⚡ TDEE Calculator: Find Your Total Daily Energy Expenditure

What is the TDEE Calculator?

Your TDEE is the total number of calories you burn across an entire day. It answers the practical question behind almost every diet: how much can I eat to stay the same weight? Eat around your TDEE and your weight holds steady, eat below it and you tend to lose, eat above it and you tend to gain. Everything from a fat-loss cut to a lean bulk is just a deliberate offset from this one number, which is why getting a reasonable estimate of your total daily energy expenditure is the sensible first step before setting any calorie goal.

TDEE is built from four parts. The largest is your Basal Metabolic Rate (BMR), the energy needed to keep you alive at rest, which is usually 60 to 70 percent of the total. On top of that sits the thermic effect of food, the roughly 10 percent of calories spent digesting and absorbing meals. Then comes exercise activity, the calories from deliberate training, and finally non-exercise activity thermogenesis (NEAT): all the walking, standing, fidgeting and chores you do without thinking of it as a workout. NEAT varies enormously between people and is often the reason two people with the same body burn very different amounts.

This calculator estimates the BMR piece with the Mifflin-St Jeor equation, published in 1990 and preferred by most dietitians today because it tracks measured metabolic rate more closely than the older Harris-Benedict formula for modern adults. It uses weight in kilograms, height in centimetres, age in years, and a constant that differs by sex: men add 5, women subtract 161. That sex difference exists because, at the same height and weight, men typically carry more lean muscle, which burns more energy at rest than fat does.

To turn BMR into TDEE the tool multiplies by an activity multiplier from 1.2 to 1.9. Sedentary (1.2) means a desk job and little exercise, lightly active (1.375) is light training one to three days a week, moderately active (1.55) is moderate training three to five days, very active (1.725) is hard training six to seven days, and extra active (1.9) is a physical job plus daily training. Picking the right band matters more than most people expect: jumping one level up can add several hundred calories to your target, which is enough to erase a fat-loss deficit entirely.

Once you have your maintenance number, setting a goal is arithmetic. A pound of body fat stores roughly 3,500 calories, so a daily 500-calorie deficit projects to about one pound (0.45 kg) of loss per week, and a 250-calorie deficit to about half that. This calculator shows five ready targets: loss at TDEE minus 500, mild loss at minus 250, maintenance, mild gain at plus 250, and gain at plus 500. These are starting points, not guarantees, because the 3,500-calorie rule is a simplification and real weight change is noisier week to week.

Treat the whole result as an educated estimate rather than a measurement. Prediction equations can be off by a few hundred calories for any one person, and your true burn shifts with muscle mass, sleep, stress, hormones and how much you unconsciously move on any given day. The honest way to use a TDEE calculator is to take the number as a hypothesis, eat at that target consistently for two to four weeks while tracking your weight, and then adjust up or down based on what the scale actually does rather than what the formula predicted.

When to use it

• Setting maintenance calories before planning a fat-loss cut or a muscle-gain bulk.
• Working out a safe daily calorie deficit for steady, sustainable weight loss.
• Finding a modest surplus for lean bulking without adding excess fat.
• Sanity-checking a meal plan or macro target from a coaching app against your real needs.
• Comparing how choosing a higher or lower activity multiplier changes your calorie budget.
• Re-estimating your daily calorie needs after a change in weight, age or training volume.

How to use the TDEE Calculator

1. Choose metric (cm and kg) or imperial (ft-in and lb) units at the top.
2. Select your sex, since the Mifflin-St Jeor equation uses a different constant for men and women.
3. Enter your age, height and current weight.
4. Pick the activity level that best matches a typical week, being honest rather than optimistic.
5. Read your TDEE (maintenance calories) and BMR, then use the target table for loss, maintenance or gain.
6. Use the copy button to save your maintenance figure, then adjust after two to four weeks of real results.

Formula & method

Worked examples

Activity multipliers used to turn BMR into TDEE

Calorie offset from TDEE and its rough weekly effect (3,500 kcal per pound of fat)

Worked example TDEE for the default profile (30-year-old man, 80 kg, 180 cm) by activity level

Common mistakes to avoid

• Overstating your activity level. Most people with desk jobs who train a few times a week are lightly to moderately active, not very active. Choosing 1.725 when 1.375 is realistic can inflate your maintenance calories by several hundred and quietly stall fat loss.
• Confusing BMR with TDEE. BMR is your rest-only baseline. TDEE is BMR multiplied by an activity factor and is the number you actually eat around. Setting your intake at BMR instead of TDEE usually makes the deficit far too aggressive.
• Mixing metric and imperial units. Entering height in cm but weight in pounds (or the reverse) produces a wildly wrong result. Pick metric or imperial with the toggle and keep both height and weight in the same system.
• Treating the number as exact. A prediction equation can be off by a few hundred calories for any individual. Use your TDEE as a starting hypothesis and adjust it after two to four weeks based on how your weight actually moves.
• Never recalculating. As you lose or gain weight your TDEE shifts, because a lighter body burns fewer calories. Re-run the calculator every few kilograms so your deficit or surplus stays on target.
• Cutting far below your TDEE for speed. A very large deficit tends to cost muscle, sap energy and become hard to sustain. A moderate 250 to 500 kcal offset from TDEE is usually more effective over the long run than an extreme cut.

Glossary

TDEE

Total Daily Energy Expenditure: the total calories you burn in a day, equal to BMR times an activity factor.

BMR

Basal Metabolic Rate: the calories your body burns at complete rest to sustain basic functions.

Maintenance calories

The daily intake that keeps your weight stable, which is another name for your TDEE.

Activity multiplier

A factor from 1.2 to 1.9 applied to BMR to account for how much you move in a typical week.

Calorie deficit

Eating fewer calories than your TDEE, which drives fat loss over time.

Calorie surplus

Eating more calories than your TDEE, which supports weight and muscle gain.

NEAT

Non-Exercise Activity Thermogenesis: calories burned through everyday movement like walking, standing and fidgeting, outside planned exercise.

Thermic effect of food

The energy your body spends digesting and absorbing meals, roughly 10 percent of intake.

Frequently asked questions

Sources

• A new predictive equation for resting energy expenditure in healthy individuals , American Journal of Clinical Nutrition (Mifflin MD et al.) (1990)
• Metabolism and Weight Loss: How You Burn Calories , Cleveland Clinic
• Dietary Guidelines for Americans, Estimated Calorie Needs , U.S. Department of Health and Human Services