Total Daily Energy Expenditure (TDEE) and Calorie intake advice
After you have worked out your basal metabolic rate (BMR) and calculated your total daily energy expenditure (TDEE) based your activity levels, your next step is to work out how many calories you want to reduce or increase, depending on whether you wish to lose weight or increase your lean muscle mass, i.e. be more muscular.
Adjust your caloric intake according to your goal
If you want to keep your weight at its current level, stick to your daily calorie intake (TDEE) or maintenance level. To lose weight, create a calorie deficit by reducing your calories slightly below your maintenance level (or keep your calories the same and increase your physical activity). To gain weight you need to increase your calories above your maintenance level.
Negative calorie balance is essential to lose body fat.
Calories are directly related to fat loss. You will never lose fat if you eat more calories than you burn off. Some foods do get stored as fat more easily than others, but even "healthy food," will get stored as fat. The laws of thermodynamics and energy balance require a calorie deficit to burn fat. This forces your body to use stored body fat to make up for the calorie deficit. And this deficit can be created through diet and exercise.
Calorie deficit thresholds: How low is too low?
Cutting calories by too much slows down the metabolic rate, decreases thyroid output and causes loss of lean muscle mass. The most common guideline for calorie deficits for fat loss is to reduce your calories by at least 500, but not more than 1000 below your maintenance level.
For some, especially lighter people, 1000 calories may be too much of a deficit. Reducing calories by 15-20% below TDEE is a good place to start. A larger deficit may be necessary in some cases, but the best approach would be to keep the calorie deficit through diet small while increasing activity level.
Positive calorie balance is essential to gain lean bodyweight
On the other hand, to gain lean bodyweight and become more muscular, you must consume more calories than you burn up in a day. A general guideline for a starting point for gaining weight is to add approximately 300-500 calories per day onto your TDEE. An alternate method is to add an additional 15 - 20% onto your TDEE.
Adjust your caloric intake gradually
Avoid drastic changes to your diet all at once as large amount of calories reduced or ingested will have negative effects on your body. Your basal metabolic rate might not adjust to a large increase or decrease and will slow down instead. If the calorie intake difference is nearly 1000, the best approach would be to gradually adjust your calories over a period of a few weeks to allow your metabolism to speed up and acclimatize.
Measure your results and adjust calories accordingly
The TDEE calculations for finding your correct caloric intake are simple and just estimates for a starting point. You need to closely monitor your progress to ensure this is suitable for you. Keep track of your caloric intake, your bodyweight, and your body fat percentage and note the percentages to see how you respond. Adjust your calorie intake and exercise levels accordingly if you don't see the results you expect. Remember that it's not effective to reduce calories to very low levels to lose fat. You should only reduce calories only slightly and increase your daily calorie expenditure by increasing your frequency, duration and or intensity of exercise.
Additional Reading
Check out our "books" or "pills" section for additional information on some popular food and diet programs.
Click to go to Books | Click to go to Pills
You can also find out how to calculate your BMR and total daily energy expenditure in the "Calculators" section.
