600 exercise calories?

hapeximendios
hapeximendios Posts: 29 Member
edited December 19 in Health and Weight Loss
Hi. I’m set as active in here and today I got 600 exercise calories for 16,000 steps. Does that seem right? 5foot 2 , 10 stone. 96 active minutes. Thanks

Replies

  • debrakgoogins
    debrakgoogins Posts: 2,033 Member
    Where did the exercise calories come from - a Fitbit? Do you have a daily job that is active?
  • hapeximendios
    hapeximendios Posts: 29 Member
    My Fitbit is linked to MFP. I just wondered what adjustments other people get for 16,000 steps. 600 extra on top of active seems a lot
  • New_Heavens_Earth
    New_Heavens_Earth Posts: 610 Member
    I got 1158 for 18,000 steps. I'm 5 foot 3, 43 yrs old, and 148 lbs. I'm set as sedentary so those steps include actual exercise.
  • GottaBurnEmAll
    GottaBurnEmAll Posts: 7,722 Member
    It's hard to know without knowing your stats and the intensity/speed of your steps and some other variables.

    The only solution is to eat back at least a portion of your adjustment, track results vs. what you would have expected, and go from there.

    I made the mistake of thinking my Fitbit was giving me too many calories for a very long time because I didn't take the time to sit down and crunch data. Consequently, I was underfueling, and this would ultimately lead to binging. Setting up a spread sheet and tracking was an eye-opening experience.
  • Panini911
    Panini911 Posts: 2,325 Member
    edited January 2019
    that seems on the high side unless you were walking in deep snow or whatnot. I found my calorie estimate for steps was super off yesterday personally (compared to other days).

    Was this the first time you sync? what does the exercise addition usually look like?
  • hapeximendios
    hapeximendios Posts: 29 Member
    I’ve just been looking back on my Fitbit and it looks like it’s all about the active minutes. I did 20,000 steps last week but hardly any active minutes and only 400 exercise calories. I lost weight before eating all my exercise calories so I’m hoping it’s right!
  • Duck_Puddle
    Duck_Puddle Posts: 3,237 Member
    New_Heavens_Earth wrote: »
    I got 1158 for 18,000 steps. I'm 5 foot 3, 43 yrs old, and 148 lbs. I'm set as sedentary so those steps include actual exercise.

    I got 1300 for a little over 18k steps. I weigh a bit more. I’m also set as sedentary and that includes actual exercise. My Fitbit has been pretty accurate for me for 4 years.

    600 doesn’t seem crazy to me for 6k steps over and above what active would be and given that it’s estimating for the day based on where you are now (and will change as the day goes on).

  • Panini911
    Panini911 Posts: 2,325 Member
    hapeximendios wrote: »
    I’ve just been looking back on my Fitbit and it looks like it’s all about the active minutes. I did 20,000 steps last week but hardly any active minutes and only 400 exercise calories. I lost weight before eating all my exercise calories so I’m hoping it’s right!

    I think there is a quirk with your fitbit and synching. are you sure you are set as active? and have been all this time?
  • hapeximendios
    hapeximendios Posts: 29 Member
    It makes me feel better that woman my age and weight get the same kind of adjustments. I’m set to active because I always do my 10,000 steps. I’m going to trust my Fitbit 🙂
  • PAV8888
    PAV8888 Posts: 14,303 Member
    edited January 2019
    I would not trust a fitbit too much on the first day I am wearing a new one and when travelling and changing time zones (especially when forgetting to also change time zones on MFP).

    Heart rate fitbits can also be significantly off if there is an unusual stressor that pushes your over-all heart rate up on the day in question.

    16,000 steps is normally above MFP very active (not just above active). So to begin with you can discount the margin between MFP Active and Very Active and then look at how many calories you're getting on top of that.

    In the end the long term overall averages and trends are what count... not individual days and measurements.

    If you're getting such adjustments regularly then I would seriously dig into a substantial portion of them subject to reviewing your weight trend vs purported deficits after a 4 to 6 week period.
  • shadow2soul
    shadow2soul Posts: 7,692 Member
    Depends on what you did, but I don’t think it looks unreasonable. The adjustment isn’t solely based on steps but a calorie burn comparison between what Fitbit had tracked and what MFP thought you would burn.

    I’m set to Sedentary right now and that means an estimated calorie burn of a measly 1683.

    Last week I had a day with:
    14,906 steps
    Workouts included-
    21 Day Fix Upper Fix (only 649 of the 14,906 steps)
    21 Day Fix Cardio Fix (only 1,860 of the 14,906 steps)
    Fitbit estimated my calorie burn to be about 2557 for the day.

    2557-1683= 874 calories

    Now I know that Lightly Active raises my MFP estimate by about 200 calories. So if I had been set to Lightly Active the adjustment would have been about 674. So it probably would have been about 474 if I had been set to active. That said I am 5’4.5”, 29 and about 136lbs.
  • yirara
    yirara Posts: 9,985 Member
    Duck_Puddle wrote: »
    New_Heavens_Earth wrote: »
    I got 1158 for 18,000 steps. I'm 5 foot 3, 43 yrs old, and 148 lbs. I'm set as sedentary so those steps include actual exercise.

    I got 1300 for a little over 18k steps. I weigh a bit more. I’m also set as sedentary and that includes actual exercise. My Fitbit has been pretty accurate for me for 4 years.

    600 doesn’t seem crazy to me for 6k steps over and above what active would be and given that it’s estimating for the day based on where you are now (and will change as the day goes on).

    Lets have a look at this. Lets say a step is 60cm. Thus 6000 steps would be 3.6km = 2.2 miles. We don't know how heavy TO is. Lets say 170lbs. Then this would account for 2.2x170x0.3 = 112kcal.
  • Duck_Puddle
    Duck_Puddle Posts: 3,237 Member
    edited January 2019
    yirara wrote: »
    Duck_Puddle wrote: »
    New_Heavens_Earth wrote: »
    I got 1158 for 18,000 steps. I'm 5 foot 3, 43 yrs old, and 148 lbs. I'm set as sedentary so those steps include actual exercise.

    I got 1300 for a little over 18k steps. I weigh a bit more. I’m also set as sedentary and that includes actual exercise. My Fitbit has been pretty accurate for me for 4 years.

    600 doesn’t seem crazy to me for 6k steps over and above what active would be and given that it’s estimating for the day based on where you are now (and will change as the day goes on).

    Lets have a look at this. Lets say a step is 60cm. Thus 6000 steps would be 3.6km = 2.2 miles. We don't know how heavy TO is. Lets say 170lbs. Then this would account for 2.2x170x0.3 = 112kcal.

    Well sure. Assuming all those steps were done on a nice regular walk. With those same assumptions, my 18000 would yield a 340 calorie adjustment (actually less - and even less for the other person listing an 1150 adjustment for 18k steps).

    Actually-that’s not right. It would be far less because it would be only for steps over and above the sedentary level (which is 4k-ish). So with those assumptions, an adjustment for an additional 14k steps would be 262 for someone 170 pounds (less for me).

    That would be dead wrong since my steps included a run, another workout and a bunch of General life stuff and exactly 0 straight up walking.

    All I’m saying (as are others in the thread) is that based on previous experience with actual real life Fitbit adjustments and actual weight change-600 as an adjustment with the given values doesn’t seem inherently far fetched.

    As always, the best bet is to try something for 4-6 weeks and adjust as needed.

  • endermako
    endermako Posts: 785 Member
    i've only been able to achieve 600 calories by walking 6 miles with a ruck, but it all depends on your body and whatnot.
  • Duck_Puddle
    Duck_Puddle Posts: 3,237 Member
    firecat1987 wrote: »
    i've only been able to achieve 600 calories by walking 6 miles with a ruck, but it all depends on your body and whatnot.

    Indeed. 600 calories for me is running for more than an hour.

    But 600 workout/exercise calories isn’t the same as a 600 calorie Fitbit adjustment.

    A Fitbit adjustment is the difference between what Fitbit thinks you burned for the entire day and what mfp thinks you burned for the entire day. If you ran more errands, did more movement, chased some toddlers, played with the dog more than usual, basically-all of your activity factors into it (plus your purposeful workouts).

    So the 600 calories here includes all activity (workouts and everything else). There might not even be any workouts at all.
  • hapeximendios
    hapeximendios Posts: 29 Member
    No workouts. Just everyday life!
  • Deviette
    Deviette Posts: 978 Member
    One thing I'm not sure anyone else has mentioned, have you got your fitbit set up for the same weight loss rate as MFP? I'm not sure if it'll make a difference, but I'd always have it set the same.

    Also, I don't trust the calorie adjustment so I don't have my fitbit linked. I know it's a weird way of doing it, but I use MFP for logging as I find it much easier, but I much prefer fitbit's CICO part of the app, so I use that for the calorie correction.
  • missysippy930
    missysippy930 Posts: 2,577 Member
    Seems like a lot to me. I have had a Fitbit for 6 years and routinely get 15-20K.
    However, I use my Fitbit mainly to motivate me to move more, and I am not concerned with eating back calories, so I pay very little for attention to calories burned.
  • tirowow12385
    tirowow12385 Posts: 697 Member
    If you set it on active, MFP assume you are burning 900 calories above your BMI everyday, you are not even at 700 according to your Fitbit. I would lower that activity to sedentary, which does not mean you are a couch potato but MFP will only count and assume you burn 2.5 x more calories above your BMR.
  • callsitlikeiseeit
    callsitlikeiseeit Posts: 8,626 Member
    the fitbit and accuracy of extra calories seems different for everyone.

    on my old one, it was horribly INaccurate. so much so i stopped wearing it altogether and think i gave it away.

    i got a new a few months back, and it seems very accurate, based on what im eating back of them and my rate of loss.

    watch it, play with it, see what works and what doesnt.

    i do not log food with the fitbit, only exercise/steps. i log my food in mfp and do not log exercise here (sometimes i will put the time and change the calories burned to '1' but not usually. )
  • csplatt
    csplatt Posts: 1,206 Member
    I have never included daily steps in my calorie count to eat back... I assume that's built in based on my "sedentary" or "active" status on my profile. I do deduct calories burned in actual cardiovascular exercise, like running or elliptical.
This discussion has been closed.

Categories