Apple Watch & Fitbit calorie adjustments very different on the same day

Mojofilter
Mojofilter Posts: 14 Member
edited November 2024 in Health and Weight Loss
Hi. I have recently bought an Apple Watch and would like to use it to adjust my calories in MFP but the adjustment appears too low.

Currently at nearly 10pm the Apple Activity app shows a total calorie burn sp far of 3038. The Fitbit shows a similar figure - 2904. I beleive both of those figures to be broadly correct based on 12,223 steps.

The problem is that when my Apple Watch is selected to count my steps in MFP i'm only getting a calorie adjustment of 280.

MFP is set to sedentary and using that it estimates my daily burn figure to be 2498.
2498 + the 280 adjustment = 2,778. Not 3038 figure reported in the Apple Activity app.
When I press the calorie adjustment for more info it give me a full day projection of 2778.

When I change my steps in MFP to Fitbit my calorie adjustment jumps up to 624. 2498 + 624 = a full day projection of 3122 based on 2904 burned as of 21:54.

So my question is, why is my Apple Watch calorie adjustment so much less than the Fitbit given the actual devices themselves are reportiing a relitivley similar calorie burn? On those figures the Apple Watch calorie adjustment should actually be slightly higher than the Fitbit one.

This isn't a one off, it has happened every day since I bought the watch last week.

Anyone got any ideas? I'm baffled by it!

Replies

  • macgurlnet
    macgurlnet Posts: 1,946 Member
    MFP made some changes to how they handle calorie adjustments from iOS devices.

    It's broken on their end, and I've seen quite a few threads in the feedback forum about it from people with Apple watches. The responses they've gotten from support are that things are working as expected.

    ~Lyssa
  • nowine4me
    nowine4me Posts: 3,985 Member
    edited February 2017
    macgurlnet wrote: »
    MFP made some changes to how they handle calorie adjustments from iOS devices.

    It's broken on their end, and I've seen quite a few threads in the feedback forum about it from people with Apple watches. The responses they've gotten from support are that things are working as expected.

    ~Lyssa

    This is true. They used to sync perfectly and then one day they didn't. They simply don't play well together. MFP has some convoluted explanation in the help area, but bottom line is it's broken.
  • Mojofilter
    Mojofilter Posts: 14 Member
    Thanks for the replies. Much appreciated.

    I emailed support and this was their response -
    "Thank you for contacting us regarding your Apple Watch integration. At this time we are currently only reading the step data, and individual "other" workouts sent from the watch via what transfers directly from Healthkit. We are not yet considering the active calories amount, which is the cause of the discretion you are seeing.

    In the meantime, you may notice that your total calorie burn showing on the watch, does not match the total being reported to MyFitnessPal by the Healthkit. This is to be expected. Please do, however, let us know if your step count is not matching up or you do not see your "other" workouts displayed in your MyFitnessPal Diary as "Apple Health Exercises."

    We appreciate your patience and understanding as we work out all the kinks. We will also do our best to update the following link as we have more information available: https://myfitnesspal.desk.com/customer/portal/articles/1957681"

    Looks like I'll be wearing a device on each wrist for the foreseeable future!
  • Francl27
    Francl27 Posts: 26,371 Member
    You will probably lose 150-200 calories of MFP's adjustment overnight anyway - I always do (I typically watch TV and don't move much after 8.30pm).

    So it should actually be pretty similar.
  • duncan04
    duncan04 Posts: 67 Member
    I find the watch to be a snore accurate accounting. It takes into consideration your size , Gender and heart rate with each activity. The MFP is a generic calculator that doesn't take into consideration. I go by both Fitbit/Apple and find a happy medium in the middle. Most important is that you're active!
This discussion has been closed.

Categories