Dynamic Calorie Goal

My Versa 2 is dying and Google has all but ruined Fitbit, so I'm looking at other trackers. One of the best features of Fitbit is that it adjusts my daily calorie goal based on activity. It starts with a base calorie goal, but adjusts it up or down based on how active I am through the day, giving me knowledge of whether I need to eat more or less to stay close to the target.  Does anyone know if Garmin can do that? It would be one deciding factor on whether I move to Garmin or continue to suffer with Google.

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  • 4 months ago in reply to 5433396 +1 verified
    After two days I'm seeing that Fitbit and MFP both show the same amount for calories eaten, but different numbers for calories expended

    I am not familiar with Fitbit, so have no idea how…

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  • Garmin will only give you active and resting calories. You can choose a calorie goal for a list of actives on the Connect website but that is not a dynamic goal.

  • Yes, if you use Garmin Connect together with MyFitnessPal, you get adjusted Calories goal depending on the energy burned during workouts, and the consumed food.

  • Thanks, that will make it more tricky. Fitbit seems more user friendly that way because I'm never active in the same way from one day to the next, and there was always a handy guide showing me how close I was to that day's calorie budget. Having said that, Google is constantly making Fitbit worse and it's already much less user friendly than it used to be, so in the long run this feature might not be as helpful as it once was anyway.

  • Thanks for the reply, trux. I have an MFP account that I rarely use, but decided to try connecting it to Fitbit to see how it worked. It seems to transfer data back and forth, but I do see big discrepancies in the daily calorie budget between the two apps - MFP seems to allow for considerably more calories than Fitbit does, even though they both show the same intake calories. I guess that Garmin doesn't track food intake calories, so I imagine you can't say whether the same kind of discrepancy happens between MFP and Garmin, right?

  • I guess that Garmin doesn't track food intake calories

    I does, but you have to enter them through MFP.

    I imagine you can't say whether the same kind of discrepancy happens between MFP and Garmin, right?

    There should be no discrepancy, since the consumed Calories are directly taken from MFP 1:1.

  • Unfortunately that's not what I'm seeing. After two days I'm seeing that Fitbit and MFP both show the same amount for calories eaten, but different numbers for calories expended - checking this morning for Wednesday's tracking, MFP says I burned 1986 calories, while Fitbit says it was 2293. It seems something's not transferring correctly one way or the other, but I don't want to trouble you with that - I'll probably reach out to MFP to see if I'm doing something wrong.  I might even pick up a cheap Garmin to run some tests on that side - I saw Walmart selling a Vivofit 4 for only $70.

  • After two days I'm seeing that Fitbit and MFP both show the same amount for calories eaten, but different numbers for calories expended

    I am not familiar with Fitbit, so have no idea how it works with Fitbit, but it works correctly with Garmin Connect, assuming you enabled the option "Allow Negative Calories Adjustments" in MFP settings, in order to avoid counting some Active Calories twice.

  • Thanks for the info, trux. I'll be sure to do that when I pick up the Garmin.