Net Calories and eating your exercise calories you earn

MFP already builds in your caloric deficit for the day to lose however much you've entered per week. They add your exercise calories back in to keep you within a reasonable, healthy, and sustainable deficit each day.

I'm new too... and I don't get it either.

I'm new to MFP and confused on the calories you are given each day. I do exercise, but I don't want to eat more because I am trying to lose weight. I don't understand why the calories you earn are added back to your daily target if you are trying to lose weight.

Please eat them the program is set up the way it is for a reason. You initial caloric intake that MFP gives you is to lose your goal amount of weight with no exercise, so once you exercise you need to eat more to lose that amount of weight. (500 cal/day deficit to lose 1 lb/week, if you burn an extra 300 your deficit is not 800, so to keep your deficit at 500 you must eat those 300 extra)

Most professionals will tell you not to eat your exercise calories back because they added it into your TDEE, whereas MFP ignores exercise and only accounts for it when you perform it. Either way should get you to the same place.

As an example say MFP gives you 1450 calories to lose 1 lb/week, and you plan on exercising 5x/week for an average of 400 cals per workout. well MFP will tell you to eat 1450 on the days you don't workout and 1850 on the days you do whereas a "professional" may tell you to eat 1750 everyday regardless if you workout.

So for the week MFP will have you eat 12,150 (1450*2+1850*5) whereas doing it the other way will have you eat 12,250 (1750*7) almost the same number of cals for the week. The issue in not following MFP is if you don't workout the full 5 days or burn more or less than planned. If that is the case you may lose more or less than your goal, whereas MFP will have you lose your goal amount regardless how much you actually workout.

What many MFPers do is take the low 1450 and not eat back exercise calories which is wrong, if you are not eating them back then your daily activity level should reflect the higher burn with would be covered in the 1750/day above.

Unless I'm mistaken, total calories - calories burned w/ excercise = net calories. Net calories are the amount of calories you need to sustain yourself throughout the day for energy. For example, my girlfriend is given 1200 net calories each day. Yesterday, she burned 1118 doing an 80 minute high intensity class at the gym. That would leave her a total of 82 calories for her meals all day, which is impossible! Your net calories adjust as your excercise is taken into consideration.

Hope this sheds a little light, and if I'm not right, I hope someone out there corrects me with a more accurate explanation.

It depends on how you use MFP.

You can setup your diet so you are at a deficit in order to lose weight (i.e. consume fewer calories than you burn). In this case, you should eat back the calories you burn during exercise to maintain the original deficit (too large a deficit can be unhealthy).

You can setup your diet so you are at maintenance, then use exercise to create the deficit. In that case, don't eat back your calories.

By default, calories area added back because most people set their diet to a deficit in order to lose weight. As such, based solely on their diet they are going to burn more calories than they consume, and thus lose weight. When they exercise on top of that, the additional calories burned create a greater deficit. MFP adds back those calories so people return to the original deficit, not the increased deficit which can be unhealthy.

Now, all that is pretty generalized and someone over simplified, but hopefully it makes sense and answers your question.


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I'm new to MFP and confused on the calories you are given each day. I do exercise, but I don't want to eat more because I am trying to lose weight. I don't understand why the calories you earn are added back to your daily target if you are trying to lose weight.

Please eat them the program is set up the way it is for a reason. You initial caloric intake that MFP gives you is to lose your goal amount of weight with no exercise, so once you exercise you need to eat more to lose that amount of weight. (500 cal/day deficit to lose 1 lb/week, if you burn an extra 300 your deficit is not 800, so to keep your deficit at 500 you must eat those 300 extra)

Most professionals will tell you not to eat your exercise calories back because they added it into your TDEE, whereas MFP ignores exercise and only accounts for it when you perform it. Either way should get you to the same place.

As an example say MFP gives you 1450 calories to lose 1 lb/week, and you plan on exercising 5x/week for an average of 400 cals per workout. well MFP will tell you to eat 1450 on the days you don't workout and 1850 on the days you do whereas a "professional" may tell you to eat 1750 everyday regardless if you workout.

So for the week MFP will have you eat 12,150 (1450*2+1850*5) whereas doing it the other way will have you eat 12,250 (1750*7) almost the same number of cals for the week. The issue in not following MFP is if you don't workout the full 5 days or burn more or less than planned. If that is the case you may lose more or less than your goal, whereas MFP will have you lose your goal amount regardless how much you actually workout.

What many MFPers do is take the low 1450 and not eat back exercise calories which is wrong, if you are not eating them back then your daily activity level should reflect the higher burn with would be covered in the 1750/day above.

Well said!

I just eat my 1200 calories and if I feel hungry later i eat an apple or something low calorie and don't worry about the rest. I never go over my daily calorie count.And if I do as long as I work out its ok.Maybe I'm wrong about this I don't know but it works for me.

Ok, I'm still a little confused (sad, I know!). My net goal is 1490, I earned 892 exercising and now I have 645 left, I'm supposed to eat those 645 calories? :huh: :noway:

Ok, I'm still a little confused (sad, I know!). My net goal is 1490, I earned 892 exercising and now I have 645 left, I'm supposed to eat those 645 calories? :huh: :noway:

Yep, that's right! If you don't eat them, you are functioning on 845 calories for the day. They say you need minimally 1200 calories for your body just to perform every day functions. So you may experience tiredness or get sick easier, etc. etc. if its not getting the fuel it needs to function.

Even though it says that I consumed 1737 calories today?

So I think I'm more confused... So if I have 1200 calorie daily intake. I burn say an average of 700 calories 5x a week. Do I not add the 1200 + 700 to get 1900 calories to consume daily? To which I never eat that many and always have between 300-700 calories remaining.

Although now that I'm pregnant, I try to eat back my exercised calories burned which is lower (1500 + ~ 500= 2000).

The way I'm reading this thread is that your subtracting the calories burned? (1200-700=500) Or is my brain already fried at 7 weeks preggers?

Congrats on being preggers.

You should eat the 1900 in the example you gave is you only at 1200 and burned 700, would be like eating 500 (1200-700) and not exercising, if you ate 1900 and burned 700 it would be the same as eating 1200 (1900-700) and not exercising. The MFP goal of 1200 is your goal to lose your goal amount of weight with no exercise, once you exercise you need to eat more to lose your goal amount of weight.

1200-700 = 500- 0