Calorie deficit arithmetic mistake?

hammad_azhar
hammad_azhar Posts: 1 Member
edited January 13 in MyFitnessPal Tech Support Questions
I recently synced my Garmin fitness watch with myfitnesspal app on my phone. The app computed a calorie deficit for me based on my weight loss goal. Im quite certain it is making a simple arithmetic mistake of double counting. Let me illustrate:

My calorie deficit should be 500 calories/day to achieve a weight loss of 0.5 kg/week. Myfitnesspal app gives me 1900 as my food goal since my total calorie burn is estimated at 2400/day. It then adjusts my calorie goal based on active calorie expenditure data that it syncs from my Garmin watch and subtracts whatever active calories i burnt through exercise to give an ‘adjusted goal’. But thats double counting! The 2400 figure already includes my active calories. So it should either remove my active calories data from total food intake goal at the outset (so focus just on resting calories only to compute) or not subtract my active calories from my food intake. If it does both then i end up with far more food calories than are required for a deficit of 500/day.

My synced app is either making the above mistake or grossly underestimating my resting calories (2050) that it should be able to accurately sync from my garmin watch like active calories data.

Do other users also face this problem and then manually adjust the calorie goal?

Best Answer

  • lilacpaula
    lilacpaula Posts: 2 Member
    Answer ✓
    I set mine to lightly active, and hoped that it would then add on any extra calories I earn. It doesn’t!
    I’ve done an intensive spin class and another work out today. My basic calorie allowance is 1600. I was expecting an extra 400-500 calories, which it seems to have given me, but then it’s taken my apple watch ‘active’ calories away 🤷‍♀️
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Answers

  • nossmf
    nossmf Posts: 12,525 Member
    Others who use smart devices and the like can weigh in, but I believe most people do EITHER:

    A) Set MFP activity level to "active" and go without the smart device input, or
    B ) Set MFP activity level to "sedentary" and let the smart device add calories "burned" that it records
  • durden
    durden Posts: 3,670 MFP Staff
    I'm not sure why you're getting a -721 adjustment, but given what you've shown here it makes perfect sense that you're not being given an additional adjustment in addition to having logged exercises. MFP is already assuming a certain activity level and giving you credit for it ahead of time- on top of you logging exercise which is also being accounted for. Your Apple Watch has reported a calorie burn lower than the "MFP Calories Burned", so because you have negative adjustments turned on, you're "losing" that adjustment we would have otherwise given you as an assumption.

    This is just from a very passing reading of what you've provided. Again, the -721 adjustment itself seems high based on the (very little) information provided, but it's otherwise not weird that you're not being given a positive adjustment.

    To reach our support team for assistance, please visit https://myfitnesspal.zendesk.com/hc/en-us or email directly to support@myfitnesspal.com

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