Net calories? Total calories?

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lmejia1289
lmejia1289 Posts: 13 Member
in Health and Weight Loss
What's the difference?

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  • malibu927
    malibu927 Posts: 17,565 Member
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    Total calories is the entire amount you eat. Net calories is total calories minus what you burned through exercise. You should generally want your net calories to equal or come as close to your goal as possible.
  • lmejia1289
    lmejia1289 Posts: 13 Member
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    Thank you!
  • terbusha
    terbusha Posts: 1,483 Member
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    I always just watch total calorie intake. I never track calories burnt during exercise. What I do and what I recommend to people is to eat at a calorie level that allows you to make good progress towards your goal. If you are trying to lose weight, eat so you drop 1-2 lbs/week. This assumes an average calorie burn from you getting in all of your workouts. This will be different for everyone, so you'll have to do some trial and error to figure it out. I'd start ~1600 cal/day. Hit this goal, along with your macros and getting in your workouts, for 2 weeks. If you lose 1-2 lbs/week, you're good to go. If you lose too much, increase your intake and repeat. If you don't lose enough, reduce your intake a bit and repeat. After a few cycles, you'll figure out what works for you in your situation.
  • lmejia1289
    lmejia1289 Posts: 13 Member
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    Thank you @terbusha. So you're saying I should just focus on meeting my 1,200 calorie goal but not track my exercise? I assume you recommend this so that I don't see all these "extra" calories I earned after exercising. In the first 2.5 weeks of meeting my 1,200 goal and exercising here and there I lost a little over 7lbs. To me, that was awesome
  • terbusha
    terbusha Posts: 1,483 Member
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    Right, just focus on hitting your total calorie goal. If you keep losing more than 2 lbs/week, then increase your calorie intake a bit and go for another couple weeks. The great thing about using your weight loss progression to adjust your calorie intake is that it accounts for your calorie expenditure without you having to track it at all.
  • sijomial
    sijomial Posts: 19,811 Member
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    lmejia1289 wrote: »
    Thank you @terbusha. So you're saying I should just focus on meeting my 1,200 calorie goal but not track my exercise? I assume you recommend this so that I don't see all these "extra" calories I earned after exercising. In the first 2.5 weeks of meeting my 1,200 goal and exercising here and there I lost a little over 7lbs. To me, that was awesome

    If you don't want to track / eat back exercise calories then set your weight loss goal with a TDEE calculator and not MFP.

    Either method works but mixing them isn't a good idea.
  • Cave_Goose
    Cave_Goose Posts: 156 Member
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    Many recommend you eat back no more than half your calories burned from exercise. The reason is we tend to overestimate how much we burned and underestimate how much we consume.
  • malibu927
    malibu927 Posts: 17,565 Member
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    lmejia1289 wrote: »
    Thank you @terbusha. So you're saying I should just focus on meeting my 1,200 calorie goal but not track my exercise? I assume you recommend this so that I don't see all these "extra" calories I earned after exercising. In the first 2.5 weeks of meeting my 1,200 goal and exercising here and there I lost a little over 7lbs. To me, that was awesome

    Eating 1200 total and not eating your exercise calories back can cause some issues. The way MFP is set up, you should be eating a portion back to fuel your body and keep your deficit consistent. I did that for fifteen months on 1500-1900 net and lost over 60 pounds.

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