The idea of the 2000 calorie (8000kJ) diet is baked in to a lot of nutrition advice. But it turns out that 2000 is the wrong number for almost everybody. These charts show what people actually need to eat to maintain their weight.
Only 20 per cent of women and 2 per cent of men burn 2000 calories a day or less. The average woman burns a little over 2,300 calories and the average for men is 3,100 calories. The charts you see here come from FitFolk, but they’re based on data from US government studies.
It turns out we are terrible at estimating our calorie consumption: women report consuming 1,600 to 2,300 calories per day, and men report 2000 to 3000. So, because we are lying to ourselves, the real numbers were too difficult to believe.
What Are the Average Calories Burned Per Day by Men and Women? [FitFolk]
Comments
One response to “Most People Burn More Than 2000 Calories”
Surely it’s better to underestimate how many calories we burn rather than overestimate. Especially if trying to lose weight.