Calorie difference relative to weight loss

I was wondering about the calorie defecit and weight loss.  I know that you should eat less calories than you burn in order to lose weight, but is there a formula to this?

Like if you were to consume 200 calories less than you burn, would that mean you would lose about 1 pound a week?

I know that it would vary for each person and build, but I would like to know if there is any general rule.

The math is the same for everyone; you must eat at least 500 cals/day less than you burn to lose 1 lb/week. A lb of fat = 3500 cals, and 500 x 7 = 3500.

The difference between what you burn and what you eat is your "deficit." It is extremely short-sighted to have a deficit routinely larger than 1000--your body will try to conserve calories (the dreaded "conservation mode.") People who chronically undereat and lose faster than 2 lbs/week will find the weigh coming back on when they try to eat at their maintenance level (the number of cals their body, at their age and weight, SHOULD burn). Deficits greater than 1000 will really mess with your metabolism.

There are also minimums everyone MUST eat; adult women/1200; adult males/1500; teens +300 for their sex. An adult female body, no matter the size, needs 1200 cals to function properly. But most of us need to eat more than that because we will trigger the conservation mode if we don't (since most of us aren't that tiny AND we exercise, which adds to our total daily burn).

Depending on your age/wt/ht, you will have a RBR (resting burn rate) that is the minimum number of calories you need to exist without weight change even if you were lying in bed comatose. Everything you do on top of that will add to your burn. Use the "burn meter" tool to figure out what you probably burn on a daily basis (including exercise). Aim to consume about 500 cals LESS than that average (without going under 1200) and you should lose 1 lb a week. You might not always show a 1 lb a week loss but it should average out if that way if you are scrupulous about the cals in and the cals out.

I hope this helps.

3500 calories= 1 lb. of fat, so if you have a 500 calorie deficit each day, you in theory should lose 3500 calories. you can create that deficit by eating 500 calories less or by exercising to burn 500 extra calories. Your body type/height/weight/etc. shouldn't affect this. What does affect it is if your body becomes efficient at whatever exercise you're doing, and maybe you used to run for 45 minutes to burn 500 calories, but now your body is used to running and therefore when you run for 45 minutes at the same speed, you may only burn 300 calories instead, because your body tries to become as efficient as it can, and efficient to your body means expending the least amount of energy (it's like survival of the fittest, your body tries to hold on to fat so that if you had to go without food, you'd last longer than someone who doesn't have a lot of fat)

Also, in general, it's safe to lose 1% of your body weight in a week, so if you weigh 200 lbs, you can lose 2 lbs. per week, if you weigh 130, you can lose 1.3 lbs. per week...

This is good advice.......that I need to take. 

I've hit a real wall after steady loss.  I just calculated my 15 day average caloric intake at 1503 cal and my  average daily calories burned at 3130.  Oops. I guess this explains why I am so tired.  (BTW:  I'm a 5'6" 221lb male)

My question would be how do I eat 2630 (healthy) calories (nearly 1100 more a day than I am getting now)? Or should I ease up on the daily cardio workouts?  

Peanut butter and olive oil are great (and healthy) ways to eat more.

Original Post by sleepyk08:

My question would be how do I eat 2630 (healthy) calories (nearly 1100 more a day than I am getting now)? Or should I ease up on the daily cardio workouts?  

 If your trying to shrink your deficit, it's almost always better to eat more than to exercise less.

 Adding healthy calories is easy, eat more often, switch to higher fat dairy, add olive oil anything you can think of, etc.

Original Post by sleepyk08:

My question would be how do I eat 2630 (healthy) calories (nearly 1100 more a day than I am getting now)? Or should I ease up on the daily cardio workouts?  

 

 Haha, I'd love to have your problem! But yes, look for high cal/high nutrition foods to keep the volume from overwhelming you. It takes a lot of fruits and veggies to add cals, so look into oils and raw nuts or, as someone already said, peanut butter. It is definitely a good friend for this type of need!!

You guys are so helpful, and sharp!

Agreed!  Thanks everybody!

Question.  In order to lose weight I should be eating about 1250 calories a day (that's the 500 less than my resting).  If I exercise and burn say 300 calories that day, should I add those calories back in to my diet so that I net 1250 for the day or is that just a bonus that will hopefully add up to more than 1lbs lost a week? 

In the past I've done weight watchers and there if you exercise it earns you points which you can use for more food.  I'm assuming that means they are trying to keep you at a net of ~1200 calories a day.  I just want to be sure that I'm not starving myself but also making sure that I lose weight effectively. 

katefafa - don't think of it as "net" - it's just calories in and calories out.

If you burn 1750 calories sedentary, but you exercise, so your total burn is 2050, go ahead and eat 1550. You'll still have a deficit of 500 calories for that day, which will help towards the pound/week loss.

Thanks.  Just to make sure I understand (I'm feeling kind of retarded about it).  Here's what an average day would look like:

sedentary burn of 2400 + added exercise burn of 500 = 2900 burned for the day

I could eat 2400 calories that day and still be 500 calories deficit.  If I ate 1900 calories instead, it would move towards a 2lbs weight loss for the week. 

I'm a little confused - you seem to be giving new numbers. But your math in the last post is right - between 500 and 1000 less than you burn.

To be safe, I like to recommend that people don't eat below their BMR (essentially what their body would burn in a coma.) Try www.phord.com/cc to calculate it.

However, if you are burning 2400 sedentary, you definitely should be eating more than 1250.

Thanks amethystgirl - that site is helpful.