Eat all exercise calories back?

Depends on how you have calculated your initial calorie goal, most formulas include your work outs so if you have used one of those you can ignore on MFP. But if you have not included those in you initial calculations they you'll need to eat them to maintain your weight.
For me when I calculate my macros I use formulas that include my training - it just makes it easier to hit those calories as you can prepare your meals in advance and don't have to adjust anything to take into account of calories burned whilst training.

Should probably test it out too.
1. A lot of apps overestimate the effect of training
2. You underestimate how much you eat
3. It depends, the effect of a workout is complex

If you eat when hungry till your full, you should be in balance. I wound not eat just to get the calories up unless you have problems gaining weight.

You should always eat your exercise calories even if you have MFP setup for weight loss. The reason people choose not to eat some of their exercise calories is because they are overestimating their calorie burns and rather than enter the correct data they just don't eat some of them.

TimothyFish wrote: »

You should always eat your exercise calories even if you have MFP setup for weight loss.

Possibly the least helpful advice I've read so far on this forum!

All the calculations done for you on MFP are based on averages, actual values (and therefore results) will vary to lesser or greater extents from one person to the next.
Once you are in maintenance, you should, on average, be ok eating back exercise calories, but be aware of the points made by sebastiansteinmann in his reply above.

It's not a stupid question. I'll bet this thread could go 8 pages of people discussing their various opinions and carefully-honed techniques.

In theory, yes, you should eat back your exercise calories, based on the MFP method of CICO.

HOWEVER, given that the MFP exercise calorie counts are a based on good estimates, at best (and arbitrary nonsense, at worst), and given that, in maintenance, there's not really a deficit "cushion," I'd be cautious about this. Personally, I've found maintenance to be more difficult than cutting, in a way, because of that lack of a "cushion." (What I mean by "cushion" is that in a deficit, if you go over your calories by a few hundred every so often, worst case scenario is that you lose more slowly. In maintenance, if you go over your calories by a few hundred every so often, you'll start to gain.)

So you could choose to eat back only some percentage of your exercise calories, to be safe. Or you could eat them all back but monitor your calorie intake and weight with pinpoint accuracy and adjust every other week or so, as needed.

JeepHair77 wrote: »

It's not a stupid question. I'll bet this thread could go 8 pages of people discussing their various opinions and carefully-honed techniques.

In theory, yes, you should eat back your exercise calories, based on the MFP method of CICO.

HOWEVER, given that the MFP exercise calorie counts are a based on good estimates, at best (and arbitrary nonsense, at worst), and given that, in maintenance, there's not really a deficit "cushion," I'd be cautious about this. Personally, I've found maintenance to be more difficult than cutting, in a way, because of that lack of a "cushion." (What I mean by "cushion" is that in a deficit, if you go over your calories by a few hundred every so often, worst case scenario is that you lose more slowly. In maintenance, if you go over your calories by a few hundred every so often, you'll start to gain.)

So you could choose to eat back only some percentage of your exercise calories, to be safe. Or you could eat them all back but monitor your calorie intake and weight with pinpoint accuracy and adjust every other week or so, as needed.

At first glance, this seems to be the case. That maintenance requires this fine balance. But the reality is that due to unconscious changes in NEAT (non-exercise activity), most folks have a range of calories that they maintain on. This is especially apparent for folks trying to bulk. They find they have to to higher in calories than they think to get above the upper maintenance range. For me, I found I had to go 200-250 calories higher than first estimate to gain reliably. I know some folks who have a maintenance range of nearly 500 calories.

When I initially started maintaining, I found I had to net 2150 to maintain as I slowly lost on my initially calculated 2100 calorie maintenance. I maintained at this calorie level at 165 lbs for a year. When I started to bulk, I went slow at first with a 250 calorie surplus because I was afraid of gaining too fast. I gained a quick 5 lbs, then stalled. I had to eat another 250 calories to begin to gain slowly again. Currently, I have been maintaining my current weight of 150 lbs (running race weight) for almost 2 years at 2300 net.

The_Enginerd wrote: »

JeepHair77 wrote: »

It's not a stupid question. I'll bet this thread could go 8 pages of people discussing their various opinions and carefully-honed techniques.

In theory, yes, you should eat back your exercise calories, based on the MFP method of CICO.

HOWEVER, given that the MFP exercise calorie counts are a based on good estimates, at best (and arbitrary nonsense, at worst), and given that, in maintenance, there's not really a deficit "cushion," I'd be cautious about this. Personally, I've found maintenance to be more difficult than cutting, in a way, because of that lack of a "cushion." (What I mean by "cushion" is that in a deficit, if you go over your calories by a few hundred every so often, worst case scenario is that you lose more slowly. In maintenance, if you go over your calories by a few hundred every so often, you'll start to gain.)

So you could choose to eat back only some percentage of your exercise calories, to be safe. Or you could eat them all back but monitor your calorie intake and weight with pinpoint accuracy and adjust every other week or so, as needed.

At first glance, this seems to be the case. That maintenance requires this fine balance. But the reality is that due to unconscious changes in NEAT (non-exercise activity), most folks have a range of calories that they maintain on. This is especially apparent for folks trying to bulk. They find they have to to higher in calories than they think to get above the upper maintenance range. For me, I found I had to go 200-250 calories higher than first estimate to gain reliably. I know some folks who have a maintenance range of nearly 500 calories.

When I initially started maintaining, I found I had to net 2150 to maintain as I slowly lost on my initially calculated 2100 calorie maintenance. I maintained at this calorie level at 165 lbs for a year. When I started to bulk, I went slow at first with a 250 calorie surplus because I was afraid of gaining too fast. I gained a quick 5 lbs, then stalled. I had to eat another 250 calories to begin to gain slowly again. Currently, I have been maintaining my current weight of 150 lbs (running race weight) for almost 2 years at 2300 net.

Well, sure, I agree with that, but that's variable, too. Your range of about 200-250 calories, based on a calorie budget of 2150-2300 might only translate to a range of 50 calories or so, for a small-ish woman who isn't as active and is on a calorie budget of 1700.

This is a variable dependent upon your level of accuracy and precision. If you are using a scale and measuring your food...if you are using a fitness tracker and running/biking/swimming then your numbers are going to be more accurate and you should be eating back those calories.

If you are a bit lax on this then you need to be cautious. It is human nature to become more efficient. This is disastrous for weight management and why people tend to yo-yo.

You have to tailor this to your own behavior. Keep an eye on your weight, body composition, and other key metrics and if one starts trending in an undesired direction, implement a corrective action and get it moving in a desired direction.