Free tool for coaches
TDEE calculator
How many calories your client burns in a day. Enter their details and activity level to get maintenance calories, plus the fat-loss and muscle-gain targets that follow from them.
Maintenance calories (TDEE)
— kcal per day
BMR — kcal · Mifflin-St Jeor
What that means for each goal
| Goal | kcal/day | Per week |
|---|---|---|
| Fat loss (−20%) | — | — |
| Slow fat loss (−10%) | — | — |
| Maintenance | — | — |
| Lean gain (+10%) | — | — |
Estimates for healthy adults, not medical advice. Equations are typically within 10% of the real number; track weight for 2–3 weeks and adjust.
Turn the number into a plan
In SendFit the calorie targets live on the client's plan and every day shows how close it comes. Your client gets a branded link on their phone.
How this TDEE calculator works
Total daily energy expenditure (TDEE) is everything a person burns in a day: the body at rest (BMR, usually 60–70% of the total), digesting food (about 10%), planned exercise, and all the walking, standing and fidgeting in between. The calculator estimates it in two steps.
First, basal metabolic rate with the Mifflin-St Jeor equation, which performs best for healthy adults in comparison studies:
- Men: 10 × weight (kg) + 6.25 × height (cm) − 5 × age + 5
- Women: 10 × weight (kg) + 6.25 × height (cm) − 5 × age − 161
Then BMR is multiplied by an activity factor, from 1.2 (sedentary) to 1.9 (physical job plus daily training). If you enter a body-fat percentage, the Katch-McArdle equation (370 + 21.6 × lean mass in kg) is shown too; it's more accurate for very lean or very muscular clients when the body-fat estimate is good.
The goal rows apply a 10–20% deficit or a 10% surplus to TDEE, and convert the daily difference into an expected weekly change using about 7,700 kcal per kilogram of body tissue.
The formula is a starting point, the client's data is the answer
Prediction equations are within about 10% of measured expenditure for most people and off by 20% or more for a meaningful minority. On a 2,000 kcal estimate that's a 1,800–2,200 range, which is the difference between losing half a kilo a week and losing nothing.
So use the number for the first two to three weeks, then calibrate: take the client's average daily intake, the change in their weekly average weight, and convert the weight change to calories (0.5 kg a week ≈ 550 kcal a day). Actual TDEE ≈ intake + daily deficit. If a client eats 1,650 kcal and loses 0.3 kg a week, their real TDEE is about 1,980.
Why TDEE falls during a diet
TDEE isn't fixed. As a client loses weight, BMR falls because there's less body to run, non-exercise activity drops without them noticing, and digesting less food costs less. Together these can cut expenditure by 10–15% over a long fat-loss phase. That's the main reason progress slows with perfect adherence, and the reason to recalculate from the data every few weeks instead of cutting from a number estimated in week one.
Questions about the TDEE calculator
What's the difference between BMR and TDEE?
BMR is what the body burns at complete rest, roughly 60–70% of the total. TDEE adds digestion, exercise and all daily movement. Meal plans are built from TDEE, not BMR; eating at BMR would be a large deficit for almost everyone.
Which activity level should I pick for a client?
Judge the whole day, not the training schedule. A client who trains three times a week but sits the rest of the day is usually "lightly active". Daily steps are a better guide than gym days, and when in doubt the lower level is the safer guess.
How accurate is the result?
Within about 10% for most healthy adults, which can still be 200 kcal a day. Treat it as a first guess, hold the intake steady for two to three weeks, and recalculate from the client's weekly average weight.
Should I use Mifflin-St Jeor or Katch-McArdle?
Mifflin-St Jeor for most clients, because it only needs height, weight, age and sex. Katch-McArdle uses lean mass, so it's better for very lean or very muscular clients, but only if the body-fat estimate is reliable, which scales and calipers often aren't.