Charge HR calorie burn accuracy

[JoeT92]

I have just started using my Fitbit and it is telling me that I am burning in excess of 3500 calories a day but I'm not sure how accurate this is. I'm aged 25, 5t 9in and around 75kg. I have a fairly active job which involves me walking close to 20,000 steps a day and also partake in 1-2 hours of fairly intense exercise per day.

Moderator edit: updated subject for clarity. 

[SantiR · Accepted solution]

@JoeT92 Welcome to the Fitbit family! Thanks for posting your inquiries regarding the calories burned tracked. I'm also glad to hear that you just started using a Charge HR.

It sounds that you are a very active person. So, I would believe that it is possible for you to burn that amount of calories. Is it like that every day?

Something to take into consideration is the heart rate readings. This influences in the amount of calories burned, so check if those are being accurate. To make sure it will give accurate readings, wrist placement is very important in this case. Please check this post to check the correct wrist placement. Also, check this helpful article for more details on this.

Additionally, just take a look at your personal settings once again. Just make sure they were typed correctly. If there is a typo or if any of those are incorrect it may result in the calories burned not being accurate according to your body type and age. 

It is also important to take into consideration the BMR (Basal Metabolic Rate), please check this article for more details on this. 

Hope this helps. Let me know how it goes! 

[JoeT92]

Thanks for the helpful reply @SantiR.

My days are usually always like this Monday to Friday but I'm a bit less active at weekends.

I have had a look at the links you posted and checked my settings. I have also adjusted the position of my Fitbit on my wrist and reset it so will see if this makes any difference.

Thanks again 

[SantiR]

@JoeT92 Thanks for your reply! Sounds great! Thanks for following those tips. I'm sure it will be better, even if it is just a small difference.

Also, as you are very active, I guess you are competitive too! So, if you are looking for Fitbit friends to compete with on challenges, check this thread and add some! 

Keep being active. Let me know if you need anything else! 

[Pjgjc]

I didn’t sleep with the Fitbit on last night and looked at it this morning , it sat on the table all night and I looked at the calories it said 44 . The sun was on it some could that have any bearing on it . I just can’t believe the calories it says ((( yesterday it read 2,026 steps .8 miles and 886 calories. Seams like that’s too many calories. 

[SantiR]

@Pjgjc Welcome to the Fitbit forums! Thanks for sharing the experience you have had with your tracker calories burned. 

Please take into consideration that your tracker will show your BMR all the time. This is the Basal Metabolic Rate and corresponds to all the calories you burn just by being alive (breathing, sleeping, brain activity. etc.). This will show automatically since the beginning of your day. Check this article for more details about it. 

Keep me posted! 

[Urolll]

Hi @SantiR. Thank you for your help, but I am still trying to wrap my head around the fact, that when I wake up in the morning and I put my Ionic on my wrist, it tells me that I burned 500 calories while sleeping. At first I was thinking to my self, cool I am burning fat while sleeping, but than my trainer told me that this is impossible 🙂

I am 34 year young, quite active guy (2x per week gym with personal trainer, 4 - 5 time cardio or walking). My work is 70% office job 30% field (filming and photography). My Ionic is telling me that I burn around 4000 cal per day, which sounds nice, but again my personal trainer (who I worked with past 6 months and by now know my way of life pretty well) is telling me that its not likely that I am burning that much calories per day.

All my data for BMR is correct. I will follow the advices you gave on this tread, but what do you think about burning 500 cal while sleeping? Its strange right?

[vlcudworth]

Hi! So the Fitbit tracks your BMR as well as calories burned through your personal statistics. It goes by you weight, height, activities, heart rate and step count. The Fitbit has motion sensors that analyze your body constantly. Your body is always burning calories (even when you sleep) and every midnight the Fitbit's calorie counter resets. So, yes you do burn 500 calories in your sleep because your body just doesn't stop functioning (which is great!). Also someone mentioned that they take about 20,000 steps in a day and the Fitbit says they burn 3,000 calories, which is very accurate as well accounting for that every 50 steps taken equal one calorie burned and taking into account their BMR and daily activity as well. 

Hope this helped 🙂

[Mildredx]

The body uses 1 calorie per minute just to keep the respiratory going. So if you sleep 5 hours x 60 minutes in an hour is 300 calories burn. It is correct to burn calories as u sleep. The body doesn’t stop functioning.

[jhanrushton]

I can't see how it is possible to place the Fit Bit that far up.your arm and for it to stay in place. 3 fingers width from the wrist bone would place it 1/3 up my arm. Which means thehe strap is so loose it just falls down the arm anyway.

[Madlenaram]

Hi, my Fitbit versa 2 calculates calories burned everyday around 2000 without me being active these days and it doesn't make any sense. I experimented and left the device on the table with my phone overnight and in the morning I see 0 steps and 815 calories burned. How could I fix that? It seems calories burned are being automatically counted independently of my activity levels.

Settings are correct, age, height in cm and weight in kg.

[poppyjohnsonnn]

fitbits include your BMR which is how many calories you burn at rest(doing absolutely nothing) which depends on your height and weight. the total calories shown includes any extra calories burned by exercise ect too

[ZacharyZ]

Normally I wouldn’t jump in on a post, but I took issue with your personal trainer giving absolutely nonsense as a factual statement. 

As others have pointed out, your body doesn’t turn off at night. Yes your metabolism slows down, but why? There are a few reasons, but it all comes down to slowing down for rest, and we know your body is slowed down because your breathing slows. Why is breathing important to determine if your metabolism is lower? Many people don’t know this, but breathing is how you lose fat. A super simplified version is that food goes in, mixes with oxygen, is burned in the cells, and then that carbon dioxide is transported back to the lungs to be exhaled.  There is an equation you can use to calculate exactly how much you’re burning, down to the molecule if you had accurate enough readings. 

Here is a great video on the science: https://youtu.be/vuIlsN32WaE

TL:DR- your trainer is not knowledgeable  and you may want to seek a different trainer that understands the most basic tenets of their chosen profession. 

[Allman1998]

So yes I have seen this video aswell but your misunderstanding what he's actually saying yes you burn fat when you breathe but you still have to be exercising with increased heart rate to actually make any dent in the fat because if that was true everyone would be skinny there some kinda logic in there like it's too good to be true you burn calories just for normal bodily functions every day which you can find equations online and basically that's just energy expenditure like if you look at a some packs of food it shows the amount of calories and energy so that's best to work it out you use more energy you burn more which means you burn more calories same goes for heat you need energy to heat up which then burns more cals that's why some days you burn more than you others 

[Atheba]

Hi, 

I have only just got my Fitbit Inspire, but it’s defaulting my calories at 1250 when in fact I haven’t done anything at all. It doesn’t seem right. I understand that I will burn calories by simply breathing but seems excessive for my height and weight? 

[Madalenac]

Hi! If you are a short and relatively light person that’s probably about right 🙂 I am 5ft 4 and I burn about 1400 just by existing. With normal movement (no workout), I burn about 1800, and with moderate exercise and lots of walking I burn about 2200. The majority of calories burnt in the body are by normal functions such as your heart beating and your brain working, which needs a lot of calories to keep working and this is why you shouldn’t eat under that amount of calories (about 1200) as it’s important to keep those things working! Actual activity like exercise counts for a much smaller percentage of calories burnt than people think. 

[Atheba]

Hi, I’m exactly 5ft or a tiny bit under. Your explanation sounds right. Thank you for your reply 😊 I’ve been trying to erase my calories as I kept thinking it’s wrong lol 

[Dad808]

I just received my FitBit via UPS. It had the watch already had 853 calories for the day. I dismissed it as being in the van and transport. It needed to be charged, so I plugged it in for a while and checked it was 99%. But the calories now said 1280? How can that be, I wasn’t wearing it and it was stationary. 

[MattyD88mk]

Yes and no. Just for people reading this. 
fat burning has almost nothing to do with excercise, it’s 100% to do with calories in and calories out.

BROAD STROKE EXAMPLE your BMR says you burn 1500 on a day sitting on the couch for a month and you only eat 1000 calories a day, you’re in a deficit so will loose weight. Simple as that.

People are only fat because they but more calories in than goes out. Simple rule of thermodynamics 

Your BMR.

Moderator edit: merged reply

[ElFuego]

Nope.  That's too simple.  Not all calories are the same.  100 calories of fat has a very different impact compared with 100 calories of sugar or carbs - which are just long chains of sugar molecules.  Mix fat and sugar/carbs and again, a very different effect.  Plus the frequency of eating has a huge impact.  High levels of insulin is what makes people fat.  High carb, high sugar, high fat mostly highly processed foods (and high protein can play a part as you get an insulin response from that too) significantly spike insulin levels.  When your insulin levels are high you can only burn sugar for energy.  Once the sugar you ate is used (any fat you ate just gets immediatelyy stored to fat cells - because high insulin means store fat) if your insulin is still high (which if you've eaten highly processed sugar/carb/fat food is likely) you'll get hungry - because when insulin is high - you can only store fat.  Not burn it.  So you eat more high sugar/carb/fat food because your cells are starving - you may have lots of body fat - but high insulin means you can't burn it.  Repeat!