
And more...
Do yourself a favour and connect your fitbit.com account to www.trendweight.com.
Connect your fitbit to MFP and enable negative adjustments (which will make things a bit wonky in the morning and will also make things a bit wonky in the evening if you go to bed/become less active before midnight because calories will disappear instead of getting added)
Eat as per what MFP-Fitbit integration suggests (i.e. eat -500, or -750 off of your Fitbit TDEE). Limit your deficit to 25% of your TDEE while obese, 20% when you become overweight.
Evaluate every month or so how you are doing in terms of your logging deficits (as per MFP-Fitbit) matching what you see happening in trendweight and adjust.
If you have a high degree of water retention associated with TOM, you may also want to use www.weightgrapher.com (also free, also integrates with Fitbit.com; but usually requires that you click a button to manually update). WG allows you to superimpose the graph of a previous user selectable period so you can visually match how you are doing this 28 day period compared to the previous 28 day period while accounting for TOM water weight variation.
Note: that whether you are setup on MFP as sedentary, active, or superwoman, when you enable full Fitbit integration including negative adjustments, simple math happens, and you get an adjustment such that at the end of the day, at midnight, your eating allotment was based on the calories out that Fitbit calculated that you spent by midnight.**
**if you are extremely inactive MFP will now stop at 1200 Cal, even though Fitbit would blithely continue to 0.
**during the day estimates will change and vary. The more your true activity level as estimated by Fitbit and the level you are setup on MFP diverge, the larger the total SIZE of the adjustment, whether negative or positive.
While I agree, I will Amend this to say that 10,000 steps per day doesn't necessarily qualify one as "active". In the extreme, people like me, who are very short with less than 35ish lbs to lose (or even those of average height with <15 to lose) at 10,000 steps per day of just average, non-cardio-centric walking around the house, may still be in the "lightly active" category at 10,000 steps. A better way to judge whether you are "active" or "sedentary" or "lightly active" by MFP standards would be to click on the fitbit adjustment explanation page (exercise tab...little blue icon over the word fitbit) and compare your actual fitbit burn to what MFP thinks is "lightly active" etc for you.
For example: At "lightly active" setting, with 34lbs left to lose, at 5'2", MFP estimates my daily burn (every day, without fail, it should not change unless you change your activity level) at 1922 calories. On an average non-work out day for me, that's about what I get from fitbit also. So I can be fairly sure I'm lightly active. However, when I am working out consistently, fitbit reports me as burning 2100-2400 calories, which is about in line with what MFP estimates I'll burn daily on the "active" setting.
So if you love data, or if you're just not sure, that's a fine way to verify what activity level you really are. You can change it as many times as you like and you can always revert to your original activity setting.0 -
I recently found out how to change my stride size because I was getting a lot of steps at work on days I didn't feel particularly busy. Went to the gym and tracked my strides over a set distance and then changed the setting. Now I'm getting less steps but more mileage and that's definitely effected my calorie burn. For example, yesterday I had 21,000 steps or 10.68 miles and I burned 1153 calories. My Charge HR has been pretty accurate since I got it in May. I ate different amounts (combined with exercise) each week for 4 weeks and noted the weight trends. I only lost when I net 1900 calories on my Fitbit so that's what I'm shooting for now.0
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I've had my Charge HR since the first week of August and I find the TDEE it gives me to be quite accurate. If anything it slightly under estimates.
Do keep in mind that the Fitbit figure is TDEE, not just exercise calories.
I like to avoid confusion as much as possible, so I do NOT link my Fitbit with MFP. It seems to me that either totally confuses too many people or they have issues with getting the sites to sync properly. From watching my Fitbit TDEE over time I have a very good idea of what my average is. Since I've been in maintenance for a couple of months I simply try to match my calorie intake (logged on MFP) to the average TDEE per Fitbit.0
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