Is my fitness watch right?

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VirtualMellie
VirtualMellie Posts: 68 Member
in Fitness and Exercise
After a 20 minute no break kettlebell workout it says I burned 40 calories? Does this sound accurate?

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  • dewd2
    dewd2 Posts: 2,445 Member
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    Maybe (lifting burns very little). Your watch is pretty much useless for counting calories for anything other than walking and running.
  • VirtualMellie
    VirtualMellie Posts: 68 Member
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    Even if it tracks your heart rate?
  • macgurlnet
    macgurlnet Posts: 1,946 Member
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    VirtualMellie wrote: »
    Even if it tracks your heart rate?

    Your watch can guess calories for steady state cardio based off your heart rate. This includes activities like walking and running. It will not be accurate for an activity like weight lifting since your HR is not steady.

    Lifting weights does not burn a ton of calories. It feels hard and like you're putting forth a lot of effort, but the calorie burn is small compared to cardio.

    ~Lyssa
  • dewd2
    dewd2 Posts: 2,445 Member
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    VirtualMellie wrote: »
    Even if it tracks your heart rate?

    Heart rate is not a good indicator of calories burned. It can track your steps and probably knows if you are walking or running. Based on this (assuming you entered your weight correctly AND it guesses your stride length correctly) it can guestimate your calories burned.
  • andyhartleyuk
    andyhartleyuk Posts: 21 Member
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    Try a different exercise to see if it calibrate with a different one I do a 30 mile bike ride same route same way one week it will say in burnt 700 calories another week it will say if burnt 500 at the end of the day it's all down to how hard your body is working it might not seam it but little things make a big difference hope that makes sense in a way x
  • sijomial
    sijomial Posts: 19,811 Member
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    VirtualMellie wrote: »
    Even if it tracks your heart rate?

    Calories (energy remember) in weight training is in relation to mass moved over distance - your watch can't know either of those things.
    Heart rate isn't telling you anything useful for weights workouts.
  • MeanderingMammal
    MeanderingMammal Posts: 7,866 Member
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    VirtualMellie wrote: »
    Even if it tracks your heart rate?

    HR is pretty meaningless as an indicator of calorie expenditure in many circumstances.

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