Calories Burned Calculator - By Activity, Weight and Duration
Calories burned by activity
Same time, other activities
| Activity | MET | Calories |
|---|
Estimates based on MET values for an average adult; your actual burn depends on fitness, intensity, terrain and body composition.
How calories burned are calculated
Every activity has a MET value — how many times more energy it uses than sitting still. Multiply it by your weight and the time you spend and you get the calories burned: that is the formula exercise scientists use, and the one behind most fitness trackers. This calculator applies it to 31 common activities and lets you compare them for the same time at your own weight.
Steps
- 1 Pick an activity. The MET value next to it is the intensity used in the formula.
- 2 Enter your weight in kilograms or pounds and how many minutes you were active.
- 3 Read the calories burned and the hourly rate, and scroll the table to see what the same time would burn in other activities.
The MET formula
Calories per minute = MET × 3.5 × body weight in kg ÷ 200. A MET of 1 is resting quietly, about 1 kcal per kilogram per hour. Running at 8 km/h is 8.3 METs, so a 70 kg person burns 8.3 × 3.5 × 70 ÷ 200 ≈ 10 kcal per minute, or about 305 kcal in half an hour. The values come from the Compendium of Physical Activities, the standard reference used in research.
Why heavier people burn more
Moving a heavier body takes more energy, so at the same MET a 90 kg person burns about 30% more than a 70 kg person doing the same activity for the same time. That is why the formula uses weight, and why the calories shown on gym machines — which often assume a default weight — can be off by a wide margin.
Intensity matters more than the activity
Walking briskly (4.3 METs) burns half again as much as a stroll (2.8); cycling hard (10) burns two and a half times as much as cycling for pleasure (4.0). Where an activity appears with several speeds, pick the one you actually sustain for the whole session — a workout with long rests is lower intensity than it feels.
What the number does not include
The result is the total energy spent during the activity, which includes the calories you would have burned sitting still anyway. The extra cost of exercise is the total minus about 1 MET. It also excludes the small afterburn following hard sessions. For weight management, treat the figures as estimates within roughly ±20% and watch the trend rather than a single number.