Calorie calculator
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Calorie & TDEE Calculator
Find out how many calories you burn and how many to eat to hit your goal. Enter your stats below and get your BMR, TDEE, a daily calorie target, and a complete macro breakdown — instantly, with no signup.
This calculator provides general estimates for educational use only and is not medical or dietary advice. Talk to a doctor or registered dietitian before making significant changes to your nutrition, especially if you have a health condition.
How to use your numbers
Three numbers come out of this calculator, and each answers a different question. Your BMR is what you would burn lying in bed all day — the energy cost of simply being alive. Your TDEE is that figure scaled up for how active you are; it's your true maintenance level, the intake at which your weight holds steady. The big daily target is your TDEE nudged toward your goal: eat below it to lose fat, at it to maintain, above it to gain.
We calculate BMR with the Mifflin-St Jeor equation, published in 1990 and still the most reliable predictive formula for healthy adults. For men it is 10 × kg + 6.25 × cm − 5 × age + 5; for women the final constant is −161 instead of +5. Your daily life then scales it — 1.2 if you mostly sit, 1.375 if you're on your feet a lot, 1.55 for physical work — and your training is added on top from how often, how long and how hard you train.
The goal is a pace, not a percentage. Losing fat at a steady 0.5 kg a week is about 550 kcal a day under maintenance; a gentle pace is half that, a faster one half again, and no pace ever asks for more than 1% of your body weight a week. Building muscle adds 0.25% of your body weight a week on a lean bulk, 0.5% on a standard one. The target never drops below a safe minimum, and if you tell us what you eat now, day one starts no more than 500 kcal from it — the scale earns anything lower.
The macro split is the part most calculators skip. Protein is set from a reference weight, not a flat percentage, because protein needs scale with lean mass, not with energy or body fat. Fat sits at about 25% of calories — enough for hormones and satiety — with a floor so it never drops too low. Carbohydrates take whatever calories remain; they fuel training, so on high-volume days they're the lever you raise. Hit your protein and calories every day and the rest is detail. To try a different split, take your target to the macro calculator, or get a bodyweight-based range from the protein intake calculator.
Finally, remember that every formula is an estimate. The honest workflow is to use this number as a hypothesis, eat to it consistently for two to three weeks while logging your food and weighing in, and then adjust. If the scale isn't moving the way you predicted, change your intake by 100–200 calories and reassess. That feedback loop — not the calculator — is what actually gets you to your goal, and it's exactly what the Athli Track app is built to run.
FAQ
Frequently asked questions
- How many calories should I eat a day?
- It depends on your size, age, sex, how much you move outside workouts, how you train, and your goal. The calculator works out your maintenance — your BMR scaled by your daily life, plus what your workouts burn — then applies your goal at the pace you choose: about 0.25–0.75 kg a week to lose fat, or 0.25–0.5% of your body weight a week to build muscle. It never goes below a safe minimum: 1,200 kcal for women, 1,500 for men, and never under 75% of your maintenance.
- What is the difference between BMR and maintenance (TDEE)?
- BMR (basal metabolic rate) is the energy your body burns at complete rest just to stay alive. Maintenance, often called TDEE (total daily energy expenditure), adds everything else: how much you move during the day and what your training burns. It's the intake at which your weight holds steady, and the number your goal is built on.
- Which formula does this calculator use?
- Mifflin-St Jeor for BMR, the predictive equation most consistently shown to be accurate for healthy adults. Your daily life multiplies it by 1.2 (mostly sitting), 1.375 (on your feet a lot) or 1.55 (physical work). Training is added separately — sessions × minutes × how hard, using standard exercise energy values — so a desk worker who lifts four times a week isn't treated like a builder. It is the same engine the Athli Track app uses, so your number here matches the app.
- How accurate is a calorie calculator?
- Predictive equations land within roughly 10% for most people, but your true expenditure varies with muscle mass, everyday movement, sleep and metabolism. Treat the number as a starting point: log your food and weigh in weekly for three to four weeks. The Athli Track app does exactly that and learns your real maintenance from your weight trend.
- How are the macros calculated?
- Protein is 1.6–2.0 g per kg of a reference weight — your lean mass when it's known, or the weight you would be at a BMI of 25 for a larger body — so it doesn't balloon with body fat. Fat is about 25% of calories (at least 0.6 g per kg), carbohydrates take the rest, and fiber is 14 g per 1,000 kcal.
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A calorie target is a guess until you measure against it. Athli Track logs every meal and macro, learns your real expenditure from your weight trend, and keeps your number current. Free to start on iPhone and Android.