This calculator is for informational purposes only. Consult a registered dietitian or healthcare professional before making significant changes to your diet.
What Is TDEE and Why Does It Matter?
TDEE stands for Total Daily Energy Expenditure — the total number of calories your body burns in a day, accounting for your basal metabolic rate (the calories you burn at rest) plus the energy you burn through activity.
Knowing your TDEE is the starting point for any evidence-based approach to changing your body composition. If you eat below your TDEE, you lose weight. Eat above it, you gain. Eat at it, you maintain. The number itself is an estimate — no formula is perfectly accurate for every individual — but it gives you a calibrated starting point that’s far more useful than generic “eat 2,000 calories a day” advice.
How This Calculator Works
This calculator uses the Mifflin-St Jeor equation, which is the formula most widely recommended by registered dietitians and used in clinical research for estimating resting metabolic rate. It takes your age, height, weight, and sex, calculates your BMR, then multiplies it by an activity multiplier based on your weekly exercise frequency.
The activity levels used are:
- Sedentary (1.2×) — desk job, minimal walking
- Lightly active (1.375×) — light exercise 1–3 days/week
- Moderately active (1.55×) — moderate exercise 3–5 days/week
- Very active (1.725×) — hard exercise 6–7 days/week
- Extremely active (1.9×) — physical job plus daily training
Understanding Your Macro Breakdown
Once you have your TDEE, this calculator splits your calories into the three macronutrients based on common dietary approaches:
Protein — the most important macro for body composition. Set at 0.7–1g per pound of bodyweight for most goals. Higher protein preserves muscle during a calorie deficit and supports recovery when building.
Fat — essential for hormone production and fat-soluble vitamin absorption. A minimum of 0.3–0.4g per pound of bodyweight is typically recommended.
Carbohydrates — the remaining calories after protein and fat are accounted for. Carbs aren’t essential in the way protein and fat are, but they fuel high-intensity exercise and are the preferred energy source for the brain.
Common Use Cases
Starting a fat loss phase — Set your calories to your TDEE minus 300–500kcal per day for a moderate deficit. This typically produces 0.5–1lb of fat loss per week without excessive muscle loss.
Lean bulking — Eat 200–300kcal above TDEE to maximize muscle gain while minimizing fat gain. Slow and controlled works better than aggressive bulking for most people.
Maintenance and body recomposition — Eat at TDEE while maintaining a high-protein intake and progressive training. Works well for beginners and people returning after a break.
Tracking dietary changes over time — Recalculate every 4–6 weeks, since TDEE changes as your weight and activity level change.
Frequently Asked Questions
How accurate is the TDEE calculator?
The Mifflin-St Jeor formula is accurate within ±10% for most people. Treat the result as a starting point: track your calories and weight for 2–3 weeks, then adjust up or down based on actual results. Real metabolic rate varies with muscle mass, gut health, sleep quality, and other factors no formula can capture precisely.
What’s the difference between BMR and TDEE?
BMR (Basal Metabolic Rate) is the calories you burn doing absolutely nothing — just staying alive. TDEE adds the calories burned through movement and exercise. For most people, TDEE is 1.4–1.9× their BMR.
Should I eat back calories burned from exercise?
If you used the “moderately active” or higher activity setting that already accounts for your training, no — those calories are already included. If you used “sedentary” and track workouts separately, add roughly 50–75% of your estimated burn (activity trackers consistently overestimate calorie burn).
How often should I recalculate?
Recalculate whenever your weight changes by more than 5–10 lbs or your activity level significantly changes. TDEE decreases as you lose weight, which is why calorie intake needs to be adjusted during a long fat-loss phase.
Is this calculator suitable for athletes?
The Mifflin-St Jeor formula underestimates TDEE for very muscular individuals because it doesn’t directly account for lean body mass. Athletes with above-average muscle mass may find their actual TDEE is higher than calculated. The Katch-McArdle formula (which uses body fat percentage) is more accurate in those cases.
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