How come I can never reach my calorie burn goal??

[Bops]

I don't have unrealistic goals (set to burn 500 more than I take in) and make my steps for the day, stairs climbed, miles walked, etc, but my calorie burn seems impossible to reach.  What am I suppose to do....run on a treadmill 3 hours a day?? Is my fitbit broke?  My husband makes his calorie burn without even trying or going to the gym.

[Collin1000]

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@Bops wrote:

I don't have unrealistic goals (set to burn 500 more than I take in) and make my steps for the day, stairs climbed, miles walked, etc, but my calorie burn seems impossible to reach.  What am I suppose to do....run on a treadmill 3 hours a day?? Is my fitbit broke?  My husband makes his calorie burn without even trying or going to the gym.

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The trick is to either get more activity or eat less food - or both. If you have it set to be 500 calories more than you eat, you'll need to either burn more calories or eat less food. You also might want to try a lower goal at first, and making sure all of your info in fitbit is correct. I found that I could never ever reach a -1000 plan because I wasn't able to burn enough and I was too hungry. -500 turned out to be my personal sweet spot. Every body is different so play around with it.

I'm going to move this topic fromt the Fitbit One Product Help forum to the Get Fit area so that others can share their suggestions and assistance. 

[mikkolover]

hello, i have a similar queston, which i posted earlier, is there any answer that can help?

Hi, you seem to know what you are talking about.. and after 7 mo of not losing a single gram, im getting increasingly frustrated.. i posted this earlier today, perhaps you have an answer??

thank you in advance:)

Hi there, i love my fitbit flex, but i havent lost a single gram since i got it. I set my deficit to -1000 i just have about 10kg to loose, having lost 40kg already and wanted this for a last push. I noticed that fitbit tells me on my dashboard and log to eat xx amount per day, say 1800 average., However, i noticed in the in and out area, that im always in the red AND i have no deficit at all!

Why is it telling me that its ok to eat 1800 and keep this deficit of -1000 when that clearly isnt true?? Isn't that the beauty of this fitbit flex that you see at real time what you burn and CAN eat..,then i realy dont think this is working properly.. or is it?? thanks!!

[Aussieanne]

Hi, I'm pretty new to fitbit but have many years of dieting experience. Basically a deficit means that you need to burn more calories than you eat. So if you set a 1000 deficit you need to use 1000 more than what you take in. If your fit bit is telling you that you have 1800 calories to eat, then I guess that you need to burn 2800 a day. My goal is -750 a day. So I am automatically given around 1200 calories to eat based on my height and weight. If I want to maintain my weight I need to eat around 1950 a day (1200 + 750). But I workout everyday and usually burn around 2500 a day which means that I have to eat more. If I did no exercise, and still wanted to keep -750 deficit, I would only eat 1200 calories a day.
If you've lost a lot of weight already you might be experiencing a plateau. If that's the case, try something to change it up a bit. For me, protein only for a couple of days seems to work but might not be right for everyone. Hope this helps.

[Inga]

eat less to make sure you are in the green 🙂

[SunsetRunner · Accepted solution]

First off, your husband probably meets his calorie burn goal much easier simply because he's a man. Sad for us ladies, but true. This is because men naturally have more muscle which burns more calories while he's at rest. Also, he might and most probably should have different goals than you.

When it comes to you and your calorie burn goals it all depends on how much you're eating and your BMR (basal metabolic rate), easily calculated by weight, height and age.
I'll use my stats as an example as I don't know yours and round off numbers for simplicity.
My BMR is 1700, as is my daily calorie allowance. I'm going for a 500 calorie deficit since I can't exercise much (major pain issues).
My calorie burn goal is 2200.
Since 2200 - 1700 = 500, I know I'm golden if I hover right around my food and burn goals.
If I burn 2500 in a day, I can eat 2000.

I suggest you add 500 to your daily food allowance and set that as your calorie burn goal (done easily on the dashboard with the bolt whatever icon on your calorie burn).
Always think calorie burn minus calorie intake equals 500 and you're set!
Hope that helped and good luck! 🙂

[Caffeine]

@mikkolover 

 

I know the frustration!  I have had the same issue, and found that the big problem was WHAT, not how much, I was eating.  I switched to a diet of fruits, vegetables, good meats, seeds and nuts, and healthy fats, and the weight finally started to shed...and actually took quite a while to come back on when I fell off the wagon.  Too much processed food, too much sugar can be the things tripping you up.  Your body might also just get used to what you're eating and stop losing weight.  I've had that happen too.  

 

 

[Caffeine]

@Bops 

 

I, too, notice that I'm not reaching my calorie burn, even though I'm hitting everything else.  The calorie goal is just set too high.  I found that I can either change the goal or focus on the other factors--if I've had 100 ounces of water, 75 minutes of activity, and am well under my food plan goal at the end of the day, I figure that it works out OK.

 

That said, ignoring that the numbers don't say what I'd want them to is maddening.  There's a good argument there for changing the calorie burn goal itself. 🙂

[ac7ss]

It sounds like you are setting the goal backwards.
Calculate your BMR, subtract your preferred deficit and use that for your starting calorie goal.

Any excercise you do can either add to the allotted calorie count or add to your deficit.
For example my BMR is 2462 (Using the lowest possible values and formulae)

2462 - 500 = 1962 cal / day
Assuming thet my BMR is correct, if I eat 1962 calories a day I will lose 1 pound a week (not including water fluxuatioins)

If I add in my walks (my 3 mile walk was listed at 435 calories) It changes my burned calories per day to nearly 2900. I can either add in 435 caloies in food, or take it as additional deficit.
You will not burn off that cheeseburger as easily as you hoped you would, easier to reduce your daily intake and work to increase the deficit instead of trying to work harder to afford the slice of cheesecake.

[AliceGrimm]

Soo.. if I did this correctly, I used MyFitnessPal's BMR calculator, which told me my BMR is 1,696 and I minus 500 from, which would give me my daily burn goal of 1,196, is this correct?

[whome]

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@AliceGrimm wrote:

Soo.. if I did this correctly, I used MyFitnessPal's BMR calculator, which told me my BMR is 1,696 and I minus 500 from, which would give me my daily burn goal of 1,196, is this correct?

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Correct if you plan to not move all day - BMR is short for Basal Metabolic Rate - that means the number of calories needed to sustain life, that is respiration, circulation, digestion, elimination, etc. - once you are standing up you have increased .your calorie burn above your BMR because it requires effort to stand upright.

 Hope this helps, good luck

[AliceGrimm]

Thank you!

I know what BMR is.. and I know there are lots of equations to calculate it. I may not know it in researched detail, but it is just the energy for your body to function.

My question is... the "Calories Burned" square on the dashboard, that makes you make a goal. And when you hover over the question mark in the left hand upper corner, it tells you about BMR. I don't understand what are or why you set a daily goal...

Is it a goal of how much you want to burn a day by working out? Or does it help them understand that you want to take so many calories of food you eat, and have a deficiency.. and thus leaving some of your BMR burned calories not equaling what you are taking in, which means you wll lose by doing nothing in the world?

Sorry.. I am so confused it is difficult to articulate what am even trying to say. lol I am sorry.

[Heybales]

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@AliceGrimm wrote:

Thank you!

I know what BMR is.. and I know there are lots of equations to calculate it. I may not know it in researched detail, but it is just the energy for your body to function.

My question is... the "Calories Burned" square on the dashboard, that makes you make a goal. And when you hover over the question mark in the left hand upper corner, it tells you about BMR. I don't understand what are or why you set a daily goal...

Is it a goal of how much you want to burn a day by working out? Or does it help them understand that you want to take so many calories of food you eat, and have a deficiency.. and thus leaving some of your BMR burned calories not equaling what you are taking in, which means you wll lose by doing nothing in the world?

Sorry.. I am so confused it is difficult to articulate what am even trying to say. lol I am sorry.

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Forget the terrible recommendation you saw above about setting your eating goal to 500 less than BMR.

That's just asinine, and shows someone doesn't understand how things work.

You merely need to eat less than you burn in total daily. By a reasonable amount and you can help it be fat only. Make it too big and it'll include muscle mass too - and then you can repeat this next year when you fail to maintain.

Guess what is telling you how much you burn?

Actually underestimated, because it's assuming BMR level burn for all non-moving calories, and that's not true when awake or standing. And you should also correct for exericse that is not step based and underestimated too.

And the Fitbit default profile setup is to ask how much less you want to eat than what you burn for weight loss. Say you picked 500 for 1 lb weekly.

The goal for how much to burn is a total different setting - and is unrelated to your eating goal.

It can help your eating goal be sustainable for you though.

Perhaps you know you like to eat 2000 calories mostly, that's comfortable, you can adhere to that.

So you set your burn goal to 2500, so you can eat where you want, and lose 1 lb weekly.

But your eating goal is still going to be set to 500 less than what you actually burn - if you picked that setting.

Whether you reach the 2500 is up to you and that being realistic, which means eating 2000 is up to you to.

But if a slow day, and Fitbit says you only burned 2000 - you can decide if you want to stay at 1500, or eat closer to 2000 and not lose any fat that day.

[AliceGrimm]

Thank you. I think I understand a bit more of how it works. I think I need to figure out how to do all these settings and see what works best for me.

I am kind of inbetween two sites. I am uing MyFitnessPal, but of course that has restricted me to 1200 calories a day. Once I get more active in the gym though, I may see if that changes, if it doesn't, I may follow fitbit more, because I don't want to do as you said.. and include losing the little muscle I do have. I am also hoping to build mucle, but that will take more time than losing the weight I need to.

Thank you so much for taking time out of your day to explain how the Dashboard works.

[Heybales]

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@AliceGrimm wrote:

Thank you. I think I understand a bit more of how it works. I think I need to figure out how to do all these settings and see what works best for me.

I am kind of inbetween two sites. I am uing MyFitnessPal, but of course that has restricted me to 1200 calories a day. Once I get more active in the gym though, I may see if that changes, if it doesn't, I may follow fitbit more, because I don't want to do as you said.. and include losing the little muscle I do have. I am also hoping to build mucle, but that will take more time than losing the weight I need to.

Thank you so much for taking time out of your day to explain how the Dashboard works.

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Actually, you made MFP end up at 1200 calories.

You selected the activity level, and if you chose sedentary and it's not true, you caused estimated daily maintenance to be lower than it could be. And that's the non-exercise days only.

Never fear - merely syncing with Fitbit will correct that figure with the calorie adjustment given.

In fact if you have non-exercise days with 200 or more positive calorie adjustment, your activity level selected is too low - increase it so you can better plan your day.

But you also selected weight loss goal amount - if you selected too big, it stopped at 1200.

If you have less than 15 to lose, 1/2 lb weekly is reasonable, if body is healthy otherwise.

15-30 lbs, 1 lb weekly.

30-60 lbs, 1.5 lb weekly.

Over 60, 2 lbs weekly.

Then I'd keep the accounts synced, since MFP is easier to deal with food side of the equation.

Only thing you need to do on MFP or Fitbit, and Fitbit a tad better, is logging your non-step based workouts that Fitbit is underestimating, like swimming, biking, rowing, lifting, elliptical, ect.

If you don't, that creates extra deficit.

Then just meet your MFP daily eating goal.

[Sveltagain]

Thank you.

[Adi90]

Saw this post and had a question

The part where you said that if you do some activity, your calorie burn rate automatically increases by 400 for example which means you can eat upto 400 more - why isn't Fitbit automatically calculating that. It is synced with myfitnesspal. So as a result for me, it points me toward a1000 calorie deficit instead of a 500 one which is what I was trying to do. 

To explain - my bmr is around 1800. So my eating/consumption calorie goal should be 1300 to get a 500 calorie deficit which is what I set on MyFitnessPal. But my Fitbit doesn't seem to record that part so instead it continues to show my daily calorie burn goal as 2300 (+500) why does that happen

[Heybales]

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@Adi90 wrote:

Saw this post and had a question

The part where you said that if you do some activity, your calorie burn rate automatically increases by 400 for example which means you can eat upto 400 more - why isn't Fitbit automatically calculating that. It is synced with myfitnesspal. So as a result for me, it points me toward a1000 calorie deficit instead of a 500 one which is what I was trying to do. 

To explain - my bmr is around 1800. So my eating/consumption calorie goal should be 1300 to get a 500 calorie deficit which is what I set on MyFitnessPal. But my Fitbit doesn't seem to record that part so instead it continues to show my daily calorie burn goal as 2300 (+500) why does that happen

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Not sure if I'm totally getting your point since you may be using phrases differently or understanding of how it works is off.

Your Daily Calorie Burn Goal is a static number, appears to be 2300. You can adjust that as desired.

It doesn't adjust based on what you've done or how MFP is set (those numbers not synced), but it can certainly encourage you for what you want to do.

Your eating goal should NEVER be a deficit off your BMR (calories burned if sleeping all day, ie coma), but rather your total daily burned calories - TDEE. You only need to eat less than you burn for the day to lose fat weight. You are increasing your deficit right there to perhaps unreasonable and unsustainable by starting off wrong.

So with say a 500 deficit, you come to realize you just aren't happy unless you can eat say 1600 at least daily, less than that your workouts suck, you get hangry, headaches, binging on a day, something negative.

So you'd manually set your Fitbit Daily Burn Goal to 2100. And then keep an eye on that on device.

Knowing that if you at least hit that goal for daily burn, you'll get your minimum amount to eat of 1600 on MFP. And if you do more, get to eat more - and still lose 1 lb weekly.

On the MFP side - it should be calculating that. If no adjustment shows you may have sync issues. Or manually logging workouts over there when you should not. Or selected a higher Activity Level and don't have Food Diary option enabled for Negative Adjustments.

MFP  receives from Fitbit that TDEE figure as the day progresses and a timestamp. A little math for rest of the day estimate.

Fitbit, minus what MFP thought you'd burn at your selected Activity Level and no exercise expected, equals your Adjustment. That could be increased daily activity over the selected level, or exercise, or combo probably.

Base eating goal and that Adjustment is the new eating level. Deficit is still in there.

I will suggest though, and it sounds like you are doing it - MFP for eating related logging & goals, Fitbit for activity related logging & goals.

[Adi90]

Nice! Got what you are saying, I had removed the negative adjustment option
on Myfitnesspal because i was trying to ensure I stick to my food intake
goal irrespective of how much I workout so I can lose more weight but added
that back again now because i think it helps with being sustainable

Thanks for the advice!!

[Marir0412]

Yesss this is the best explanation for this question!!!!! I wanna be on a 750 calorie deficit as well. It’s easy for me to burn 2,500 calories a day. 2,500 - 750 = 1,750. I can eat 1,750 calories & still be in a 750 calorie deficit IF I burn 2,500 calories. All about the math!