How Many Calories Should You Eat to Lose Weight?
Every diet that works, works one way: you eat less energy than you burn. The skill is finding your real burn rate and cutting the right amount — enough to lose, not so much that it backfires. Here's the exact method.
Step 1 — your baseline burn (BMR)
The Mifflin-St Jeor equation — the one most clinics use — estimates calories burned at complete rest:
- Men: 10×kg + 6.25×cm − 5×age + 5
- Women: 10×kg + 6.25×cm − 5×age − 161
Example: a 35-year-old woman, 70 kg, 165 cm → 700 + 1,031 − 175 − 161 = 1,395 kcal/day at rest.
Step 2 — multiply by real life (TDEE)
| Lifestyle | Multiplier | Her TDEE |
|---|---|---|
| Sedentary (desk, little exercise) | × 1.2 | 1,674 |
| Light activity (1–3 workouts/wk) | × 1.375 | 1,918 |
| Moderate (3–5 workouts/wk) | × 1.55 | 2,163 |
| Very active (6–7 hard sessions) | × 1.725 | 2,407 |
Moderately active, she maintains on about 2,163 kcal/day. (A 42-year-old man, 88 kg/180 cm, moderate: BMR 1,800 → TDEE ≈ 2,790.)
Step 3 — set the deficit
Cut 15–25% below TDEE. For her: 2,163 − 20% ≈ 1,730 kcal/day, a ~430-calorie daily deficit ≈ 0.4 kg (0.9 lb) per week. Sustainable beats fast: crash deficits shed muscle, tank energy, and rebound.
About that 3,500-calorie rule
"3,500 calories = 1 pound" is true for the first pounds, then drifts optimistic — as you lose, your BMR falls (smaller bodies burn less), so a fixed intake yields a shrinking deficit. The fix is simple: re-run the numbers every ~5 kg / 10 lb and adjust. Track progress by the 2–3-week scale trend, never single days — a salty dinner swings more water than a week of fat loss.
Make the deficit livable
- Protein ~1.6–2.2 g per kg of goal weight — protects muscle and blunts hunger.
- Prefer big-volume, low-calorie foods — the deficit should be felt in the ledger, not the stomach.
- Lift something 2–3× a week so the weight lost is fat, not muscle.
- Progress check-ins pair well with a BMI trend — direction matters more than the single number.