

Try to stick to your Metabolism Calculator calories for a week without changing your exercise routine. There's been some refinement of thinking on this, but in general, to lose a pound a week, she will need to consume 500 fewer calories each day (because a pound equals about 3,500 calories), or 1,593 calories. For example, a 45-year-old woman who is 5'4", 158 pounds, and moderately active will maintain her weight on 2,093 calories a day. By plugging in your gender, age, height, weight and activity level (there's a five-point range on the site, from "inactive" to "extremely active"), you'll learn what it takes to keep the status quo. After 50, it falls to 1,800.Īnd you? Check out the Metabolism Calculator at.

In her 30s and 40s, it drops a little to just about 2,000. A moderately active woman in her 20s requires a daily average of 2,000 to 2,200 calories to maintain her weight. Since a woman's metabolic rate falls roughly 2% to 3% each decade, this number-alas-goes down with age. Then, to lose pounds, you can subtract from that maintenance number. If simply cutting back isn't budging the scale, it's helpful to know how many calories you need each day to maintain your weight. Happily, it starts with what you consume-the right foods at the right times. And as researchers get deeper into the physiology of weight regulation, they're fine-tuning their understanding of what it takes to ramp up that 30% and drop pounds. Ok, put away the Brie and consider this: About 30% of your metabolism is under your control (the rest, devoted to such mundane but essential functions as digesting food and repairing cells, isn't). When a week goes by with no miracles, we give up and resume the same bad habits-sloppy portions, half-hearted workouts, and non-petite servings of imported cheese. So we fight the slowdown, eating like parakeets for a few days or launching into an intense exercise routine. Traditional wisdom holds that a sluggish metabolism is a curse of midlife, like needing reading glasses to use a smartphone or starting to worry about your retirement plan.
