Fitbit Calories Burned

slgraha
slgraha Posts: 27 Member
in Fitness and Exercise
I am so confused with MFP and how it calculates cals from steps. Ex. Monday I had 3891 steps and MFP gave me 290 cals and yesterday I had 6919 steps and MFP gave me 191 cals. To me MFP is so random with the number it calculates. Any suggestions on how to correctly track steps?

Replies

  • T0M_K
    T0M_K Posts: 7,526 Member
    slgraha wrote: »
    I am so confused with MFP and how it calculates cals from steps. Ex. Monday I had 3891 steps and MFP gave me 290 cals and yesterday I had 6919 steps and MFP gave me 191 cals. To me MFP is so random with the number it calculates. Any suggestions on how to correctly track steps?

    i agree. was about to start researching this. is 3800 steps worth an additonal 200 to 300 "exercise" calories? just feels like even if my MFP setting is set to sedintary that few of steps in a day shouldn't equate to addtional calories.

    If i determine something i'll let you know.
  • slgraha
    slgraha Posts: 27 Member
    Tomk652015 wrote: »
    slgraha wrote: »
    I am so confused with MFP and how it calculates cals from steps. Ex. Monday I had 3891 steps and MFP gave me 290 cals and yesterday I had 6919 steps and MFP gave me 191 cals. To me MFP is so random with the number it calculates. Any suggestions on how to correctly track steps?

    i agree. was about to start researching this. is 3800 steps worth an additonal 200 to 300 "exercise" calories? just feels like even if my MFP setting is set to sedintary that few of steps in a day shouldn't equate to addtional calories.

    If i determine something i'll let you know.


    Thank you!!
  • capaul42
    capaul42 Posts: 1,390 Member
    It's not giving you "step" calories. Fitbit sends over 2 pieces of info: step count and total calorie burn. MFP takes the calorie burn at sync time and estimates what your burn will be for the whole day (til midnight) then subtracts what MFP figures for your maintenance. That is the adjustment you see.

    Example (numbers rounded): yesterday I had 13,000 steps and a total burn of 2400 calories at 11pm. MFP says my maintenance calories are 1800. 2400-1800=600. So MFP added 600 to my calorie goal of 1560. So the 600 wasn't based on the 13,000. I have had 15,000 days where I only got a 500 calorie adjustment.
  • slgraha
    slgraha Posts: 27 Member
    It's crazy to see less when your steps are almost doubled. Wondering if it would be better to remove my Fitbit and have it not sync to MFP. That would allow me to manually add my exercising and would probably give me a more accurate number.
  • TeaBea
    TeaBea Posts: 14,517 Member
    slgraha wrote: »
    It's crazy to see less when your steps are almost doubled. Wondering if it would be better to remove my Fitbit and have it not sync to MFP. That would allow me to manually add my exercising and would probably give me a more accurate number.

    FitBit works well for a lot of people (most of the time). You don't want to manually add all your steps.....even sedentary people take steps. By logging them all you're definitely going to have some double counting. FitBit is supposed to compare your stated activity level to your actual activity level.

    Try posting this in the FitBit group and see if there have been syncing issues for the last couple days, or if you should try something else.

    http://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/group/1290-fitbit-users
  • slgraha
    slgraha Posts: 27 Member
    TeaBea wrote: »

    FitBit works well for a lot of people (most of the time). You don't want to manually add all your steps.....even sedentary people take steps. By logging them all you're definitely going to have some double counting. FitBit is supposed to compare your stated activity level to your actual activity level.

    Try posting this in the FitBit group and see if there have been syncing issues for the last couple days, or if you should try something else.

    http://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/group/1290-fitbit-users

    Oh no, I'm not wanting to manually track all my steps for the entire day just those while walking on the treadmill. That will allow me to manually enter that time as a workout vs FitBit counting as normal steps.

    I will post in the FitBit groups to see how others handle. Thanks for the suggestion.

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