Hardly any other topic is as interesting for athletes as their own metabolism and the calculation and influence of the body’s own energy balance. With our online basal metabolic rate calculator you can calculate your daily basal metabolic rate of calories and find out everything about your BMR.
The Basal Metabolic Rate Calculator
How much energy does my body need per day?
The basal metabolic rate is also known as the basic calorie metabolism. This describes the total calorie intake necessary for the body to maintain fundamentally necessary life functions. This includes functions such as cell structure, body temperature, heartbeat, respiration and protein synthesis. Basically, the basal metabolic rate is equivalent to the amount of energy that the human body urgently needs in order to be able to function without complications even in a state of rest. A person with an average level of activity burns about 60% to 75% of the total energy requirement with the basal metabolic rate alone.
The basal metabolic rate provides information about a person’s daily energy requirements at rest. The BMR value therefore provides information about how many calories your body needs per day. Activities such as standing, running or other movements that require additional energy are not included in this value.
How do you calculate the basal metabolic rate?
The required basal metabolic rate of your body depends on various factors. The main factors are your gender, age, height and weight.
In order to calculate the exact basal metabolic rate, various formulas can be used, which have been developed and evaluated using statistics. There are three different formulas for calculating the basal metabolic rate:
- In 1984 the so-called Harris-Benedict formula was developed. This formula was used for determination of the BMR until 1990.
- In 1990 the Mifflin-St-Jeor formula was introduced. This formula has proved to be much more accurate than the formula used up to that point. It is also used in our online BMR calculator.
- The Katch-McArdle formula can be used as a supplement whenever you know your own muscle mass and fat percentage. This formula is the most accurate way to calculate the basal metabolic rate, but it also requires exact values of muscle and fat mass to give an accurate result.
The Mifflin St-Jeor formula:
x is the gender dependent parameter. For women it is x = -161 and for men x = +5.
What is the BMR value for?
The basal metabolic rate can be used to determine exactly how many kilocalories you can consume per day independently of sport and other activities in order to either maintain, lose or increase your weight.
So the basal metabolic rate tells you the minimum number of calories your body needs each day to maintain itself.
You can use our online BMR calculator to calculate your daily calorie intake. Please note, however, that this is only an approximate value. If you want to know the exact value for your basal metabolism, we recommend that you have your metabolic rate professionally measured and evaluated in the laboratory.
Factors affecting the metabolism
- Nutrition plays an important role. There are certain foods that can speed up the metabolism.
- A higher weight also means that your body needs more energy for self-preservation and the BMR is therefore higher.
- Gender also has an influence on the body’s basal metabolic rate. Men have a higher turnover. On average, the daily energy requirement of men is 5% to 10% higher than that of women. This is because women have a higher body fat percentage and less muscle mass.
- A person’s metabolism slows down with increasing age. This is primarily due to muscle loss in old age and hormonal changes in the body.
- The presence of injury or illness can cause the metabolic rate to double, as the body has to expend a lot of energy to regenerate.
- The physical constitution also determines the body composition. The more muscle mass you have, the higher your metabolism and the more energy you need.
- As body temperature rises, so does the metabolism. On average, the BMR rises by 7.00% each time the body temperature rises by about 0.5°C. That is because in the human body chemical reactions run faster with rising temperatures.
The basic metabolic rate for losing weight
With our online basal metabolic rate calculator you can calculate your daily calorie requirements. You can use the result to “count calories”. So if you want to lose weight, you should keep your calorie intake lower than your basal metabolic rate to stay in a calorie deficit. In theory, you can lose weight without doing any sport. Of course, exercise will increase your basal metabolic rate even more and you will burn more calories. For this purpose we have a special online calorie calculator which also takes your sporting activities into account and calculates your basal metabolic rate plus the calories you actively need.
Basically, in the course of weight reduction, the metabolic rate and thus the basal metabolic rate also decreases somewhat. One of the reasons for this is the loss of muscle resulting from a diet. If you do weight lifting or general fitness training in addition to a diet, you can counteract the muscle loss. Adequate exercise is important and should be taken into account, especially during a diet, to keep the body and metabolism going.
Other calculators & tools
Fitness trackers can help you determine, track and analyse your personal fitness values. Here are some of the best and most common fitness trackers:
To get even more exact values about your body, you can also use our other calculators:
- Body Mass Index Calculator
- Body Shape Index Calculator
- Calorie Calculator
- Waist-to-Height-Ratio Calculator
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