How Many Calories Burned To Effectively Lose Weight?

Calories are the energy your body needs in order to function properly. And you can find them in any kind of foods, but the amount will vary.

Obviously, eating less or more than you need will result in gaining or losing weight. Therefore, knowing the exact amount of food you need to consume and the precise quantity of calories you need to burn is crucial for you to have a perfect body!

How to Count Calories

Many of us may question about the amount of calories we should burn a day. Fortunately, the Harris-Benedict formula comes in handy in estimating how much calories we need to use for daily activities.

The key factor of this famous formula is the individual basal metabolic rate (BMR). The BMR lets us know our required calories for a day. Accordingly, we can decrease the calories taken in to lose weight and vice versa.

BMR Calculation

To do the BMR calculation, you will need your age, weight, and age:

• For men: BMR = 66 + (6.2 x weight) + (12.7 x height) – (6.76 x age)
• For women: BMR = 655.1 + (4.35 x weight) + (4.7 x height) – (4.7 x age)

You can look at these following example for a clear understanding of how to calculate your BMR:

• For a 30-year-old woman with 6 feet 5 inches height and  140 pound weight, her BMR would be
  • 655.1 + (4.35 x 140) + (4.7 x 65) – (4.7×30) = 1,428.6
• For a 30-year-old man whose height is 8 feet 7 inches and weight is 160 pound, his BMR would be
  • 66 + (6.2 x 160) + (12.7 x 87) – (6.76 x 30) = 1,960.1

Activity level

The BMR itself is not accurate enough to determine your required calories consumption, especially when you have an intense workout. Therefore, when you know your BMR, it’s time to estimate your activity level according to the below criteria:

• 1.2 underactive (little to no exercise)
• 1.375  lightly active (exercise from 1 to 3 days a week)
• 1.55 moderately active (exercise from 3 to 5 days a week)
• 1.725  very active (intense exercise from 6 to 7 days a week)
• 1.9: super active (very intense exercise or hard physical job)

Now we will get our full equation!

Suppose that the woman and the man from the above example are underactive and superactive respectively, then we will have the full equation below:

• Daily amount to maintain the woman’s current weight
  • 1428.6 (BMR) x 1.2 (activity level) = 1714.32 calories

• Daily amount to maintain the man’s current weight
  • 1960.1 (BMR) x 1.9 (activity level) = 3724.19 calories

Therefore, if the woman wants to gain weight, she will need to consume more than 1714.32 calories a day. On the other hand, if the man want to lose weight, he will have to take in less than 3724.19 calories a day. Then, how about you?

Tips on Losing Weight

It is always easier to gain weight than to lose weight. To gain weight, you just need to consume more calories than you burn. However, to lose weight, you need to decide carefully what you take in. The less energy you absorb, the less effort you have to make in order to burn calories.

Workout and activities

Truth be told, the best way to burn calories and lose weight is to work out and perform exercises. Here are some of them and the calories burned in case you do them seriously. Just Not Sports sharing this chart:

Cutting calories by appropriately consuming foods

Besides going to the gym, the way you consume foods is obviously the most excellent method to lose weight. However, if you cut a lot, you may experience severe health problems.

Here are some common ways  you can try to cut down on calories:

• Avoid  high-calorie but  low-nutrition foods
• Replace high-calorie foods with lower-calorie ones
• Decrease your portion sizes

Avoiding  high-calorie but  low-nutrition foods

Skipping a few high-calorie foods is a good start if you want to decrease the amount of calories taken in.

For example, it is fine to skip a morning latte, a lunch soda, or a dinner bowl of ice cream, and to consume more of high-nutrition but low-calorie foods.

*Actual calories can vary depending on manufacturers

Therefore, if you replace flavored latte with black coffee, you save time to burn 264 calories.

Swapping high-calorie foods for lower calorie options

There are foods containing the same nutritions but different amount of calories. So you may want to have the ones with less calories.

*Actual calories can vary depending on manufacturers

As a matter of fact, to lose weight, replacing chips with popcorn may help you “burn” 317 calories.

Reducing your portion sizes

The more you eat, the more calories you consume. Therefore, try your best to eat enough or less for a better result of losing weight.

*Actual calories can vary depending on manufacturers

According to the table, having a standard portion of spaghetti noodles helps you cut 185 calories.