Trouble with Calorie Goal Setting

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HDKramer
HDKramer Posts: 3 Member
in Getting Started
Has anyone else had trouble when they set their calorie goal? I made some changes today and it is telling me to have 1990 calories a day. I set it to want to lose 2 lbs per week. Then it tells me that at 1990 calories a day, I will lose 0.1 lb a week!!! How do I get this to work right? I have never had this problem before!

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  • CyberTone
    CyberTone Posts: 7,337 Member
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    Check that your current weight and starting weight are correct. It sounds like there might be an error in one of those.
  • lauralee328
    lauralee328 Posts: 21 Member
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    I am having the exact same problem! It's forcing a calorie intake of 1500 calories a day on me, and saying I will only lose 1/3 of a pound per week, despite my goal of 1 pound per week. Good grief, my TDEE is only 1700. At 1500 calories a day, and losing 1/3 lb. per week, I'll need a year and half to lose 20 pounds. That's ridiculous. All the info I put in is correct, so I don't understand why it's forcing a 1500 calories per day goal on me. I can't figure out how to get it to change that.
  • serindipte
    serindipte Posts: 1,557 Member
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    You can go in and manually set your own calorie goal: http://www.myfitnesspal.com/account/my_goals

    I don't know why MFP is giving you wrong numbers unless, like said above, you entered something incorrectly, but you can change it easily enough.
  • Theo166
    Theo166 Posts: 2,564 Member
    edited February 2017
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    Did you also enter in weekly exercise into the goal tool? I think that affects the calorie budget.
  • CyberTone
    CyberTone Posts: 7,337 Member
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    Theo166 wrote: »
    Did you also enter in weekly exercise into the goal tool? I think that affects the calorie budget.

    That is incorrect. When choosing a weekly exercise goal for number of times and minutes during MFP guided goal settings, those choices have no effect on the Calorie goal calculation.

    MFP uses the NEAT (non-exercise activity thermogenesis) method to calculate maintenance at your chosen Activity Level, then either subtracts (for weight loss) or adds (for weight gain) Calories to provide a daily Calorie goal. This allows users who may not be able to exercise a base plan to attain their weekly weight loss or weight gain goals without purposeful exercise. That is why MFP expects users who exercise to log any exercise activity and eat back at least a portion of the extra Calories earned from logged exercise.

    The method MFP uses is different than many online calculators that use TDEE (total daily energy expenditure), which includes expected EAT (exercise-associated thermogenesis) in their recommended Calorie goal.

    ​Please see this article, and search for answers to Frequently Asked Questions and other helpful articles, on the MFP Help/FAQ pages...

    https://myfitnesspal.desk.com/customer/en/portal/articles/410332-how-does-myfitnesspal-calculate-my-initial-goals-

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