1. Does anyone use the website caloriecount.com to help them keep up with their daily intake? I've been using it, and am finding it really helpful, but I wonder if it's accurate (though it has to be more accurate than my cheap heart-rate monitor watch since it takes a lot of your information to determine the amount you burn/expend).

2. I'm a bit confused about net calories. I'm trying to stay around 1600, and although I ate closer to 2000 the calorie count website still gave me negative net calories. Are negative good? Should I strive to have a negative "balance" everyday?

Thanks.

1. I've never used caloriecount.com so I can't say for certain. I've been using fitday.com.

2. If you are trying to lose weight, having a negative balance is good. It means you burned more than you ate. Net calories is the amount of calories you ate - the amount of calories you burned.

Thank you.

Caloriecount.com tries to estimate the amount of calories you burn just being awake, so that coupled with my exercise calories results in a negative balance. I'm not sure I'm doing as well as it's saying, though, because of the calories "burning" just with me being awake, so I might join some other sites to compare.

Are you talking about Fat Secret? I ask because Fat Secret has an app called calorie count that I use. I really love it. I especially like that when you input your exercise, it deducts the amount of time AND calories from your "resting" calories/time, so that you're truly getting the "net" calorie figure of what you've burned. MyFitnessPal does not do this, so when I used that (for a brief time), it just added in the "calories burned" on top of my calorie allottment without deducting any calories from the resting burn rate.

With that said, though, I've found that I can eat more calories than caloriecount says that I can (but, then again, all calorie count figures are just estimates anyway).

Check your profile settings. My activity level was originally set to "mostly seated with some movement" and that was quoting me as burning way too many calories, IMO. So I lowered it to sedentary instead, the lowest possible level, to see if that made more sense and it does. So maybe it has you set to a higher activity level which is throwing off your count.

I actually have it set for sedentary. It says I burn 1888 without me adding in any exercise or activity I do.

That sounds about right. If I change my height and weight to your stats on Fitday, it's quoting 1976. When I put my own height and weight in, it says I'm burning 1734.

I use Calorie Count (on about.com) and I love it! When you go to your main page (the Dashboard tab), you will see the following:



Under 'Remaining' you do not want a negative total - because that means you actually ate past your target calories. It does subtract any exercise you add in through the activity log. For example, I already ate 1,502 calories today but I also jogged for a total of 402 calories burned but. That brings my net calories to 1,100. If I wanted to eat up to my 1,800 target I could have another 701 calories, which is what is reported in green under 'Remaining'. Though I probably don't want to eat all 701 calories because that would defeat the purpose of my jogging!

So to sum up - a green colored number under 'Remaining' is what you aim for, whereas a negative red colored number means you ate over your calorie limit for that day.

If anyone would like to Support me on calorie count, my username is WasabiSushiSama. I'd be happy to have more friends there

"net cals"... "net carbs".... all this "net" this and that makes me itch. it's overthinking what should be very simple: eat less, move more.

@Michi

Good info, that is so weird, it sounds like it should be the other way around.

[QUOTE=Michi702;4286722It does subtract any exercise you add in through the activity log. [/QUOTE]

Does it let you opt out of doing it that way? Maybe the OP would prefer not to subtract activity calories?

Hey Serval, I just noticed we're the same height! Or should I say we're the same shortness?

I also use Calorie Count, the iphone app and not the website -wondering why it looks so different. The app layout seems a little easier to follow...

For me negative green is good - that is a calorie deficit. Red is bad. Too many calories for the day.

I love Calorie Count. I need a tool to monitor myself throughout the day. It's quick. It's easy and I know exactly where I stand at any moment of the day. It's pretty great.

Like threenorns I don't get into the specifics of calorie counting--I just eat a set amount each day. It seems to be working thus far.

I use a combination of calorie count and myfitnesspal to look up calorie counts of different food. I have an account on calorie count that I use to track my macros once every few weeks or so, just to make sure I'm on track with my protein intake.

Just started using calorie count and it seems really helpful. When I say I just started, I do literally mean today, so my opinion is very limited. I'm also using myfitnesspal, but I'm seeing gaps between the two apps so now need to make the decision as to which I'm going to find more beneficial.

Calorie count seems more useful as your able to track more things like my general activity which I couldn't figure how to do in myfitnesspal.

Great topic, thanks for bringing it up.