Question about losing weight

[Tina1977]

Hi there, I set my weight loss goal and timescale to lose it in. I never touched the daily calories to burn goal or active minutes. These I assume were put in automatically when I put in my weight goal. I changed how many days exercise I would do manually and changed the 10k steps a day to 8k. Ok so, am I supposed to reach ALL the goals i.e calories burnt,active minutes, steps etc EVERYDAY in order to lose the weight OR will just concentrating on being on target for calories in/out be enough on its own to lose the weight?  Obviously I am getting steps in and active minutes each  day and burning calories but I don’t always reach every goal, just the calories in/out I’m concentrating more on.

[MakMak]

Hi, @Tina1977! Without going into all the detail about how muscle burns more calories than fat, etc., etc., basically you should aim to be meeting the calorie goal. You should definitely check out the manage weight forum, where I'm moving your post to. It's got a lot of great information and support for weight loss.

[Dominique]

@Tina1977: weight loss is driven by a caloric deficit, so of all metrics Fitbit lets you track, total calories burned are the most important, together with calories eaten (if you are also using your Fitbit account to track your intake). Note that tracking calories (whether out or in) is not exact science, and there’s a margin of error: it’s not unusual for activity trackers to overestimate energy expenditure, and for humans to underestimate their dietary intake. 

[Tina1977]

So your saying I don’t need to meet ANY of the other dashboard goals as long as I’m on target for calories alone to lose weight?

[Tina1977]

So I don’t need to meet any of the other dashboard goals apart from the calorie one to lose weight?

[Dominique · Accepted solution]

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@Tina1977 wrote:

So your saying I don’t need to meet ANY of the other dashboard goals as long as I’m on target for calories alone to lose weight?

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Provided you are in an actual caloric deficit, you will lose weight. The stress here is on actual. If your Fitbit overestimates calories burned by 250 and you underestimate calories eaten by 250, what appears to be a 500 calories deficit in Fitbit will be no actual deficit.

Most of the goals set by Fitbit aim at motivating you to be more active, and if you are more active, chances are you will burn more calories overall.

If weightloss is your primary concern, you should focus on what and how much you eat (calories in) and how much total energy you expend during the day (calories out). No matter how active you are, how many of the Fitbit goals you hit etc., if you are not in an actual caloric deficit, you will not lose weight. 

[Jezok]

I'll try it too