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In the previous two posts I went over counting the Calories in the food you eat. Of course there is also the other side of the equation: how many Calories does your body actually need? In general there is quite a simple relationship between these two values and your weight. If you consume more Calories than your body needs then the extra Calories will get stored in your body as fat. If you consume less Calories than you need then you’ll lose weight. Losing weight does not automatically mean you’ll lose fat but can also mean you lose some of your muscle. That’s why you need to be careful when dieting since losing muscle will make you burn less Calories during the day which will mean you’ll lose less fat. But that’s a topic for another article

To calculate daily Calorie needs, you can use the online tools described below. In case you need to convert from centimeters to inches or kilograms to pounds you can use google. One foot has 12 inches.

Calorie Calculator at freedieting.com
You need to enter your age, gender, weight (in pounds or kilos), height (in feet and inches only) and exercise level. Then you press “Calculate” button and get three numbers:

• Maintenance – how many Calories you need daily to maintain your current weight
• Fat Loss – how many Calories you need daily if you want to lose fat
• Extreme Fat Loss – how many Calories you need daily if you want to lose fat faster (note: this is only appropriate for people who are very overweight not for someone who wants to lose a few kilos)

You can also select “Advanced Options” where you can choose how the results are calculated. It can be interesting to compare different values. And if you know your body fat percentage you can use it to make the results more accurate.

There is also an option for “7 day calorie cycle (zig-zag)” which gives you Calories per day but in a weekly cycle. The idea is to vary the daily Calories intake in order to prevent so called “weight loss vicious cycle“.

Daily Caloric Metabolic Calculator at HikingUpward.com
Here you need your weight in pounds, height in feet and inches, age, gender, body type (muscular, average or overweight) and activity level. Pressing “Calculate Daily Caloric Requirement” and you’ll get two values:

• BMR (Basal Metabolic Rate) – how many Calories you’d burn per day if you stayed whole 24 hours in bed.
• Daily caloric requirements to remain at your current weight – this adds to BMR the Calories required for all the activities you do during the day.

Calorie Calculator at ExRx.net
Again you need to enter a similar set of values: sex, age, weight (Pounds or Kilograms), height (in inches or centimeters) or body fat percentage. You also need to estimate your average activity levels by specifying how many hours per day you are resting or performing activities at different levels. Pressing the “Calculate” button gives you again three numbers:

• BMR – Basal Metabolic Rate
• Activity – additional Calories you burn per day due to your activity level.
• Total Calories – the sum of the above two numbers.

Diet Calculator at ScientificPsychic.com
This tool takes a bit different approach. Here beside the usual height, weight, sex and activity level you also need to enter measurements of your waist, neck and (for females only) hips. Press “Calculate” button and based on these values the page will calculate:

• Body Mass Index – values over 25 indicate being overweight unless your body is very muscular (BMI calculation doesn’t take into account fat/muscle ratio)
• Waist-to-Height ratio – values above 0.5 indicate too much abdominal fat
• Percent Body Fat
• Lean Body Mass
• Whether you’re underweight, overweight or have weight in normal range
• Minimum caloric requirements – this takes into account your BMI and automatically tries to reduce your Calories per day if BMI is over 25
• Minimum content of proteins in your diet

If you use these tools you should get a better idea on the amount of Calories you should be consuming on average. Regardless whether you want to maintain your current weight, lose some fat or gain some muscle you need to know these numbers in order to properly control your diet.