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Calorie accuracy

Former Member over 7 years ago

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Crissyrose74
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#1 [h=2]

Calorie burn wildly inaccurate?[/h] 03-27-2017, 11:52 AM
Has anyone had major accuracy issues with Garmin devices? I'm a 5'3 female sitting at 133 lbs with a sedentary office job, and I work out 3-5 times per week (a mix of lifting and running). My new Garmin Forerunner 35 (which has HR) is telling me that I consistently burn 3000+ calories on my active days which is wildly inaccurate.

I made sure my height, weight and gender are accurate and my activity level is currently set to 3. I spoke with a rep and he told me to up my activity level, as the device assumes someone at a higher activity level is more efficient and therefore burns fewer calories during a given activity vs. someone who is sedentary. But while that technically makes sense, it's still odd to me because other devices manage a fairly accurate calorie estimation with only the heart rate monitor, steps, and your height, weight, age, etc.

I want to run a half in November so I decided to get my first-ever running watch now that my Fitbit crapped out on me. I didn't need one with a lot of frills and I wanted to get one on a budget, so at $160 I decided on this one. The in-watch GPS was an important factor in my decision because I keep reading here that phone GPS is inaccurate.

I've only had the device for a few days, so maybe it takes some time to adjust for accuracy, but I'm wondering if there's anything else I can do to make it more accurate. If this is just a bug with Garmin watches, I may just get a Fitbit Blaze and deal with the slight GPS inaccuracy since it uses phone GPS.
Tags: calorie burn, calories, forerunner 35, tracking

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Carmen_F
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#2
03-27-2017, 03:11 PM
Mine is most time way off, too. I don't know why. I had Fitbit before with less calories burned. Nobody can tell me that I (female, 39 years, 1,67m, 51kg) burn more than 2300 calories with working 2 hours and going 4700 steps the whole day, but no sports.

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Angela4332
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Join Date: Aug 2017
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#3
Today, 09:16 AM
I just bought a Garmin Forerunner 35. So I took 1000 steps and it says I earned 209 calories. That seems very high. I usually get around 13000 steps a day. So at the end of the day it says I have over 1400 calories left to consume. Can anyone please tell me how to insure that I am getting accurate info from this device? I used to have Fitbit Blaze (it quit working after almost 2 years) and it seemed on target and I never worried about over consuming. I have my calorie goal set at 1330, I weigh 146, 5' 3"and am very active. Any help would be aporeciated. I have had the device for 3 days and am already frustrated. I depend on calorie counting as I lost 68 pounds so far when using the fitbit. I have also turned on negative adjustments in MFP. I thought I woukd give the Garmin a try after reading reviews. Thanks guys!

0 brmwia over 7 years ago

209 calories for 1000 steps seems very high to me too. @235 I get about .075 calories per step. I don't have a Garmin Foreunner though. I would suggest checking user settings and /orcalling Garmin support for help.

0 dfreybur over 7 years ago

There's an article in this month's Discover magazine on calorie count inaccuracy. Garmin are not listed but all of the listed ones have terrible accuracy for calories. This is not surprising to me - My Gold's Gym stationary bike shows calories per workout and my VAHR reports 150% that number.

Whenever I write about numbers I wonder about Activity Class settings. Enter the wrong number there and all other numbers go nuts.

0 Vitaly over 7 years ago

I think, that Garmin add extra calories for the recovery after workout. For instance, if I check my calories right after workout in Garmin and in Strava, there is a difference for about 30%. That's average additional calories the body needs to recover. Strava adds that amount right away, but Garmin adds it during the day. Perhabs that can partially explain the "inaccuracy" :)
I also noticed that in the Runtastic app, which also add extra calories for recovery. So, I would suggest to monitor the difference in a day with workout and in a day without. That could give a clue for actual calories spending.

Cheers,
Vitally

0 Former Member over 7 years ago

I've been ignoring the calorie number for a very long time, i forgot it exists. Being sedentary all day with about 5k steps get me 3000 calorie expenditure, I should've lost a lot of weight by now but I didn't.

I think workout calories are calculated just fine, but that 24/7 monitoring is really lousy in that department. Some people get it correct once they key in VO2Max number but I don't. Perhaps my VO2Max estimation is not correct...

0 Brett456 over 7 years ago

My calorie count is way off. Garmin tells me a 3.5 hour bike ride with a heart rate average of 141; an average speed of 27kms and 1,000m of climbing burns 1500 calories. I am 52, 172cm and 80kg. A 5min search on the web can give me a formula that seems much more accurate.

0 JSRUNNER_ over 7 years ago

Unless you are in a lab set up most calorie estimates are pretty innaccurate - as long as they are roughly consistent for the device for similar activities from day to day I'm not sure that you can expect much more.

Brett456 what do you think your calorie burn should be for your ride?

0 Former Member over 7 years ago

I woke up this morning and walked around the house for 175 steps and the app says I've burned 480 active calories!

0 Andy275 over 7 years ago

I woke up this morning and walked around the house for 175 steps and the app says I've burned 480 active calories!

That sounds like my kind of routine for weight management! :-)

To be realistic, it is very difficult for any device or exercise machine to accurately determine calories burned. In theory is should just be a factor of height, weight, age, and HR. But it may depend on muscle mass, what shape you are in, if your body has slowed its response due to calorie restriction, time of day, caffeine intake, among other factors. That said, sometimes they are just way, way off.

0 nancyjocoy over 7 years ago

As I contemplate moving from Fitbit to Garmin, I am finding my exercise calories are scarily accurate. Since Oct 1 I have been logging food in Cronometer and Importing exercise calories from fitbit every single day. I summed the deficits during this time and the weight loss predicted by dividing the sum by 3500 is, to the tenth of a lb, exactly what I have lost, 18.0lbs. [FWIW I weigh my food].

Because of how I am using the device for weight loss and pushing my exercise up, pushing intensity, the calorie accuracy is very helpful so I am following this. Also going to repeat the experiment for November, then for December. I did not expect that kind of accuracy. Being post menopausal and meeting my nutrient requirements every day, I don't have a lot of water weight fluctuation.