Exercise calories

Does your Fitbit have a heart rate monitor? MFP doesn’t take into account zone minutes so I personally wouldn’t eat them unless hungry and if I was exercising with vigorous effort (heart rate in the cardio zone for most of those minutes). 12,000 leisurely steps below zones doesn’t burn as many calories as 12,000 steps in the zones.

If you get hungry though you could eat some. I wouldn't eat more than half.

Jayj180894 wrote: »

Today I started C25K went on a couple of walks and overall covered just over 7 miles and MFP is linked to my fitbit. My fitbit does over count steps but not massively. MFP says I've earnt 1000 exercise calories. How many can or should I eat back if any at all?

Your fitbit isn't giving you calories specifically for exercise...it is reconciling the activity level you set with MFP to your estimated actual activity level per your FitBit...ie if you're set for sedentary and you cover 7 miles, you aren't sedentary...not even close...so you get an adjustment...but it isn't specifically just for the exercise as Fitbit is lumping in your total activity and everything else (BMR, etc).

As to how much, that really depends on how accurate that adjustment is...many people start with eating some % of those like 50%...there's no rime or reason to that...it's completely arbitrary. This is going to be trial and error

westrich20940 wrote: »

It depends on if your fitbit is counting your calories burned based on your all day activity or just your workouts (walks/C25K stuff)....

If you walked 7 miles....a ROUGH estimate of cals burned would be ~700 (100 cals/mile --- or less than that depending on how much you weigh).

If your Fitbit is synced to MFP, there is no distinction between all day activity and just workouts.

Jayj180894 wrote: »

It does yea. Out of all that I've only been in 69 zone minutes, but I am asking cos I'm starving and my kcals are 1300 for the day. Thank you.

Your goal was 1300 base if your daily activity matched exactly what you told MFP to use - I'm betting Sedentary (which is fine if you have linked Fitbit now).

But you aren't sedentary - that's what Fitbit is informing MFP of, and MFP did the math and discovered you are way over Sedentary for either daily activity or exercise or usually combo of both.

If MFP had been informed of your exact activity level up front you'd have receive a much bigger base eating goal that still includes a deficit for weight loss in it, and would be receiving no adjustments - and I'm betting you wouldn't be 2nd guessing because it would have been told to you up front.

So why question it's wrong now based on nothing more than it seems wrong?

I'll bet if you looked at the distance on any false steps (are you talking 100's where it would matter?) you'll discover minor distance, and calorie burn.
Use your Fitbit 24 hr daily graph, bounce between step view and calorie burn view. Likely barely above base sleeping burn rate called BMR.

Jayj180894 wrote: »

Why isn't MFP number just from exercise though? My fitbit will tell me how many calories I have burnt throughout that day as a whole and MFP seems to have a lower number which just seems to be the calories from the exercise logged on my fitbit?

The adjustment you see on MFP is not your exercise. It's the difference between what MFP projected you would burn based on the activity level you provided and the activity recorded by your Fitbit.

It will be a lower number that your Fitbit only because MFP assumes that you will be burning a certain amount each day just by living.

For example, I tell MFP I'm sedentary and, as a result, it estimates that I need 1,460 calories a day just to maintain my weight. Once I move enough to have burned more than that, I will begin to see adjustments. It has nothing to do with just exercise, although exercise can certainly be a part of it.