Fitbit and Calories Burned Question

LookingBusy
LookingBusy Posts: 72 Member
in Fitness and Exercise
I just got a Fitbit Charge 2 this week for the first time and I am confused about the calories it tracks and adding exercise manually.

I understand that is automatically tracks things with lots of movement (running, walking, etc.) and that I should be manually entering things that it does not (i.e. weight lifting sessions, etc). But when I enter something manually, it also enters a calorie burn (that I can override). Since Fitbit does not track certain exercises, should I be adding this extra calorie burn or just enter the exercise but put the calories at 0? Fitbit tracks my heart rate throughout the entire day, so wouldn't those calories be captured within that daily heart rate tracking anyway? I just don't want to overestimate anything or forget anything.

Thanks for the help!

Replies

  • heybales
    heybales Posts: 18,842 Member
    You'll want to read over this 1st section couple times:
    http://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/10098937/faq-syncing-logging-food-exercise-calorie-adjustments-activity-levels-accuracy

    FYI - it tracks everything you do - the accuracy though for calories burned is another matter.
    Hence manually inputting say Weight's on Fitbit to replace it's potentially inflated calorie burn with something more correct.

    Never create a workout on MFP (or Fitbit) with 0 calories - that will replace that chunk of time with 0 calorie burn on Fitbit.
    Talk about as wrong as you can possibly get.
    If you want a workout shown on your wall - just make a comment about it with more detail than a workout entry would even show - more interesting to friends list anyway usually.

    Fitbit tracks your HR through the day - but it's only used for HR-based calorie burn during workouts. As lifting above - that's not always correct.
  • LookingBusy
    LookingBusy Posts: 72 Member
    Perfect! Thank you!

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