Which burns more calories?

[Newfitkitty]

I was using the workout part on my app and I used it many times today. Well, there were two times that I had noticed something. The first time when I used it today it showed I worked out for 45 minutes, 36 minutes of fat burn, and 9 minutes of cardio. I burned 247 calories at that time. Then later I worked out (doing the same thing) for 35 minutes and it showed 2 minutes of peak, 7 minutes of cardio, and 24 minutes of fat burn. That said i burned 286 calories. So, does that mean i burn more calories in less time when my heart rate shows peak, cardio, and fat burn? and why?

[Dominique]

Well, at the risk of stating the obvious, the more intense an activity is, the more energy you will expend per unit of time. For instance, you will burn more calories when walking briskly for 30 minutes than when walking at a more leisurely pace for the same time. If jogging, you will burn more, and if running, even more. Your average HR will be increase with the intensity of your activity.

Now, if your aim is to burn the maximum amount of calories in the minimum amount of time, you’d probably want to consider HIIT-style workouts (high-intensity interval training), as opposed to steady-state cardio, in which you’d perform whatever activity you’ve selected at the same intensity the whole time.

[Newfitkitty]

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@Dominique wrote:

Well, at the risk of stating the obvious, the more intense an activity is, the more energy you will expend per unit of time. For instance, you will burn more calories when walking briskly for 30 minutes than when walking at a more leisurely pace for the same time. If jogging, you will burn more, and if running, even more. Your average HR will be increase with the intensity of your activity.

Now, if your aim is to burn the maximum amount of calories in the minimum amount of time, you’d probably want to consider HIIT-style workouts (high-intensity interval training), as opposed to steady-state cardio, in which you’d perform whatever activity you’ve selected at the same intensity the whole time.

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Thank you. at least you gave a more detailed answer then this person at yahoo answers. They just told me "A bike."

[Dominique]

If you want to compare what various activities burn per unit of time, you can have a look at the Compendium of Physical Activities. For a way to apply the METs values, see this post. To determine your BMR, you can use this online calculator.

If your question was related to the "optimal" ratio of time spent in each HR zone (fat burn, cardio, peak), my advice would be not to bother too much about it. You should pick your activities/workouts, and their intensity/duration, based on your goals (e.g. improve fitness, lose weight, build muscle, increase strength etc.), and let your HR fall in whatever zones.