Daily Calorie Calculator: How Many Calories Do You Need?

For most adults the answer sits between 1,600 and 2,600 calories a day. Your own number depends on four things: how much you weigh, how tall you are, how old you are and how much you move. The calculator works out your resting rate with the Mifflin-St Jeor equation, then multiplies it by an activity factor between 1.2 for a desk job and 1.9 for physical work or twice-daily training.

A deficit of 500 calories a day takes off roughly half a kilo, or one pound, a week. That is the pace most people can hold. A 250 calorie deficit is gentler and easier to live with; anything past 500 tends to cost muscle and gets abandoned. The calculator shows each pace with the date you would reach your goal weight.

No. BMR is what your body would burn lying still for twenty four hours, breathing and pumping blood. It is usually 60 to 70 per cent of your daily total. The number you actually eat to is BMR multiplied by your activity factor, which is the maintenance figure in the card above.

For healthy adults, Mifflin-St Jeor. It was validated against indirect calorimetry and the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics recommends it, which is why the BodyPal app uses the same one. Harris-Benedict is the 1919 original, revised in 1984, and usually reads a little high.

Because the number moves. A lighter body burns less, so the maintenance figure that gave you a 500 calorie deficit at 80 kg gives you a smaller one at 72 kg. Re-run the calculator every four or five kilos and adjust.

Not if you picked an honest activity level. The multiplier already includes your training. Adding exercise calories on top double-counts them, which is the most common reason a deficit quietly disappears.