The bike knows my height and weight and that’s about it. From that it can calculate how my body burns calories?

Every body is very different, so I don’t see how any calculation can be accurate.

  • visor841@lemmy.world
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    2 months ago

    On a theoretical level, food calories represent a specific amount of energy that can be extracted from food. So some kind of calculation could probably be made as to how much work is required to operate the exercise bike, which probably depends on your height and weight. That work uses a certain amount of energy, which is probably equated into calories.

    All that said, I have no idea how accurate that would be. And in the end IIRC there’s a bunch of other factors that affect how humans burn calories and gain or lose weight, so in the end the calorie burning stats only really need to be comparable to other calorie burning stats. So I think the bigger question is: Do different exercise equipment types put out comparable numbers?

    • Nighed@feddit.uk
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      2 months ago

      It be would be much better if they just showed the number of Wats you are working at, and the total joules of work done at the end of the session. This is probably configurable on most exercise bikes, but calories are much friendlier for the average user.