Activity Calorie Calculator to Help Determine How Many Calories Burned

The calories burned calculator enables you to estimate calories burned by activity from 821 different activities.

What are calories?

Calories are a measure of energy, and the definition of a calorie is the energy that’s required for raising the temperature of 1 gram of water by 1º C. Calories in nutrition refer to the energy from food and drink consumed, and also the energy used from physical activity. One needs to burn approximately 3500 calories to lose a pound of body weight.

Kcal vs cal

Kcal, or kilocalorie is a large calorie and is how much energy needed for raising the temperature of 1 kg of water by 1º C.

Cal is a small calorie and is how much energy needed for raising the temperature of 1 g of water by 1º C.

1 kcal is equal to 1,000 cal.

Does 3,500 calories equal 1 pound?

The scientist Max Wishnofsky determined In 1958 that 3,500 calories was the caloric equivalent of one pound of body weight lost or gained.

Despite his calculations being based on old research, it’s common knowledge that 3,500 calories equals 1 pound of body weight and his results continue to be cited in scientific literature. It can however be assumed that 3,500 calories is an approximate estimate and a pound of body weight can contain anywhere between 3,436 and 3,752 calories.

Metabolic equivalent of task (MET)

The calories burned calculator works out calories burned by using body weight, activity duration as well as metabolic equivalent of task, or METs. 1 MET will be the rate of energy output when resting.¹

All MET values are estimations and are based upon a 70 kg male, energy output is normally lower in women. The MET calculator also doesn’t take intensity into account so results are to be seen as approximate and not as precise measurements.

Even though the MET values used come from the most reliable source available, the updated 2011 compendium of physical activities,² you might find that you don’t agree with some of the MET values.

Activity frequency and rate of fat loss

Other factors should also be taken into account such as activity frequency. For example, when just starting to run, rate of fat loss is higher compared to athletes who’ve been running their entire life.

A study examined how endurance runners’ bodies reacted to the conditions of running for an extended period of time, researchers followed them for 2 months over a 4,500-kilometer race making use of a mobile MRI unit.³

A huge amount of unique data was acquired regarding how the body’s body fat and muscle is affected by endurance running. Most of the data collected is also applicable to the average runner.

The results revealed that an average of 5.4% body volume for the duration of the race was lost, the majority of being in the 1st 2,000 kilometers. 40% body fat was lost in the 1st half of the race and 50% during the course of the race. There was an average loss of 7% leg muscle volume.

It was found that regardless of the daily endurance running, the athletes’ leg muscles in fact degenerated due to the huge energy consumption. While most individuals don’t run to this extreme, some of the other findings of the study are still significant for the recreational runner.

One important outcome of the research was that fat tissue was the 1st tissue impacted by running. Even more important, visceral fat loss took place a lot sooner in the running process than believed in the past.

Visceral fat is associated with cardiovascular disease and is the most harmful fat. The results also showed that the largest amount of overall fat loss happened early on in the process. This sport should be done regularly over the years. If running is stopped for lengthy periods, caloric input needs to be reduced or alternative aerobic exercises chosen to prevent weight gain.

Calories burned running vs calories burned walking

Walking at a very brisk pace (4.5mph) can burn more calories than jogging and the same amount as running at 5 mph.

Calories burned walking for a 70 kg male walking at a very brisk pace for 60 minutes = 581 calories
Calories burned jogging for a 70 kg male for 60 minutes = 490 calories
Calories burned running for a 70 kg male running at a 5 mph for 60 minutes = 581 calories

The biggest advantage of walking for exercise is low risk of injury, especially to the knees. There are however other factors to take into account when running or walking.

In a study making a comparison between human running and walking motions, and if the knees, ankles or hips or are the most significant power sources for those motions, scientists demonstrate that the ankles generate most of the power when we run, but the hips generate most of the power when we walk. Knees give about 1 fifth or less of running or walking power.⁴

The research reveals that, in general, hips produce more power when we walk. That’s until we reach the stage at which we’re speed walking, when we walk so quickly that it’s more comfortable to run, at 2 meters a second. The hips produce 44% of the power when walking at a pace of 2 meters a second, with ankles giving 39% of the power.

When we begin to run at this 2 meter/second pace, the ankles really start working, providing 47% of the power in comparison to 32% for the hips. The ankles still supply more of the power of the 3 lower limb joints as the running speed increases, even though the hips start closing the distance at faster speeds.

For the study, 10 individuals ran and walked at different speeds on a uniquely designed treadmill; several cameras captured their gait with monitoring reflective markers placed on different parts of the individuals’ lower limbs as the treadmill collected data from the applied force.

The research looked at running and walking on level ground so as to gauge the differences caused by increased speed; running and walking on inclined ground is essentially different than running and walking on flat ground, and would probably alter the power generation results in favor of the knees and hips.

Calories burned calculator

Select activity type from the drop-down menu below. Enter body body weight in pounds, and time of activity in minutes and the activity calorie calculator will give an estimate of how many calories burned.