FitBit Extra Calories and Not Losing Weight

[SunsetRunner]

So on July 4th 2019 FitBit's customized calorie counter gave me about 3118 calories. I was under budget by about 85 calories. It added those extra cals because I got 10,000 steps in, did 30 minutes of exercise bike, and 30 on the treadmill. When I stepped on the scale this morning (July 5th) I was up exactly 1 pound.

Now 1000 calories over my typical budget is not enough to gain a pound, so it has to be food on the gut, water retention etc... But this isn't the first time I've doubted the accuracy of the calorie counts in FitBit.

I thought about switching from customized to sedentary, but though I would try and figure out what extra calories I can have on my own first.

I'm pretty sure FitBit is overestimating my additional calories that can be consumed based on the heart rate monitor which isn't 100% accurate. To get a more accurate idea of how many calories extra that can be consumed I'll need to do a little math.

After doing some research I found a calorie expenditure table with a formula to do this. I don't want to explain the whole thing or type out the entire table, so I'm including a link.

https://www.hss.edu/conditions_burning-calories-with-exercise-calculating-estimated-energy-expenditu...

As an example on July 4th
218 calories burned cycling - FitBit overestimated by 54% (392 burned)
190 calories burned  treadmill - FitBit overestimated by 53% (353 burned)
408 total extra calories that can be consumed

Fitbit allowed 3118 for the day
Should have only allowed 2710 (about 13% lower than FitBit estimate)
408 calories is the difference.

408 calories may not sound like much, but over the course of a week that is nearly 1 pounds worth of calories. For those of us trying to lose weight that is a big deal. I'm going to continue studying this, but for now I'm just going to subtract 15% from "extra" calories that the FitBit customized plan says I can have.

I'll report back next week to see how this all works out. In the meantime I hope it is helpful to others who have been counting their calories, getting the work in, and not seeing the results they expect.

[JimC_99]

I have been tracking both calories consumed and calories burned for over a year and my Fitbit Charge 2 over estimates by 350 - 375 calories per day.  I have adjusted the pulse monitor range, and select the wrong hand for wearing  (to reduce the activity measured), but it is still high.  Now I just set the calorie reduction to 250 and eat a little below for maintaining current weight.  

[SunsetRunner]

What do you mean by "set calorie reduction by 250"? Is there a place to do that, or is this something you're just doing manually?

[JimC_99]

I am currently trying to taper and maintain,  so in the food plan I set the amou t to lose to the lowest setting (250).  I do wish the app would allow an adjustment value for calories to compensate for individual metabolic differences...