Fitness & Sports

Calories Burned Calculator

What this does

Estimate exercise energy expenditure from activity MET values, body weight and duration using the Compendium of Physical Activities.

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Calculator inputs

How to use it

Using the calories burned calculator

  1. 01

    Pick the closest activity

    Seven common options cover walking through swimming; choose honestly; intensity inflation inflates results.

  2. 02

    Enter weight and duration

    Body weight drives the linear scaling; minutes can span multiple sessions averaged or a single workout.

  3. 03

    Use the burn rate row

    The per-minute figure helps compare activities quickly; e.g. running versus cycling at equal enjoyment.

Good to know

What METs actually mean

Sitting quietly costs 1 MET by definition. A 9.8-MET run therefore demands nearly ten times resting metabolism; which is why intensity dwarfs fine-tuned duration when comparing workouts.

Why fitness trackers disagree

Wrist heart-rate models personalize around your pulse response and often overestimate by 20–40% versus calorimetry. MET-based math is blunter but unbiased; useful for budgeting intake against honest averages.

Typical session burns at 70 kg

  • Walking 30 min: ~128 kcal
  • Cycling 45 min: ~557 kcal
  • Weight training 60 min: ~525 kcal

How it's calculated

The math behind this calculator

kcal = MET × 3.5 × weight(kg) ÷ 200 × minutes

One metabolic equivalent (MET) approximates resting oxygen consumption. The Compendium of Physical Activities catalogs intensity multipliers for hundreds of activities; multiplying MET by 3.5 × bodyweight ÷ 200 converts to kcal burned per minute.

Because burn scales linearly with both body mass and time, heavier bodies and longer sessions pay proportionally more energy; the arithmetic is transparent enough to verify mentally.

Assumptions & limitations

  • Compendium MET values assume moderate conditions (flat terrain, steady pace).
  • Individual metabolism varies ±10–20% around the estimate.
  • Resting calories are not included; this is gross activity cost minus nothing, computed as activity-only convention.

Worked example

A 70 kg runner logging 30 minutes at the compendium’s 9.8-MET running value burns roughly 360 kcal; about 12 per minute.

FAQ

Frequently asked questions

Are these net calories or extra calories?
The formula prices activity above rest in its derivation but is conventionally read as activity burn; subtract ~1 MET-equivalent if you want strictly incremental cost.
Why does weight matter so much?
Moving heavier mass requires proportionally more oxygen per minute; the 3.5×kg÷200 term encodes exactly that linear relationship.
Do I eat these calories back?
For weight management, safer to eat back at most half; tracker overestimation plus measurement noise erodes apparent deficits quickly.

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