PLEASE, READ THESE Notes on the Calculator AFTER USING IT
1. To address your first likely concern right off the bat…
Yes, the calculations ‘work’ — I’ve been coaching online as a full-time job since 2011. If I didn’t get results (view over 100 client results photos here), I’d get fired.
And yes, they are very well thought out — they’re based on the recommendations in my book, The Muscle and Strength Nutrition Pyramid, which is a 290-page, fully-referenced guide for powerlifters and physique athletes.
But wondering whether they are ‘correct’ is the wrong way of thinking about things, because…
2. You will need to adjust these numbers sooner or later to achieve the desired rate of weight change.
Why sooner? Because the calculations are based on equations derived from group averages. You might be either side of this average, so consider them a start point from which to adjust.
Why later? Because energy needs change over time as we diet and bulk. Your metabolism will gradually adapt to fight a caloric deficit, and energy needs increase when we gain weight. These things happen for some people more than others and this is not something a calculator can predict for.
However, knowing how impatient people are to see results, I’ve factored this into the calculations…
But Before we get into that…
People consistently make the same simple mistakes when acting on these calculations. So I have built a free, 7-lesson email course that has helped 80,000 people so far avoid them.
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It’ll be in your inbox by the time you’ve finished reading these notes.
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So as I was saying, I’ve factored the energy need adaptions into the calculations in the following couple of ways…
3. For those cutting, I’ve calculated energy intake at a level where bodyweight losses would be 0.75% per week, were the metabolism not to adapt.
But it will, and many people will find their resulting weight loss to be around 0.5%, which from experience, seems to be the sweet spot for busy individuals with real lives who can’t afford the brain fog that comes with higher caloric deficits.
Additionally, the total nerds among you (love you guys!) who have been getting your calculators out to check my math, may have noticed that…
4. For those bulking, I’ve upped the caloric surplus by 50% to anticipate some of the increased energy needs when bulking.
This is not an extreme change. For a 30-year-old 200lb novice male, their daily intake will change from 3200 kcal to 3340 kcal because of this.
Unfortunately, there’s a tricky little bitch called NEAT who can impact energy needs way more from person to person, especially when bulking.
Non-exercise activity thermogenesis (NEAT) is the energy expended for everything we do that is not sleeping, eating, or sports-like exercise. It ranges from the energy expended walking to work, typing and texting friends, shaking up a protein shake, performing yard work, and fidgeting.
Some people ramp up NEAT much more than others which explains those who claim not to be able to gain weight (a.k.a. ‘hard gainers’) when, in fact, they need to eat more.
This cannot be factored into an initial calculation either, which is why tracking average weight change and then adjusting caloric intake based on the outcome is so critical.
5. So now you’re probably wondering, “What is a desirable rate of weight loss or gain?”
I’d recommend 0.5-1% of body weight loss per week when cutting. — The leaner you get, the slower you should take it.)
I’d recommend 1-3% of body weight gain per month when bulking. — The more experienced a trainee you are, the closer you are likely to your genetic potential so the slower you should take things.
Readers of The Muscle and Strength Nutrition Pyramid may notice that these figures are double the 1.5, 1% and 0.5% rates we recommend in there for the novice, intermediate, and advanced trainees respectively. I often recommend these higher rates because the changes are easier to track, and the training progressions are more obvious, which makes it easier to stay motivated.
Those extra sensitive to fat gain may wish to be more conservative, but those struggling to see changes might do better with my higher figures.
6. Most people will have a jump in scale weight in the first week.
This will be due to the change in gut content, water, and muscle glycogen in your body. It happens whenever you change the number of carbs you eat or the total food intake in general.
So, before deciding you need to adjust, track for several weeks first, taking the average scale weight each day, and ignore the first week of data.
7. To make an adjustment to get your body weight change on track, we can use the following easy math:
If you are cutting, multiply the amount you are off your weekly weight change target by 500 kcal (or 1100 kcal for those using kg). Add or subtract that from your caloric intake each day accordingly. Here are some examples:
- If you’re losing weight 0.5 lbs slower than your target each week, reduce daily caloric intake by 250 kcal (500*0.5).
- If you’re losing weight 0.3 lbs faster than your target each week, increase your daily caloric intake by 150 kcal daily (0.3*500).
If you are bulking, multiply the amount you are off your monthly weight change target by 200 kcal (or 440 kcal for those using kg). Here are some examples:
- If you’re gaining weight 0.9 lbs slower than your target each month, increase daily caloric intake by 180 kcal (200*0.9).
- If you’re gaining weight 0.5 kg faster than your target each month, reduce daily caloric intake by ~220 kcal (440*0.5).
Make this caloric change via fat and carb changes per your preferences. This is as simple as follows:
Leave protein intake as is, unless you have a lot of body fat to lose. (More on this in a moment.)
8. Before making any adjustments, make sure your adherence is on point.
If it’s not, fix that. Solid adherence in the week only to throw it away on the weekends is the most common screw-up pattern people follow.
9. Double-check that you are tracking things accurately.
Here’s my guide to counting macros and making meals out of them. (It’s the simplified counting rules in this guide which gave the food value estimations at the end of the calculator.)
But despite guides like that trying to simplify, studies consistently show that people are terrible at tracking things. So, if you’re not losing weight at the rate desired and you’re concerned that your macros look low, swallow your ego and consider the possibility that you’ve screwed something up.
Log everything that passes your lips into a nutritional calculator for 2 weeks. This will tell you if you have an issue.
10. Protein intake is calculated based on body weight rather than lean body mass.
This is much easier than requiring people to estimate their body-fat percentage first, and the results are roughly the same anyway. Plus, all the methods we have available for estimating body-fat percentage are prone to chuckle-worthy levels of error. I recommend you do not attempt it.
(Calculating protein intake based on body weight is a departure from how I’ve suggested people do it on the site up until now, which is why I feel it’s worth mentioning. I will edit every other guide on the site in the coming weeks for congruency.)
11. Importantly, those with a lot of body fat to lose will, therefore, find their protein intake skewed too high. You’ll need to adjust for that.
This is an easy fix — change your daily protein intake to be your height in centimeters:
- 6’2 = ~188 cm
- 6’ = ~183 cm
- 5’10 = ~178 cm
- 5’8 = ~173 cm
- 5’6 = ~168 cm
So, if you’re 260 lbs and 5’11, instead of consuming ~260 g of protein as I have in the calculator, consume 180 g and swap the 80 g remaining for carbs to maintain the calorie balance. This will be better for satiety, diet variety, and training quality.
Some people may argue that this protein figure is a little too low to be protective of muscle mass when dieting.
I disagree.
Having a lot of fat mass is protective of muscle mass. This makes sense when you think about it from a survival perspective. When the body comes to choose between releasing fatty acids or breaking down muscle into amino acids for fuel, the smarter decision for survival is to burn off fat when there is an abundance of it. Therefore, protein needs are likely a bit lower for the 260 lb guy with 160 lbs of muscle mass vs. the 200 lb guy with the same muscle mass.
12. Too many people make calorie and macro calculations, wait two weeks, then decide that they “don’t work” if they don’t see the calculated for scale weight change.
They then move to another calculator (or diet method entirely).
This is sadly common. Don’t be this person.
A simple adjustment of your caloric intake up or downwards is all that will be needed. (Reasons 2-4, at rates described in 5, in the manner described in 6.) Don’t make this mistake.
13. If you have already calculated your macros elsewhere and they aren’t radically different, I don’t suggest you change them.
The key, as I’ve covered, is that you track your progress and adjust based on the outcome.
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This can’t be right. I’m supposed to start a cut with a deficit of 800 calories?
Office job, 4 times a week lifting and cardio on one of my off-days. 31/179cm/97kg.
I remember bf% to be a factor in the calculations you described before. Why did you decide to stop considering bf%? Wouldn’t this make things more accurate?
Hi Tim, thank you for the questions.
1) An 800 kcal reduction from your estimated maintenance caloric intake — yes, this sounds about right if you’re aiming for a 0.5% body weight loss per week.
[The math: You’re 97 kg. 0.5% of body weight is 0.485 kg. It takes an 1100 kcal deficit each day to lose 1 kg per week. This is 533 kcal deficit per day needed.]
This is for reasons covered in point 3: maintenance caloric intake is a moving target — we’re anticipating the metabolic adaptation (reduction in energy needs) and thus factoring that in at the outset. Admittedly, we don’t know quite how much that will be as it varies from person to person.
I do this knowing that people generally have a lack of patience and need to see results at the outset in order to stay motivated and follow through. So I figure that it’s better for people to see slightly faster changes than slightly slower changes, week to week, from the start, knowing that this can be corrected for later on. (If this leads to you losing ~0.2 kg more than targeted per week, you can make an adjustment upwards as described.)
But if you wish to add 277 kcal to that at the outset though, feel free. You just have to add ~70 g of carbs each day. If you do this you’re gambling on there being no metabolic adaptation though, which just isn’t realistic.
2) Better this way. The numbers work out similar, and it’s easier. See point 10 on the issues with estimating body fat percentage.
Hey there, if you dont mind me asking, what is the protein / carb / fat ratios that the calculator spits out? Like you know, 50/30/20 split or? Excuse the bad english. Thank you for your site!
Hi Sebs, thanks for the question. The macros aren’t calculated on a percentage of the caloric intake.
There is an idea out there that ‘golden’ macronutrient ratios exist that can transform a person’s physique. The idea was born in bodybuilding forums by people looking at someone else’s body transformation, asking their macro intake, then reverse engineering it to come up with a macro ratio that is assumed to be somehow special.
I’m not a fan of this idea. It’s logically flawed and here’s why…
Metabolism is adaptive. Calorie needs increase over time when bulking, and decrease over time when cutting.
When cutting it isn’t prudent to decrease the calorie intake by reducing all macronutrients equally, because protein intake is best set according to lean body mass due to the muscle preserving properties when dieting.
When bulking it is neither cost-effective (protein is expensive) nor optimal (fat storage is more likely with higher fat intakes), to increase equally either.
There is a broad scope for personal preference between fat and carbohydrate intake to make up the remainder of the calorie balance for most people, outside of specific situations. But for most serious trainees, once fat intake (tolerance/preference) has been established, carbohydrate increases and decreases will be used as the prime energy balance manipulator.
Macro ratios are therefore a function of the stage of dieting, not something specific to target.
Let’s explain this with one quick and very simplified example:
Take a macro ratio ‘P40/C40/F20’ that has been proposed as perfect for cutting (meaning that 40% of a person’s diet will come from protein, 40% from carbohydrate, 20% from fat).
Take a guy that can initially lose his target rate of fat loss eating 2500kCal per day. As the diet progresses over many weeks he finally needs to adjust to 2000kCal per day, and finally 1500kCal per day by the time he gets on stage.
At the start of the diet, he’ll be consuming 250g of protein at the end of the diet he’ll be consuming 150g a day.
If that guy carries 70kg (154lbs) of lean body mass (LBM), he’ll be consuming ~3.6g/kgLBM of protein at the start, and ~2.1g/kgLBM at the end of the diet, which is an overconsumption of protein initially, and an underconsumption at the end.
Why does it matter if we over or under consume protein?
It’s suboptimal.
Overconsumption costs unnecessary $$ and steals away our ability to have a higher carb intake. Underconsumption when dieting can cost us muscle mass.
There is a similar issue with the other macronutrients also when you fix them as a ratio of the overall calorie intake rather than to lean body mass.
Fat is important hormonally and allowance should be set to lean body mass (and then adjusted per tolerance).
Carbs make up the remaining balance and are important for training intensity and recovery.
Nothing should be arbitrary.
So, we set your macros according to your energy needs, weight decides protein intake, and then tweak the carb to fat ratio for personal preference.
Regarding protein intake, how much of my protein should come from animal sources and plant sources. I have heard from research that suggest animal protein is better than plant protein because it has higher protein quality.
Hi Mike, thanks for the question.
While it’s true that animal protein sources have a better amino acid profile (meaning, there are more of the amino acids known to be important for muscle building — the branched-chain amino acids (BCAAs), specifically leucine, and the EAAs generally), the studies giving us the protein targets in the calculator didn’t take this into account.
So, you can expect people to have been eating from a variety of protein sources.
Therefore, if you’re hitting the daily protein intake numbers we are talking about, you’ll be fine.
Hypothetically, could we eat less protein if we were to get it exclusively from more meat?
Possibly, but how much of a difference is this likely to make?
Well, animal-based proteins have around 20% higher BCAA content. So, if you were to have a mixed diet with 2/3 of your protein coming from animal sources and 1/3 coming from the rest, and you switched that to purely animal sources (kinda impossible, as there’s trace protein in most foods, but let’s ignore that for a moment), then you’re talking about a 1/3 of 20% difference, which is around 7%.
So, if your target is 150 g according to the calculator, you could reduce that daily intake by 7% to 140 g if you were to have a highly meat-based diet.
Point being, it doesn’t make enough of a difference to be worth worrying about, and you probably wouldn’t want to do that anyway as you’d compromise there is variety in the diet, which may not be a good thing for overall health.
The point where I think it’s worth considering is for vegans. I’d suggest a 20% bump on the protein targets given by the calculator.
Hope that helps.
You’ve really outdone yourself with this new calculator. It’s straightforward, super-easy to make the calculations (all the hard math work is taken care of), and the details are still there but suitably left until the end.
Thank you, Peter!
I’ve been eating consistently at a number below what my estimated TDEE based off the calculator shows. I lift 5x/week and do 20-30 mins of cardio 2-3x/week. I have a desk job but stand 5 hours/day and average 8-10k steps. My weight has not changed up or down, even though I have ate well below the estimated TDEE for years now. Typically, I am 400-700 calories below. Has my body just adjusted to what I have been eating? Thanks for your work with the site!
Don’t take the calculator to be what your TDEE should be, it’s an estimate of what is may be.
If you’re maintaining weight, you have found your maintenance caloric intake.
Freakin excellent content!!
Thank you, Larry. Appreciated.
I work out 3-4 days a week and have a physical job. To estimate my TDEE should I choose Moderate? I have noticed this is a significant difference in total weekly calories between Light and Moderate.
Hi Danny, thanks for the question.
You have a physical job, so it’s a good idea to bump up the activity multiplier. So I wouldn’t choose low.
The question then is whether it should be moderate or high. This will depend on just how physical your job is. If you’re a miner, jungle trekking guide, or something like that, busting your ass all day, your needs could be in the high range rather than moderate.
Make a decision, set, track, then adjust based on the outcome. If you lose or gain slightly too quickly or slowly, adjust as outlined above.