Accurate calories burnt on treadmills

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patysq73
patysq73 Posts: 3 Member
in Health and Weight Loss
I use 2 different treadmills, one at my gym and the other at the gym in my apt complex. I do the same incline 6 and speed between 2.6-3.0, I notice the treadmill at gym has me burning almost 430 calories vs the one at my apt only 200. What’s the best way to really know how many calories I burn? I have an Apple Watch and my active calories during my work out is pretty high! I actually like that number best!

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  • Seffell
    Seffell Posts: 2,222 Member
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    Do both treadmills have your age, weight, sex etc? They might be making wrong assumptions.
  • patysq73
    patysq73 Posts: 3 Member
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    I usually just do Manual ... don’t enter any info , I’m thinking I’ll start entering my info and see if i notice a difference in the calories
  • The_Ta
    The_Ta Posts: 59 Member
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    Take the smallest value. If you start losing weight too fast, you’ll know you burn more calories than it says. If you aren’t losing at the rate you want, you’ll know you aren’t burning the calories it says.

    Truthfully, it is very difficult to account for every calorie in and out. Just pay attention to the trends.
  • patysq73
    patysq73 Posts: 3 Member
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    I’ve actually lost almost 40 lbs since Sept 16!
  • GreenValli
    GreenValli Posts: 1,054 Member
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    I enter the calories I "burn" at the gym to MFP diary. I do not "eat" all the extra calories that the machines actually indicate though. I do not think the number is that accurate since I can do just about the same work-out on machines and get way different numbers of calories.
  • sijomial
    sijomial Posts: 19,811 Member
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    patysq73 wrote: »
    I usually just do Manual ... don’t enter any info , I’m thinking I’ll start entering my info and see if i notice a difference in the calories

    As the prime factors are your weight and distance covered then adjusting for incline not entering your weight is making the estimates extremely vague.

    Different brands could well have dissimilar default values,
  • speedingticket
    speedingticket Posts: 73 Member
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    https://www.runnersworld.com/tools/calories-burned-calculator

    Try using this calculator. It won't be 100% accurate, but if you start by eating back 50%-75% of your calories, you can adjust that % according to how the weight comes off.
  • Francl27
    Francl27 Posts: 26,371 Member
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    2.6 and 3.0 speed will make a pretty big difference too. I have no idea how accurate the apple watch is though, but 440 for an hour doesn't seem excessive at all if you're going at 3 mph on a 6% incline.
  • stanmann571
    stanmann571 Posts: 5,728 Member
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    sijomial wrote: »
    patysq73 wrote: »
    I usually just do Manual ... don’t enter any info , I’m thinking I’ll start entering my info and see if i notice a difference in the calories

    As the prime factors are your weight and distance covered then adjusting for incline not entering your weight is making the estimates extremely vague.

    Different brands could well have dissimilar default values,

    This.
    speedingticket wrote: »
    https://www.runnersworld.com/tools/calories-burned-calculator

    Try using this calculator. It won't be 100% accurate, but if you start by eating back 50%-75% of your calories, you can adjust that % according to how the weight comes off.

    And this.

    The only variable is whether or not the distance calculator on the treadmill is reasonably accurate.

    Most are accurate to about 10%.
  • LivingtheLeanDream
    LivingtheLeanDream Posts: 13,342 Member
    edited January 2018
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    If the machine doesn't know your height/weight/age the calorie burn will be way off.
    I know my stationary bike at home gives me a stupid calorie burn and I know in reality its only about half the burn it gives.
  • Francl27
    Francl27 Posts: 26,371 Member
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    LivingtheLeanDream wrote: »
    If the machine doesn't know your height/weight/age the calorie burn will be way off.
    I know my stationary bike at home gives me a stupid calorie burn and I know in reality its only about half the burn it gives.

    My stationary bike at home was somehow the same as my heart rate monitor. I'm still not sure how accurate it is but I just stopped bothering with it when I got my fitbit - the calorie burn was so low I felt that I was just making my legs hurt for nothing... like, 100 calories for 30 minutes or something. I'd rather go for a brisk walk.
  • sijomial
    sijomial Posts: 19,811 Member
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    Francl27 wrote: »
    LivingtheLeanDream wrote: »
    If the machine doesn't know your height/weight/age the calorie burn will be way off.
    I know my stationary bike at home gives me a stupid calorie burn and I know in reality its only about half the burn it gives.

    My stationary bike at home was somehow the same as my heart rate monitor. I'm still not sure how accurate it is but I just stopped bothering with it when I got my fitbit - the calorie burn was so low I felt that I was just making my legs hurt for nothing... like, 100 calories for 30 minutes or something. I'd rather go for a brisk walk.
    @Francl27
    That is an incredibly low rate of burn for cycling, about 55 watts of power which is barely turning the pedals.
    Something doesn't sound at all right with that estimate.
  • LivingtheLeanDream
    LivingtheLeanDream Posts: 13,342 Member
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    Francl27 wrote: »
    LivingtheLeanDream wrote: »
    If the machine doesn't know your height/weight/age the calorie burn will be way off.
    I know my stationary bike at home gives me a stupid calorie burn and I know in reality its only about half the burn it gives.

    My stationary bike at home was somehow the same as my heart rate monitor. I'm still not sure how accurate it is but I just stopped bothering with it when I got my fitbit - the calorie burn was so low I felt that I was just making my legs hurt for nothing... like, 100 calories for 30 minutes or something. I'd rather go for a brisk walk.

    Whereas my bike tells me 550 for 30 mins which is why I said it said stupid burns.
  • spiriteagle99
    spiriteagle99 Posts: 3,681 Member
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    My TM doesn't have a way of inputting weight, so its numbers are way off. It will say that running 6 mph I am burning 1000 calories an hour. Reality is more like 525. I don't use their numbers. The MFP numbers are closer, but don't include incline (which I vary during the run) so are actually a bit low. That's fine as I'd rather assume lower than higher.
  • 5stringjeff
    5stringjeff Posts: 790 Member
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    I've used this in the past.
    https://42.195km.net/e/treadsim/

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