Total daily energy expenditure: the calories you use in a day, from resting metabolism, digesting food and moving. Eating about that much keeps your weight roughly steady, which is why it is also called maintenance calories.

How does this calculator work out maintenance calories?

It estimates resting energy use with the Mifflin-St Jeor equation from your sex, age, height and weight, then multiplies it by an activity factor from 1.2 to 1.9.

How many calories should I eat to lose fat?

This calculator suggests 500 kcal below maintenance, and never below 1,200 kcal for women or 1,500 kcal for men. Then watch what the scale does over two to three weeks and adjust from there.

Why is my result different from another TDEE calculator?

Calculators use different equations and different activity multipliers. This one uses Mifflin-St Jeor and the conventional multipliers from 1.2 to 1.9, so another tool using Harris-Benedict or its own factors will give a different number.

TDEE calculator: maintenance calories (Mifflin-St Jeor)

Enter your sex, age, height, weight and how active you are. You get the calories to hold your weight, a target to lose fat and a target to gain.

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SexAge

Height

ftin

Weight (lb)

Activity

To maintain2728kcal

To lose fat2228kcal

To gain3028kcal

This is an estimate from an equation. What you actually burn is measured from what you eat and what the scale does over a few weeks, and that is what a coach adjusts against.

How the estimate works

Resting energy use comes from the Mifflin-St Jeor equation (1990): 10 × weight in kg + 6.25 × height in cm - 5 × age in years, plus 5 for men or minus 161 for women.

A 2005 systematic review for the American Dietetic Association compared the common equations against measured resting metabolic rate in healthy adults and found Mifflin-St Jeor the most reliable of them. It is still an estimate for a population, not a measurement of you.

Maintenance, your total daily energy expenditure (TDEE), is that figure times an activity multiplier: from 1.2 for a desk job with little exercise to 1.9 for a physical job or training twice a day. These are the conventional multipliers most calculators use. They are rough, and they are the biggest source of error in any TDEE estimate: two people who pick the same level can burn quite different amounts.

The target to lose fat is maintenance minus 500 kcal, but never below 1,200 kcal for women or 1,500 kcal for men. The target to gain is maintenance plus 300 kcal.

What you actually burn shows up in what you eat and what the scale does over a few weeks. The CoachVana app estimates maintenance from a client's own logged food and weigh-ins, which is why that number and this one will not match exactly.

Sources

A worked example

A 30-year-old man, 5'10" and 175 lb (177.8 cm and 79.4 kg), who exercises 3 to 5 days a week:

Resting: 10 × 79.4 + 6.25 × 177.8 - 5 × 30 + 5 = 1,760 kcal. Times 1.55 for his activity is about 2,728 kcal to maintain, 2,228 kcal to lose fat and 3,028 kcal to gain.

Reference tables

Maintenance for the example by activity level
Activity	Multiplier	Maintenance
Desk job, little exercise	1.2	2,112 kcal
Light exercise, 1-3 days a week	1.375	2,420 kcal
Moderate exercise, 3-5 days a week	1.55	2,728 kcal
Hard exercise, 6-7 days a week	1.725	3,036 kcal
Physical job or twice-a-day training	1.9	3,344 kcal

Maintenance and fat-loss target by body weight (age 30, exercise 3 to 5 days a week)
Body weight	Man, 5'10" maintain	Man, lose	Woman, 5'5" maintain	Woman, lose
130 lb	2,412 kcal	1,912 kcal	2,032 kcal	1,532 kcal
150 lb	2,553 kcal	2,053 kcal	2,172 kcal	1,672 kcal
170 lb	2,692 kcal	2,192 kcal	2,313 kcal	1,813 kcal
190 lb	2,833 kcal	2,333 kcal	2,454 kcal	1,954 kcal
210 lb	2,974 kcal	2,474 kcal	2,593 kcal	2,093 kcal
230 lb	3,116 kcal	2,616 kcal	2,734 kcal	2,234 kcal

The fat-loss figure never goes below 1,200 kcal for women or 1,500 kcal for men.

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Questions

What is TDEE?: Total daily energy expenditure: the calories you use in a day, from resting metabolism, digesting food and moving. Eating about that much keeps your weight roughly steady, which is why it is also called maintenance calories.
How does this calculator work out maintenance calories?: It estimates resting energy use with the Mifflin-St Jeor equation from your sex, age, height and weight, then multiplies it by an activity factor from 1.2 to 1.9.
How many calories should I eat to lose fat?: This calculator suggests 500 kcal below maintenance, and never below 1,200 kcal for women or 1,500 kcal for men. Then watch what the scale does over two to three weeks and adjust from there.
Why is my result different from another TDEE calculator?: Calculators use different equations and different activity multipliers. This one uses Mifflin-St Jeor and the conventional multipliers from 1.2 to 1.9, so another tool using Harris-Benedict or its own factors will give a different number.

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