How accurate is the app when losing weight?

It's not accurate for me, but it can be a nice mental boost before I go to bed when ive had a great day with food!

Over the course of a week calories were pretty much accurate for me - the c. 200 / day calorie initial divergence I calculated from my results compared to my expectations was more down to sloppy (but consistent) logging.

But as during my weight loss I ate at maintenance 5 days a week and had a big deficit 2 days a week the prediction had zero chance of being useful.

Overall this tool enabled me to lose steadily at my desired 1lb/week with only a single adjustment after a few weeks of consistent logging.

jlsjenni1992 wrote: »

When you finish your day after logging your food , it gives you option to complete diary and tells you how much you’d weigh in 5 weeks based on your calories or excercise , Ive been using this app for week and wonder how accurate that is ? Also does the amount of calories go down the more thinner you get or can you still eat the amount of calories the app gives you at your highest weight ? For example , I’m 5’3 175.4 pounds and I set my goal to .5 pound loss every week .The app based on being not active at all gave me calorie amount as 1620 calories,My first goal is to get to 160 but , after that eventually I want to get 135 if I continue strictly eating 1620 can i get 135 or would I have to eat less calories?

You will get a much more accurate picture from a weight trend app (Libra for Android, Happy Scale for Apple). I found Libra incredibly helpful for a .5 lb/week goal.

Not very active/ sedentary looks to be under 3500 steps per day based on my Fitbit linked to MFP. Today I was feeling lousy but still have over 3500 steps just from running loads of laundry (all on one floor). I have currently earned 50 exercise calories, but will probably hit about 200 after an evening stint on my treadmill.

If possible, I'd recommend linking a fitness tracker to get an accurate number of activity calories.

The 5 week thing is just silly. No two days are alike.

In more overall terms, the goal MFF gives you is just a statistical estimate. What it spits out is the average for people like you.

Looking at the underlying data, most people are pretty close to that average. A few may be further off, either high or low. A very, very few can be quite far off, but that's very rare.

Nooshi says MFP over-estimates her calorie needs, i.e., that her maintenance calories are lower than MFP would predict. I believe her.

I find that MFP under-estimates my calorie needs, i.e., my maintenance calorie are higher than MFP would predict. This is based on nearly 5 years of logging experience.

Nooshi and I are the unusual cases. Most people - as they've said above - are the usual cases, and they find it accurate.

Start by following MFP's recommendation. Like most people who've reported above, you'll most likely to find it pretty close. It'll certainly be a better estimate to start with than asking other random people what their calorie needs are, because it's at least the average of a large number of people.

Follow the recommendation for 4-6 weeks. If your weight loss is unusual in the first two weeks, ignore those. Figure out your average actual weight loss per week. If that's the sensible goal rate you set in MFP, you're golden. If you're losing more slowly (and it would still be safe for you to lose faster), eat a little less. If you're losing faster, eat a little more. If you're a woman who has monthly cycles (not too young, not in menopause), then compare the same point in two different menstrual cycles, because we women's hormones can have odd effects on water retention.

Bottom line: It'll probably be accurate for you. After a few weeks, you'll know whether you're one of the few people for whom it isn't.

Does MFP even let you set a 5lbs loss per week? Mine only goes up to 2lbs per week. Trying to lose 5lbs a week every week is pretty unrealistic in my opinion