Scooby and Fitbit TDEE

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FLBeachluvr
FLBeachluvr Posts: 110 Member
in Health and Weight Loss
When I plug my stats in to the Scooby calculator it gives me a TDEE of 1623 however according to my Fitbit I burn between 1360-1564 calories per day if I get no additional exercise other than my daily activities. Of course I know I should exercise daily but I don't always. If I aim for 1200 calories a day how the heck am I supposed to lose weight? I'm thinking of maybe eating less than the 1200 calories on non-exercise days and then a bit more on the days when I do exercise would balance out?

Replies

  • jemhh
    jemhh Posts: 14,261 Member
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    All of these numbers are just estimates. You need to pick a number, eat that number of calories for 3-4 weeks, and adjust up or down from there.

    As far as eating 1200 calories, you'd lose weight because even 1360-1200 would give you a 160 daily deficit, which adds up over time. If that number ends up being accurate, the answer to how to lose faster would be to become more active.
  • FLBeachluvr
    FLBeachluvr Posts: 110 Member
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    Guess I'll just have to try to up the exercise. I do have a desk job which doesn't help. I'm good at coming up with excuses as I really hate most forms of exercise. I know everyone says to find something you like but I don't like any of it, lol. Plus I'm just tired when I get home from work. :s
  • trigden1991
    trigden1991 Posts: 4,658 Member
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    keharty wrote: »
    Guess I'll just have to try to up the exercise. I do have a desk job which doesn't help. I'm good at coming up with excuses as I really hate most forms of exercise. I know everyone says to find something you like but I don't like any of it, lol. Plus I'm just tired when I get home from work. :s

    Walking around the office and in your lunch break is great. I too work in an office but can get between 2-5k steps during work hours if I try. Walking to and from places that you would normally drive is a little time consuming but really not much effort and can add a few hundred calories to your TDEE.
  • cathipa
    cathipa Posts: 2,991 Member
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    Losing weight is about diet not exercise. TDEE -20% and using Scooby's calculator I have found is more accurate than the fitbit. And unless you are very short (<4'11") eating under 1200 calories is unnecessary for weight loss. Will only lead to muscle loss and becoming skinny fat.
  • FLBeachluvr
    FLBeachluvr Posts: 110 Member
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    trigden1991 wrote: »
    keharty wrote: »
    Guess I'll just have to try to up the exercise. I do have a desk job which doesn't help. I'm good at coming up with excuses as I really hate most forms of exercise. I know everyone says to find something you like but I don't like any of it, lol. Plus I'm just tired when I get home from work. :s

    Walking around the office and in your lunch break is great. I too work in an office but can get between 2-5k steps during work hours if I try. Walking to and from places that you would normally drive is a little time consuming but really not much effort and can add a few hundred calories to your TDEE.

    I work in a very small office but when everyone else is at lunch I do try to walk around in circles. Walking at lunch is only an option in the cooler months as the summer heat is brutal here in Central Florida. I don't live within walking distance of anything but do make sure I park far away from the entrance of any store I go to.

    I'm not super short (5'3") but I'm 54 and post-menopausal without much muscle mass which results in a fairly low BMR.

  • emdeesea
    emdeesea Posts: 1,823 Member
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    I'm partial to Scooby because using that calculator helped me lose 50 pounds. It works as long as you're honest with it and yourself.
  • JeromeBarry1
    JeromeBarry1 Posts: 10,182 Member
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    I have lost 85 lb without a fitbit. I put my stats in myfitnesspal. It told me I could eat 2130 calories each day. I eat less than that. I lose weight.

    Why would I want a fitbit? It just seems made to confuse the issue.
  • trigden1991
    trigden1991 Posts: 4,658 Member
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    JeromeBarry1 wrote: »
    I have lost 85 lb without a fitbit. I put my stats in myfitnesspal. It told me I could eat 2130 calories each day. I eat less than that. I lose weight.

    Why would I want a fitbit? It just seems made to confuse the issue.

    I use my fitbit to count steps and measure my heart rate nothing more. The general consensus on here is that the TDEE figures are roughly accurate for most.
  • FLBeachluvr
    FLBeachluvr Posts: 110 Member
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    I do really like my Fitbit. My new Charge 2 also has reminders to get up and move if I've been sitting for too long. I don't find that it over-estimates my calorie expenditure either.

    If I was given 2130 calories a day it would be no problem to eat less :D

    When you are dealing with being short, a woman and over 50 it's much harder to lose weight.

  • WinoGelato
    WinoGelato Posts: 13,454 Member
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    keharty wrote: »
    Guess I'll just have to try to up the exercise. I do have a desk job which doesn't help. I'm good at coming up with excuses as I really hate most forms of exercise. I know everyone says to find something you like but I don't like any of it, lol. Plus I'm just tired when I get home from work. :s

    One thing to keep in mind, don't discount the value of working to raise your NEAT, your daily activity level to raise your overall TDEE. You don't have to exercise strenuously to increase your overall calorie burn, and that's one of the things I think is most helpful about a FitBit. I'm a petite female over 40 with a desk job, and my TDEE is actually pretty high, 2200, not because I run marathons or lift like a beast. I do walk and do light circuit training, but in addition to the time I spend intentionally exercising, I've found ways to increase my overall step count and thus my overall calorie burn. Little things like: parking in the back of the lot and walking into work, getting up and walking around the office a few times a day (when weather is nice I walk outside), walking up and down stairs in my house, pacing while I'm cooking or helping kids with homework, etc. It's hard in winter but when the weather is nice, I try to get outside and walk to neighborhood restaurants, to the grocery store, etc. My average step count is 15K and about half of that is just from my general activity, not "exercise".

  • jemhh
    jemhh Posts: 14,261 Member
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    I find that my Fitbit is not close on TDEE but I still like to use it to gauge my general activity level. Different people like it for different things.
  • quiksylver296
    quiksylver296 Posts: 28,442 Member
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    keharty wrote: »
    Guess I'll just have to try to up the exercise. I do have a desk job which doesn't help. I'm good at coming up with excuses as I really hate most forms of exercise. I know everyone says to find something you like but I don't like any of it, lol. Plus I'm just tired when I get home from work. :s

    I was ALWAYS tired when I got home from work. I changed into workout clothes and hit the gym anyway (without sitting down at home. If I sat down, I was not getting back up). Even better if you hit the gym on your way home. After doing that for awhile, I found I wasn't tired when I got home from work anymore. Vicious cycle and you ultimately have to force yourself out of it.
  • FLBeachluvr
    FLBeachluvr Posts: 110 Member
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    WinoGelato wrote: »

    One thing to keep in mind, don't discount the value of working to raise your NEAT, your daily activity level to raise your overall TDEE. You don't have to exercise strenuously to increase your overall calorie burn, and that's one of the things I think is most helpful about a FitBit. I'm a petite female over 40 with a desk job, and my TDEE is actually pretty high, 2200, not because I run marathons or lift like a beast. I do walk and do light circuit training, but in addition to the time I spend intentionally exercising, I've found ways to increase my overall step count and thus my overall calorie burn. Little things like: parking in the back of the lot and walking into work, getting up and walking around the office a few times a day (when weather is nice I walk outside), walking up and down stairs in my house, pacing while I'm cooking or helping kids with homework, etc. It's hard in winter but when the weather is nice, I try to get outside and walk to neighborhood restaurants, to the grocery store, etc. My average step count is 15K and about half of that is just from my general activity, not "exercise".

    Very helpful information. I always feel like I should be jogging 5 miles a day or doing an hour on the elliptical or something. Right now though even if I walk after dinner I only end up with about 7000 steps. I'll keep at it.

  • WinoGelato
    WinoGelato Posts: 13,454 Member
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    quiksylver296 wrote: »
    keharty wrote: »
    Guess I'll just have to try to up the exercise. I do have a desk job which doesn't help. I'm good at coming up with excuses as I really hate most forms of exercise. I know everyone says to find something you like but I don't like any of it, lol. Plus I'm just tired when I get home from work. :s

    I was ALWAYS tired when I got home from work. I changed into workout clothes and hit the gym anyway (without sitting down at home. If I sat down, I was not getting back up). Even better if you hit the gym on your way home. After doing that for awhile, I found I wasn't tired when I got home from work anymore. Vicious cycle and you ultimately have to force yourself out of it.

    That's ultimately why I ended up starting to get up and work out in the morning. It was just too easy to skip the evening workout when other things got in the way. It was rough at first, but now if I don't get up and workout, I feel like my whole day is off track.
  • FLBeachluvr
    FLBeachluvr Posts: 110 Member
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    Yes, I do have a gym membership and I totally agree about immediately changing and going right after work. Too easy to get involved with other things and then sit down and that's it. I already get up at 5:45 am so I'm not sure about working out before work.
  • NorthCascades
    NorthCascades Posts: 10,968 Member
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    cathipa wrote: »
    Losing weight is about diet not exercise.

    Losing weight is about having a calorie deficit, which comes from both diet and exercise, in whatever proportion the person with the weight prefers.
  • StaciMarie1974
    StaciMarie1974 Posts: 4,138 Member
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    Scooby makes guesses about your TDEE based on the info you put in, and at best its a guess. A ballpark.

    Fitbit in my opinion is more reliable because its tracking your actual movement. If your TDEE is 1360-1560 daily, then a) eat 1200-1300 and lose slowly or b) make it a point to move more.
    keharty wrote: »
    When I plug my stats in to the Scooby calculator it gives me a TDEE of 1623 however according to my Fitbit I burn between 1360-1564 calories per day if I get no additional exercise other than my daily activities. Of course I know I should exercise daily but I don't always. If I aim for 1200 calories a day how the heck am I supposed to lose weight? I'm thinking of maybe eating less than the 1200 calories on non-exercise days and then a bit more on the days when I do exercise would balance out?

  • SusanMFindlay
    SusanMFindlay Posts: 1,804 Member
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    JeromeBarry1 wrote: »
    I have lost 85 lb without a fitbit. I put my stats in myfitnesspal. It told me I could eat 2130 calories each day. I eat less than that. I lose weight.

    Why would I want a fitbit? It just seems made to confuse the issue.

    Then you wouldn't want a FitBit. When I plug my stats in MFP (following the activity level instructions which suggest that I should be "lightly active"), it tells me to eat almost 1000 calories/day less than I actually need to eat for my target weightloss of 1 pound/week. I did the math manually and made the correction, but getting confirmation from my FitBit that I'm not nuts is massively helpful. My husband likes his because it makes him move more and some combination of his FitBit + my calorie counting has helped him get to his lowest weight in decades. He does not calorie count or log food in any way.
  • hellobaconplease
    hellobaconplease Posts: 108 Member
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    cathipa wrote: »
    Losing weight is about diet not exercise. TDEE -20% and using Scooby's calculator I have found is more accurate than the fitbit. And unless you are very short (<4'11") eating under 1200 calories is unnecessary for weight loss. Will only lead to muscle loss and becoming skinny fat.

    I'm a hair under 4'11" and would never eat under 1200 :-O. Even hobbits need nutrition.
  • SusanMFindlay
    SusanMFindlay Posts: 1,804 Member
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    keharty wrote: »
    When I plug my stats in to the Scooby calculator it gives me a TDEE of 1623 however according to my Fitbit I burn between 1360-1564 calories per day if I get no additional exercise other than my daily activities. Of course I know I should exercise daily but I don't always. If I aim for 1200 calories a day how the heck am I supposed to lose weight? I'm thinking of maybe eating less than the 1200 calories on non-exercise days and then a bit more on the days when I do exercise would balance out?

    If you aim for 1200 calories/day, you'll have a deficit between 160 and 364 calories/day. That will likely average out to about half a pound of weight lost per week.

    If you are small and sedentary, half a pound per week is likely the most weight you can safely lose. If you want to lose faster than that, you have to move more. Eating below 1200 is not advisable.

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