Calorie calculator help please

karenwheeler8
karenwheeler8 Posts: 10 Member
in Getting Started
Im unable to use their method for calculating how many calories i need daily, can someone please help out

Replies

  • Lietchi
    Lietchi Posts: 6,787 Member
    You're going to have to be more detailed on what the problem is?
    Have you entered your stats here? https://www.myfitnesspal.com/account/change_goals_guided
    (PS: ignore the question about frequency of exercise, it doesn't change your calorie goal)
    If you're not on the website, but using the app: go to "Me" and then "Update goals".
  • Cheesy567
    Cheesy567 Posts: 1,186 Member
    Try www.TDEEcalculator.net
  • westrich20940
    westrich20940 Posts: 913 Member
    Yes, use a TDEE calculator and then manually input your calorie goal.
  • karenwheeler8
    karenwheeler8 Posts: 10 Member
    Thank you for your comments, i think i have it now 👍
  • wunderkindking
    wunderkindking Posts: 1,615 Member
    Lietchi wrote: »
    So where is all this dislike of MFP's calculation coming from :tongue:
    I find TDEE calculators horrible vague, and the one linked is even more vague than some others I've seen: it doesn't even distinguish different activity levels outside of exercise, and frequency of exercise doesn't say a lot about calorie expenditure if you don't know the duration or type of exercise.
    To each their own, but I much prefer logging exercise separately, seems more accurate.
    It's also a better method if exercise is done on an irregular basis (not the same exercise intensity each week), which is definitely the case for me.

    I haaaate MFP's calculator.

    The reason though is that I have a day job sitting at a desk at home, don't intentionally exercise in a traditional sense, nor one that is easy to measure, but am active in ways that are daily, consistent, and happens mostly in small bursts multiple times a day (I train dogs).

    If I tried to input that stuff in, I'd lose my mind.

    If I ignored it, I'd starve to death.

    Using a TDEE method gives me a rough daily average that is much closer than anything MFP gives me, even mucking around with activity settings and I don't have to try to 'log' my 'exercise' and then guess at percentage of calories.

    I admtitedly still had to tinker with it but a tdee calculator is off by about 200 calories/day. MFP was off somewhere between 500 and a thousand, depending on activity setting.
  • AnnPT77
    AnnPT77 Posts: 34,156 Member
    TDEE method can work, MFP can work - what's best depends on preferences and circumstances. Let's not make this a quasi-religious argument?

    Prefer the same calorie goal daily, and your activity (including exercise) is semi-consistent? Use TDEE, set MFP calorie goal manually.

    Please don't use the pretty-awful TDEEcalculator.netvto estimate TDEE, even though it has a seductively simpler user interface. Use https://www.sailrabbit.com/bmr/, or better yet MFP-er @heybales "Just TDEE Please" spreadsheet, which I'd link if I weren't using a stupid device that makes doing so very difficult.

    Variable exercise, unpredictable; or otherwise prefer eating more if/when exercise happens? Use MFP's estimate, log exercise separately.

    Either way can work. Either way, you may need to adjust goals or intake once you have personal results data from 4-6 weeks.

    You're not a statistical average, you're a unique individual, and you may be different from average (maybe even for no known reason). It happens. NBD.

    Just try to understand the assumptions behind your chosen approach, and use it rationally. Don't randomly mix parts of each.

    OP, this rant is not aimed at you specifically. It's a response to the back & forth on the thread.

    Neither method is universally "better". They're both viable. It's about preferences.
  • heybales
    heybales Posts: 18,842 Member
    wunderkindking wrote: »
    Lietchi wrote: »
    So where is all this dislike of MFP's calculation coming from :tongue:
    I find TDEE calculators horrible vague, and the one linked is even more vague than some others I've seen: it doesn't even distinguish different activity levels outside of exercise, and frequency of exercise doesn't say a lot about calorie expenditure if you don't know the duration or type of exercise.
    To each their own, but I much prefer logging exercise separately, seems more accurate.
    It's also a better method if exercise is done on an irregular basis (not the same exercise intensity each week), which is definitely the case for me.

    I haaaate MFP's calculator.

    The reason though is that I have a day job sitting at a desk at home, don't intentionally exercise in a traditional sense, nor one that is easy to measure, but am active in ways that are daily, consistent, and happens mostly in small bursts multiple times a day (I train dogs).

    If I tried to input that stuff in, I'd lose my mind.

    If I ignored it, I'd starve to death.

    Using a TDEE method gives me a rough daily average that is much closer than anything MFP gives me, even mucking around with activity settings and I don't have to try to 'log' my 'exercise' and then guess at percentage of calories.

    I admtitedly still had to tinker with it but a tdee calculator is off by about 200 calories/day. MFP was off somewhere between 500 and a thousand, depending on activity setting.

    With a BMR multiplier of 1.25 to 1.75 range difference, a large BMR of even 2000 would indeed have a difference of 1000.

    But a jump from 1.25 to 1.4 would only be 300. Not sure how you obtained 500 jump.

    Unless you had a better TDEE calc than those external sites (like mine or Sailrabbit), 1.20 to 1.375 would have been a bigger jump than that for 350.

    And most people are no where near a 2000 BMR to see those big ones.

    I'll admit that MFP shouldn't rely so much on only 1/2 of the potential daily hours for 5 days of the week as just your job time in the description - as many people with desk jobs discover they are Lightly-Active for the whole week.

    But 1.25, 1.4, 1.6, and 1.75 are might close to 1.2, 1.375, 1.55, 1.725, (and 1.9 being the loner on external sites).

    So you must have used a better TDEE calc to get such a finer initial estimate - where was it?
  • heybales
    heybales Posts: 18,842 Member
    My intended weekly exercise, which is pretty variable anyway, totally gets interrupted or changed or dropped as the week goes on. That's about the only consistent part of my exercise - changes.

    If I had to base an eating goal daily on what my plan was for the week for exercise - never work.

    If some people have some daily walking they do, set days for fitness classes or cardio or lifting, and their schedule totally allows hitting all that - that's beautiful.

    TDEE can work great for many.

    I'm also totally convinced it's that method along with gung-ho exercise that leads people to believe you have to exercise to lose weight - and that's why they stopped losing in the past. They didn't hold to their planned workouts.

    But if TDEE works, might as well use something better. Sailrabbit is better too, and I see pieces there from a prior spreadsheet method.
    Just TDEE Please spreadsheet - better than rough 5 level TDEE charts from 1919 study.
    https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1G7FgNzPq3v5WMjDtH0n93LXSMRY_hjmzNTMJb3aZSxM/edit?usp=sharing

  • wunderkindking
    wunderkindking Posts: 1,615 Member
    heybales wrote: »
    wunderkindking wrote: »
    Lietchi wrote: »
    So where is all this dislike of MFP's calculation coming from :tongue:
    I find TDEE calculators horrible vague, and the one linked is even more vague than some others I've seen: it doesn't even distinguish different activity levels outside of exercise, and frequency of exercise doesn't say a lot about calorie expenditure if you don't know the duration or type of exercise.
    To each their own, but I much prefer logging exercise separately, seems more accurate.
    It's also a better method if exercise is done on an irregular basis (not the same exercise intensity each week), which is definitely the case for me.

    I haaaate MFP's calculator.

    The reason though is that I have a day job sitting at a desk at home, don't intentionally exercise in a traditional sense, nor one that is easy to measure, but am active in ways that are daily, consistent, and happens mostly in small bursts multiple times a day (I train dogs).

    If I tried to input that stuff in, I'd lose my mind.

    If I ignored it, I'd starve to death.

    Using a TDEE method gives me a rough daily average that is much closer than anything MFP gives me, even mucking around with activity settings and I don't have to try to 'log' my 'exercise' and then guess at percentage of calories.

    I admtitedly still had to tinker with it but a tdee calculator is off by about 200 calories/day. MFP was off somewhere between 500 and a thousand, depending on activity setting.

    With a BMR multiplier of 1.25 to 1.75 range difference, a large BMR of even 2000 would indeed have a difference of 1000.

    But a jump from 1.25 to 1.4 would only be 300. Not sure how you obtained 500 jump.

    Unless you had a better TDEE calc than those external sites (like mine or Sailrabbit), 1.20 to 1.375 would have been a bigger jump than that for 350.

    And most people are no where near a 2000 BMR to see those big ones.

    I'll admit that MFP shouldn't rely so much on only 1/2 of the potential daily hours for 5 days of the week as just your job time in the description - as many people with desk jobs discover they are Lightly-Active for the whole week.

    But 1.25, 1.4, 1.6, and 1.75 are might close to 1.2, 1.375, 1.55, 1.725, (and 1.9 being the loner on external sites).

    So you must have used a better TDEE calc to get such a finer initial estimate - where was it?

    Oh , no. I think I wasn't clear.

    First of all I don't hate MFP's calculator/method on some kind of principal thing I'm just saying that for me I really don't like it.

    Of more relevance to the immediate topic, those numbers are not the difference between MFP and the TDEE calculator (I used sailrabbit), but by how much MFP is off what I need to actually eat to maintain my weight, with the variance of more or less depending on what I use as my activity level. The TDEE method got me a much closer starting point with much less effort than trying to log my weirdly consistent but generally hard to log exercise. Not that any TDEE calculator nailed it. Just that the variance by which it was off for me, as an individual, was much less and the process less painful.
  • wunderkindking
    wunderkindking Posts: 1,615 Member
    And of relevance to post 2, I agree that TDEE for *intentional, structured exercise* is probably a worse idea than not. I think it benefits a lot of people to see what their calorie burn from activity is and recognize you can lose and maintain without it and know what's up.

    My EXERCISE is erratic and I get that.

    I just responded to someone asking why the hate for MFP's method. I don't actually hate it on principal. I hate it for me because a lot of my activity is really, really hard to log, super short duration, but consistent, because if it's not consistent I have a small herd of high energy, rules lawyering, dogs who will make me regret my life choices otherwise.

    I could PROBABLY also make this easier with a fitness tracker but I can't do that level of looking at numbers and also I don't have a smart phone.

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