Apple Watch vs MFP vs Fitbit

goatelope
goatelope Posts: 178 Member
in Fitness and Exercise
Hey all,

I find a huge variance in calculations of calories earned via different devices and wondered if people had thoughts?

I returned fitbit Inspire HR because it was way, way off - we are talking telling me I had ‘earned’ 600 calories from 8k steps of walking.

Then I got Apple Watch series 3 but I am finding same problem - MFP says I’ve earned about 25 calories so far today, whereas my watch says 146. I put watch on around 9am, so it wasn’t calculating anything in my sleep or prior to grabbing my phone.

It seems like MFP is the most conservative and reliable of all of these???

Replies

  • Maxxitt
    Maxxitt Posts: 1,281 Member
    Your MFP calculations maybe taking into account "expected" level of activity when calculating calories for "steps" and it will vary over the day. Is your AW calculation "activity calories" for the day? If so then the # includes all activity (wild gesticulation, e.g. :smiley: ) in addition to "steps." If your AW calculation is from one of the "exercise" walking options it separates out that particular activity calories from "total" calories during that time period. Finally, Apple uses a different system for calculating calories burned through exercise and so many people just choose one method and adjust accordingly depending on their own data. I just noticed this recently and I don't know whether it's new or not - go to "exercise" and you can follow the links for more info:

    MFP iOS Calorie Adjustment
    You're using MFP iOS to measure your actual activity level throughout the day.

    To accurately reflect any extra calories you're burning, we use this data to adjust your daily MyFitnessPal calorie goal.

    This is how we calculate your calorie adjustment:

    MFP iOS Calories Burned
    Full Day Projection
    (Based on 0 calories burned as of 12:09 pm) 1670
    MyFitnessPal Calories Burned
    (Includes 117 calories from exercise) 1716
    MFP iOS Calorie Adjustment
    0 *
    * Negative adjustments are disabled for you. To change this setting, go here.

    To learn more visit our Faq
  • heybales
    heybales Posts: 18,842 Member
    goatelope wrote: »
    Hey all,

    I find a huge variance in calculations of calories earned via different devices and wondered if people had thoughts?

    I returned fitbit Inspire HR because it was way, way off - we are talking telling me I had ‘earned’ 600 calories from 8k steps of walking.

    Then I got Apple Watch series 3 but I am finding same problem - MFP says I’ve earned about 25 calories so far today, whereas my watch says 146. I put watch on around 9am, so it wasn’t calculating anything in my sleep or prior to grabbing my phone.

    It seems like MFP is the most conservative and reliable of all of these???

    It's not the steps - it's the distance.

    While 8K steps is commonly in range of Lightly-Active moving into Active - the distance could clearly be Active and that adjustment may not be far off.

    Bad stride length default could add to inflated distance and therefore calories.


    Apple you can NOT sync directly as it sends the wrong figures to MFP to do math with.

    MFP is expecting a TDEE figure, Apple sends a Sedentary figure for the time it's sent.
    They do not send activity above sedentary.
    And since they do send workouts, MFP is removing that from what it thinks is the TDEE figure it's received to do proper math with.

    So you get nothing for extra activity, and workouts actually remove from sedentary level calories.

    You'll need to sync MFP to Pacer app, and then setup Pacer app to sync to your Apple account (not phone).
    Pacer will get the correct different figures, and report the correct one to MFP for correct math.

    And as shown above - it's the extra detail on that Adjustment that shows what MFP is using, from what was sent to it.
  • heybales
    heybales Posts: 18,842 Member
    Oh - to your point of not wearing watch until you woke up - doesn't matter.
    Non-step time is given BMR level calorie burn - which when sleeping is exactly right.

    Obviously that's underestimated when actually awake by a minor amount, or when standing doing things like cooking, cleaning.
  • goatelope
    goatelope Posts: 178 Member
    Blimey. Thanks but I have no idea what any of this means! But thanks anyway. I will just go by MFP as I find it more conservative in its estimates
  • heybales
    heybales Posts: 18,842 Member
    goatelope wrote: »
    Blimey. Thanks but I have no idea what any of this means! But thanks anyway. I will just go by MFP as I find it more conservative in its estimates

    Then at least correct MFP to Lightly-Active which is honest.
    Likely the reason it's more conservative is because you have it set wrong. Smaller doesn't mean more correct.

    Faster weight loss and negative effects from it are rarely beneficial long term, usually not short term either.
  • goatelope
    goatelope Posts: 178 Member
    Yes it is set to lightly active - I am very immobile due to disability

Categories