How Many Calories Do You Really Need?

Claire — Wed, 07 Nov 2007 01:56:25 +0000

When it comes to losing weight, I’ve always thought of 1200 calories as the magic number. It’s the number not to go below, so I’ve always equated it with the maximum amount of weight lost. However, this “magic number” can vary from person to person depending on activity level, weight, age, etc.

I was looking around to see if I could find an estimate of how many calories I should be taking in when I found this: It’s a calculator that takes all the factors I mentioned to figure out the ideal number of calories you would consume to both lose (an amount you specify) and maintain.

I found out that I should not go below 1400 calories, or above 1600 if I want to lose about 1 – 1.5 pounds a week.