Fitbit Calories burned walking

[rudyten]

I do like my Fitbit, But everything it calculates is so BLOATED.
Kinda misleading I would even say.
What are your Rosy colored thoughts on this????

It gives me WAYYY more steps on the Daily Step Count. Then My old RELIABLE pedometer

Put it seem pretty accurate on step count when running or walking for exercise.

The Calories burned is Crazy...not sure how they calculate it for a Exercise walk.200 lbs, I did 2.4 miles at 15 minute Pace per Mile. Took me 37 minutes,

on Fitbit it claims I burned 400 Calories.
When I read in on other sites and use their Formulas the SAME walk turned out about 250 Calories burded.

(Would love to under Firbit's Formula for walking calories burned)

[Bill_k]

This is for heart rate monitor fitbits.

Fitbit determines calories for exercise by using your personal information like your weight in combination with your heart rate as you walk or run.

Using your personal information it creates a base sedentary calorie usage /time number and when you walk or other exercise your heart rate goes up out of sedentary range and the calories burned increases as it goes thru the different ranges and  your heart rate increases.

[Dominique]

Your "old reliable pedometer" was likely worn clipped on your waist. This is optimal for step count. Your Fitbit, OTOH, is likely worn on your wrist. This means it will pick some steps from your hand movements. However, your Fitbit can monitor your HR, your sleep, remind you to move etc., all things out of the reach of your gold old pedometer. There are tradeoffs in life...

[Baltoscott]

@rudyten -- I tend to agree with you that fibit overestimates calorie burn for a lot of people, but make sure you are comparing apples to apples -- the calories listed for your walk include both the calories you would have burned anyway just sitting at your desk or on the couch as well as 'extra' calories from the walk itself.

When I was losing weight, fitbit's calculated calorie burn seemed to be about 500 calories a day too high for me.  I kept track by weighing in daily and checking my actual loss (tended over the week) to projected loss. (There were likely also errors on the calories consumed side, so it is impossible to know how much error was my recording and how much was fitbit's calculated burn).   

I also wear an apple watch.  Comparing my burn over the past 5 days (which includes a partial day for today) my average daily burn for Fitbit was 2,977 calories and for Apple 2,655 calories.  Likely they are both off from actual, but, assuming you  are not aiming for quick weight loss with massive calories deficits, the steps for losing weight are the same: record what you eat as well as you can, and if you are not losing, adjust by lowering calories more. 

[rudyten]

Well I be DANG, I threw my back off yesterday. Been sitting on couch and bed all day... took out the trash

WOOT WOOT,  8,000 Steps and counting... might hit that 10k daily step count still,,, gonna go watch TV, hopefully watching TV will give me 2k. LOL

[Dominique]

If you’re getting 8000 steps from sitting on your coach all day, something is clearly wrong. Can you post your calories burned graph for today? This one, from your Dashboard at https://www.fitbit.com/activities

If you’re mostly sitting at home, you should only see slightly higher red bars than during your sleep, as for myself between 4pm and 6pm above.

I seldom have very-low activity days, but here is one (from Dec 18, 2019), where I stayed at home for the entire day:

Only red bars (low activity), no way I would get 8000 steps on such a day. This why I would like to see your corresponding graph.

[Dominique]

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@rudyten wrote:

Been sitting on couch and bed all day... took out the trash
WOOT WOOT,  8,000 Steps and counting...

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I guess we won’t get to see how your 8k+ steps clocked in from sitting on the couch were distributed across that day...

[Bill_k]

So reboot it and if that doesn't work take it back to the store and get it replaced.

[Dominique]

Good point: restarting the tracker is always a good idea. However, it’s quite possible there’s nothing wrong with it, and the OP just reported widely inflated numbers, perhaps to make a more compelling case that their Fitbit is not "accurate" compared to their old pedometer. I want to see the "receipt" of their 8k+ steps on Feb. 6 before I’ll believe the reported number.

I did a very simple experiment a few minutes ago: while sitting in front of my computer, I recorded a two-minute "workout" that consisted in ininterrupted clapping with my hands. Here are the details:

That got me 269 steps, which are definitely "fake" steps, since I was sitting and my feet didn’t move at all. It would take me 60 minutes of such clapping to get the 8k steps reported by the OP. No way merely sitting on the couch and taking the trash out would get me 8k steps.

[emili]

I have worn a fitbit for the past 5 years and I can honestly say I haven't ever gotten steps sitting. Flailing my arms around laughing- yes. Shaking salt on popcorn- yes. Driving- yes. Weight lifting- yes. I am completely positive that fake steps happen when wearing a wrist tracker. But sitting- that's a new one. As far as calories burned- in some cases, my HR is not accurate on my tracker. It is higher than what the reality is especially when doing any kind of interval training. On the days that happens, I know my calories burned are going to be at least 200 off and I account for that in my overall day. I also know that any over estimated calorie burn on a normal day, has been the same for the past 5 years, so consistency in being wrong- so that in itself give me enough data to ensure that I am consistently right in my food intake and activities. You have to go with technology isn't perfect and have the mindset that the data I have is way more than what I would have without it.  

[Bill_k]

Never mind.