π₯ TDEE Calculator
Daily calorie needs from the Mifflin-St Jeor equation.
Maintenance Calories (TDEE)
Estimates only, not medical advice. Talk to a clinician or registered dietitian before making big diet changes.
How to Use This Calculator
Enter your age, sex, height, and weight, pick the activity level that honestly matches your week, and the calculator returns your BMR, your TDEE, and calorie targets for losing, maintaining, or gaining weight.
Choose Imperial or Metric and enter your age, height, and weight. Morning measurements before eating are the most consistent.
Select your sex. The equations differ because average body composition differs.
Pick your activity level. Be honest: most people overestimate. A desk job with three gym sessions a week is "Light", not "Active".
Read your three targets. Use the maintenance number as your anchor and the cut/bulk numbers as starting points, then adjust from real weight trends.
The Mifflin-St Jeor Equation
BMR is what your body burns at complete rest: breathing, circulation, brain function, cell repair. Weight drives the number most (more tissue costs more energy), height adds a little, and age subtracts a little each year as metabolism gradually slows. The sex constant (+5 for men, -161 for women) accounts for average differences in lean muscle mass. Multiplying BMR by an activity factor scales it to real life: a sedentary multiplier of 1.2 up to 1.9 for very active people.
Worked Example
A 30-year-old man, 180 cm, 80 kg, moderately active. BMR = 10 x 80 + 6.25 x 180 - 5 x 30 + 5 = 800 + 1,125 - 150 + 5 = 1,780 kcal/day. TDEE = 1,780 x 1.55 = 2,759 kcal/day to maintain weight. For fat loss at about a pound a week: 2,759 - 500 = 2,259 kcal/day. For lean muscle gain: 2,759 + 300 = 3,059 kcal/day. Notice how the activity multiplier does most of the work: the same man sedentary would maintain at only 2,136 kcal.
Cutting, Maintaining, and Bulking
For fat loss, a 300 to 500 calorie daily deficit loses roughly 0.5 to 1 pound per week while preserving muscle, especially with enough protein and resistance training. Bigger deficits work faster but raise hunger, fatigue, and muscle-loss risk. For maintenance, eat at TDEE and let weight settle within a 2 to 3 pound range. For muscle gain, a modest 200 to 300 calorie surplus minimizes fat gain while fueling growth; larger surpluses mostly add fat. Whichever goal you pick, protein matters: aim for roughly 0.7 to 1 gram per pound of body weight daily, and recheck your TDEE every few months as your weight changes. These are estimates, not medical advice: if you have a medical condition, are pregnant, or have a history of disordered eating, work with a clinician or dietitian instead of a calculator.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is TDEE?
TDEE stands for Total Daily Energy Expenditure: all the calories your body burns in a day. It has four parts: your basal metabolic rate (BMR, the energy to keep you alive at rest, usually 60 to 70 percent of the total), the thermic effect of food (digestion), exercise, and NEAT (non-exercise activity like walking, fidgeting, and chores). This calculator estimates BMR with the Mifflin-St Jeor equation, then multiplies by an activity factor to get TDEE.
Mifflin-St Jeor vs Harris-Benedict: which is better?
Mifflin-St Jeor (1990) is the better choice for most people today. It was validated against modern indirect-calorimetry measurements and tends to be more accurate across a range of body types. The original Harris-Benedict equation dates to 1919 and often overestimates needs, especially for people carrying extra weight. Most dietitians and modern calculators use Mifflin-St Jeor as the default.
How many calories do I need to lose one pound a week?
About 500 calories per day below your TDEE. One pound of body fat stores roughly 3,500 calories, so a 500-calorie daily deficit adds up to about 3,500 over a week. A gentler 250-calorie deficit loses roughly half a pound a week and is easier to sustain. Deficits larger than 750 to 1,000 calories a day are hard to maintain and can cost you muscle, so most guidelines suggest losing no faster than about 1 percent of body weight per week.
Should women eat fewer calories than men?
At identical height, weight, age, and activity, yes: the female Mifflin-St Jeor equation subtracts 161 where the male equation adds 5, a 166-calorie gap that reflects average differences in lean mass. In real life, though, activity level and body size matter far more than sex. A very active woman needs more calories than a sedentary man of the same weight. Use your own numbers rather than population averages.
How accurate is a TDEE estimate?
Treat it as a starting point accurate to roughly plus or minus 10 percent. Real expenditure varies with muscle mass, hormones, sleep, stress, and how honestly activity is reported (most people overestimate exercise). The practical method: eat at the calculated target for 2 to 3 weeks, track your morning weight trend, then adjust up or down by 100 to 200 calories based on what the scale actually does.