Free calorie check

TDEE Calculator

Your Total Daily Energy Expenditure is the number of calories you burn in a day, at rest and in motion. Every calorie target starts here.

Height
The basics

What your TDEE is telling you

One number for everything your body spent today: staying alive, moving around, and digesting what you ate.

Weight change comes down to the gap between what you eat and what you burn. TDEE is the second half of that equation, which makes it the number every calorie target is built from. Eat below it and you lose; eat above it and you gain.

Most of your daily burn happens while you are doing nothing at all.

That surprises people. Training matters, but it is the smaller share. The bulk of the number is simply the cost of being a living body, which is why two people of the same weight can need very different amounts of food.

Where it goes

What the number is made of

Typical proportions for an adult. Yours shift with how much you train and how much you move outside the gym.

Resting burn

Your BMR. Breathing, circulation, brain, organ function, cell repair. It runs whether you get out of bed or not, and it is the largest slice by far.

Daily movement

Walking, standing, cooking, fidgeting. Everything that is not deliberate exercise. This varies more between people than training does.

Exercise

The workouts you plan. Real, but usually smaller than people expect, which is why training rarely offsets eating on its own.

Digestion

Breaking food down costs energy. Protein costs the most to process, one of the reasons a higher-protein diet helps during weight loss.

The dial that matters

Activity levels, and what each one multiplies by

Your resting burn is multiplied by one of these. Picking a level higher than you really live at is the most common reason a TDEE comes out too high.

1.2 Sedentary Desk work, little or no exercise
1.375 Light Exercise 1 to 2 days a week
1.55 Moderate Exercise 3 to 5 days a week
1.725 Heavy Exercise 6 to 7 days a week
1.9 Very heavy Hard daily training, or a physical job
Putting it to work

Turning your TDEE into a plan

The number on its own does nothing. What you subtract from it is the whole game.

  1. Start at maintenance for a fortnight

    Eat your TDEE and weigh yourself at the same time each morning. If the average holds steady, the estimate is close. If it drifts, adjust by 100 to 150 calories and watch again.

  2. Take a deficit you can live with

    Around 500 calories below maintenance gives roughly a pound a week. Bigger cuts look faster on paper and are abandoned far more often.

  3. Hold your protein up

    A deficit costs muscle unless protein stays high. That is the difference between weighing less and looking and feeling better at the lower weight.

  4. Recalculate as you go

    A lighter body burns less. Every 10 to 15 pounds lost, run the number again so your target keeps up with you.

Read it honestly

Why this is an estimate, not a measurement

  1. The formula only knows four things

    Sex, age, height and weight. It cannot see how much of your weight is muscle, and muscle burns more at rest than fat does, so two people with identical inputs can differ by a few hundred calories.

  2. Activity levels are broad buckets

    The gap between 1.55 and 1.725 can be 300 calories a day. Nobody fits a bucket exactly, and most people place themselves one step too high.

  3. Your body adapts

    Sustained dieting lowers daily burn by more than the weight loss alone explains. Movement drops off without you noticing, which is part of why progress stalls.

  4. Health and medication shift it

    Thyroid function, hormones, sleep, some medications and certain conditions all move the number, and none of them appear in the formula.

Where it leads

When calories alone are not the answer

Plenty of people track carefully, hold a real deficit, and still stall. Appetite, hormones and years of dieting all push back, and willpower is rarely the missing piece.

500 Calories a day below maintenance is roughly a pound a week, the pace most people can actually hold.
1,200 Calories a day is the floor for women, 1,500 for men. Below that belongs under medical supervision, never self-directed.

If the number keeps coming out right and the scale still will not move, that is worth a conversation rather than another cut. Momentum Health 360 reviews your full history, current medications and goals, and tells you plainly what your options are.

Contact Momentum Health 360
Common questions

TDEE, answered

What is the difference between BMR and TDEE?

BMR is what you would burn lying still all day, keeping your organs running. TDEE is that figure multiplied up to cover movement, exercise and digestion. BMR is the engine idling; TDEE is the day you actually had.

How accurate is a TDEE calculator?

For most adults it lands within about 10 per cent, which is close enough to start from. It cannot account for muscle mass, thyroid function or medication. Treat the result as a first estimate, then let two weeks of weight data correct it.

Should I eat my TDEE to lose weight?

No. Eating your TDEE holds your weight where it is. To lose, eat below it, commonly by 500 calories a day for roughly a pound a week. Women should not go under 1,200 calories a day, and men under 1,500, without medical supervision.

Which activity level should I pick?

Count structured exercise only, and be conservative. A desk job with three gym sessions a week is Moderate, not Heavy. If your weight is not moving the way the number predicts, dropping one level is usually a better correction than cutting food further.

Does my TDEE change as I lose weight?

Yes, and this is why plateaus happen. A smaller body costs less to run, and sustained dieting lowers the burn beyond that. Recalculate every 10 to 15 pounds so your target follows your body down.

Do GLP-1 medications change my TDEE?

They work mainly on appetite rather than on how much you burn, so the calculation stays the same. What changes is how easy the deficit feels. Protein and resistance training still matter, because losing weight quickly without either costs muscle. Contact Momentum Health 360 to talk through what applies to you.

Why is my TDEE different on other calculators?

Different sites use different equations. This one uses Mifflin-St Jeor, the formula most widely validated against laboratory measurement. Others still use Harris-Benedict, which tends to read higher. A gap of 100 to 200 calories between tools is normal.

Keep going

Other tools that help

TDEE tells you the budget. These tell you how to spend it.

Calorie Deficit CalculatorWhat to eat, and how long it takes Protein CalculatorHow much you need to keep muscle BMI CalculatorWhere your weight sits today Water Intake CalculatorA daily target for your body

Medical disclaimer. This calculator and the information on this page are for general educational purposes and are not medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. TDEE is an estimate produced by a formula and cannot account for muscle mass, hormones, thyroid function, medication or medical conditions. It does not determine eligibility for any medication or programme. Contact Momentum Health 360 about your individual health before changing how you eat, train or take medication.