Using FitBit and My FitnessPal together

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adamdenison17
adamdenison17 Posts: 4 Member
in Fitness and Exercise
Any tips for using these two together?

I'm curious how to get a somewhat accurate measure of calories burned using the two. I just got a Fitbit Inspire 2, but it looks like it only calculates total calories burned for the day. Would love to get a better (rough) idea of what my calorie burn is during exercise. Tips?

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  • Speakeasy76
    Speakeasy76 Posts: 961 Member
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    I don't know about the Inspired, but with my Fitbit Versa Lite I can choose an exercise and start and stop it. That gives me a rough estimate of how many calories I burned with that exercise.
  • maroonmango211
    maroonmango211 Posts: 908 Member
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    Agreed, while the app for Fitbit will add total calories throughout the day as it syncs, you have the option to start timed workouts (run, swim, bike, weights, intervals and treadmill I think) and either during or after the workouts you can keep track of and look at your stats like estimated calories burned, steps, HR. You can also use the Fitbit app to see the calories burned during active times both the ones you choose to officially 'start and stop' as well as if you go for a walk or enjoy other activities throughout the day.
  • heybales
    heybales Posts: 18,842 Member
    edited February 2021
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    Other tip for improving accuracy on the Fitbit so when MFP corrects itself it's better.

    If you do over 10K steps in daily activity, distance matters much more than under 5K for the calories burned.
    Calories is for mass and pace, not steps. Steps just gets to a distance, using the Stride Length setting.

    You want that setting at average daily pace distance, usually about 1.8 mph for most people.
    That way the device can dynamically adjust up and down as needed.

    Walk a known distance at that pace, it will feel really slow, and confirm Fitbit got the distance right.
    If not math out the correct figure for distance and steps done.
    1/2 mile or longer is best - not across living room with 25 ft tape measure.

    Added to that, replace calorie burn for known inflated calculations.
    Weights, you can use a workout for the start/stop/duration times - but add your own Workout and let Fitbit pick the calorie burn to replace what it came up with using HR - which is inflated burn.

    For walking with HR at bottom of range, that is the most inflated place for calories is bottom of aerobic range, like right above 90. If you do a lot of it.
    If you got the distance right now - manually add a workout for distance and time and let Fitbit use calculations for calorie burn - much more accurate since treadmills have been used in research studies for decades and formula for calorie burn is very accurate.

    In either of those cases - what you manually enter will replace whatever Fitbit add there first.
    Fitbit is a replace only system. So don't worry about double-counting because the original entry is there still.
  • janejellyroll
    janejellyroll Posts: 25,763 Member
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    When I go into my Fitbit app, I can see each individual exercise session and see how many calories I burned. My version (the Charge 3) auto-detects exercise sessions so I don't even have to start and stop anything.
  • 33gail33
    33gail33 Posts: 1,155 Member
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    Mine only shows calorie breakdown for exercises it auto detects. But it doesn't auto detect cycling so when I log that after it doesn't give me the breakdown, so I just look at the total for the day. Maybe I have it set up wrong.
  • heybales
    heybales Posts: 18,842 Member
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    Don't rely on the auto-start for cycling, or lifting for that matter and any number of other workout where steps is not a major part of it.

    Increased steps and HR are needed for good auto-start.
    Otherwise manually start it.

    But even after the fact - if you create an Activity Record (as opposed to a manually entered Workout Record) for the chunk of time desired, it will have a calorie burn shown.
    It will possibly not have used HR-based calculated calorie burn though during that time though - so a big loss probably, few steps and distance means low calorie burn.
    But it will allow you to see the stats during the workout Fitbit saw.

    That must be a viewing issue too, because both Workout and Activity Records show up under exercise.
    The Workouts replace what is already there, Activity just shows a snapshot of what is already there.
  • hulldon1
    hulldon1 Posts: 10 Member
    edited February 2021
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    Interesting subject. I use Fitbit because I am a big walker and want to watch my heart rate due to age. However, if I am wanting to just monitor my exercise period I use UA Map my walk app. In comparison the caloric burn is very close provided all necessaries are set up properly. The app also shows the route, walk rate and a few other handy bits of data. Of course the both marry upto MFP but MFP counts in both caloric burns from both apps. One has to be deleted or not synch'd to MFP. It depends if you want daily caloric burn adjustment or exercise caloric adjustment. Fitbit for daily and Map my Walk for exercise period. There are other UA apps like Map my Bike, Map my Run.

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