Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
How does Apple watch count calories?
- Thread starter jwolf6589
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
While Apple has developed their on in-house algorithms FistBeat is a major 3ed party provider. You can read about it here: https://www.firstbeat.com/en/
It is not accurate. A guess using your input stats and heart rate.
It estimates it just like any other activity tracker or fitness watch made in the last thirty years.
Body weight, gender, and heart rate are a start. Heavier people burn more fuel to move (it's like how a truck burns more gas than a compact car). Males burn more than females of the same mass (usually). And a higher heart rate means more activity.
Body weight, gender, and heart rate are a start. Heavier people burn more fuel to move (it's like how a truck burns more gas than a compact car). Males burn more than females of the same mass (usually). And a higher heart rate means more activity.
For sure. it's not accurate at all. I've proved this by wearing a watch on my right and a watch on my left for an entire week, both paired to different phones.
The watch on my right has always been as much as 300 calories ahead of the left. I am right handed but have always worn a watch on the left. Footsteps on the right are always ahead by as much as 2,500 steps.
To be entirely scientific, did you swap watches and wrists, in order to ensure that the consistency between devices weren't the cause of the 300 call difference?
But you're probably right. It's likely not that accurate. And it doesn't need to be. Consistency is more important. I don't need to know exactly how many calories I burned today. What's more important is that I know I've burned 10% more calories this week vs. last.
No I didn't watch the watches around. The series 3 were on the left and the series 2 on the right. Obviously, before I had the series 3 watches, I was wearing the series 2 on the left wrist until I bought the series 3. When I was wearing the series 2 watches, I was getting the results very similar to what I am getting with the series 3.
I can sit here and wave each arm for a minute without getting up and get credit with a stand hour and of course, the watch also counts a few hundred steps during that arm movement. It also gives me a few calories. It's likely though since I am right handed, it's counting every movement, maybe even while I am typing this message, that it's giving me a few steps as well.
I'll switch the watches around at midnight and wear then another full day but I doubt it will make a difference. I have three series 3 watches and three series 2 watches and the differences is happening no matter which watch I wear, it's just I was separating them by wearing the 2 on the right and the 3 on the left.
However the accelerometer and gyroscope do also contribute to the calculations.
As a general rule, Apple’s Watch is fairly accurate on the consumer level. Pro level? Nope. You need specialized equipment for that.
It's definitely the arm movement differences between your dominant hand and you off hand. Every wrist based activity tracker has this flaw. Some devices are affected more than others, I guess due to how well the device filters out hand movements due to everyday activity versus arm swings.
The point is that an accurate calorie count isn't as important as a consistent calorie count. It doesn't really matter than my AW tracks 700 calories when I've actually burned 800. What matters is that every time I burn 800, the AW tracks 700.
ft
This is true. At midnight, I put the two watches on opposite wrists and wore them while walking for an hour and doing some pretty heavy duty house cleaning. The right is up t0 654 calories/8812 steps, the left is 582 calories/7494 steps. This is only 8 hours into the day so far so you can see how far apart the two watches can become.
If I had to guess, I would go with my watch on the left wrist being more accurate.
This thread is starting to sound like the threads in the Garmin and Suunto forums! The true facts are that NO activity tracker, calorie tracker, or step tracker is going to be 100% accurate. If you expect that, you're in for a surprise. As noted above, the value in each of these, (Garmins and Suunto's included) is the consistency, and how you use that information in your calorie INTAKE. If you consistently expend 10% more calories than your intake, then you're going to lose weight. However, I don't even count my exercise calories, I look actually at protein intake, carbs, and sodium, to determine my daily needs, and even then I don't really worry about it.
The information provided in all of these devices is intended as a guide, not a medical solution.
Just my 2c worth after spending vast amounts of money on all of those devices, is that they are all "off", but they are all also "consistent".
The information provided in all of these devices is intended as a guide, not a medical solution.
Just my 2c worth after spending vast amounts of money on all of those devices, is that they are all "off", but they are all also "consistent".
Yup, exactly. Back when I was counting calories (I know you said that you don't), I tried to take the lower estimate of my exercise calories, and then err on the side of overestimating how many calories I had eaten for the day. It worked, and I knocked off a steady five pounds per month over six months straight.
(btw, this was before I owned a fitness tracking watch of any kind -- I was using the exercise database within the LoseIt app on my iPhone)