Calories burned fitbit vs treadmill

[lee-am]

On the treadmill at the gym for a bit and the treadmill records 400 calories burned. Fitbit records over 700.Which is right?

[SteveH]

Hard to say. Is the treadmill using your height, weight etc to calculate calories or is it just using an average? Do you know if it takes into account your BMR calories (those you burn just keeping your body alive)? If not then I would put my money on fitbit.

[Dominique]

Hard to say without knowing what you actually did on the treadmill: walking, running (what speed)? for how long? You can use standard METs in order to have a third opinion.

Taking into account all your Fitbit "knows" about you (age, weight, height, HR), I would say it’s probably more accurate than the treadmill, which will throw in the same numbers for everyone.

[lee-am]

Thanks both. Treadmill didn't have any info except weight. Plus obviously the speed I was going. 

Fitbit has all the info but doesn't know what I'm doing on the treadmill so was curious to see. 

[SunsetRunner]

Hi @lee-am and welcome. 

As @Dominique, @SteveH and absolute on who is right can be hard as it depends on how much information the devises have. 

On Calories burned I would put my money on Fitbit along with @SteveH and @Dominique. The reason is that the Charge 2 has all of your demographics (weight age etc) but it also has a HR monitor. The treadmill might have your set speed to estimate the effort you put in but with your hearth rate the Charge 2 actually "saw' how much effort you put in. 

Anyway I started getting an Idea in what situations the Fitbit was more accurate by using it and comparing my stats every time I did a different activity. You end up developing an intuition on accuracy by knowing what calorie burn seems logical to the effort you put in and you end up knowing what amount "seems right" 

Let the Community know if you have any questions! See you soon!

[Cousincarmona]

Does the fact that the distance on the fitbit is wrong alter the calories burned? I have been manually entering mine since it doesn't get the distance right.

[Rich_Laue]

Your Fitbit depends more on heart rate for calories than distance, which can be corrected by setting the stride. 

Some treadmills do have built in heart rate sensors, but it requires the user to hold on, which prevents the tracker from seeing your steps correctly.  Holding on will drastically reduce calories burnt along with untraining the bodies ability to balance and possibly even cause repetitive damage to joints. 

[Ambs22]

If you had your hands on the heart rate sensor on the treadmill the whole time the calories burned may be more congruent. You must have been on the treadmill and working hard for a long time though, because 45 mins on my elliptical dripping sweat and giving it all I’ve got nets me about 400cals according to my Fitbit charge 2. Factors that will effect the calories burned could be if you are just starting on a fitness and weight loss journey. When I first started I was 35lbs overweight and 30 mins on the elliptical burned more calories then than it does now that I’m closer to my goal weight for the simple fact that it’s easier to move a smaller body.