Despite being one of the easiest ways to remain physically active, many people still don’t know how much energy they actually expend by walking during the day. The amount of energy you expended is based on a variety of different variables, including but not limited to: the type of activity you are participating in (i.e., walking); how fast you go; how far you walk; and whether you are walking on flat ground or on an uphill slope.

This information has led to the popular goal of walking 10,000 steps a day as promoted by brands (like FitBit and Apple) and devices (such as the Apple Watch) in order to get people to engage in a regular activity. Because of this men, women and children across the world are now making a habit out of recording their daily step counts.

Why Calorie Burn Differs Between Individuals

In addition to the personal/physical variables listed above, another reason that so many people can have such large discrepancies in levels of energy expended by walking is simply that calories burned are not based on the same formula for everyone (or are not based on only one factor). There are many different factors that affect the amount of calories burned from one person to the next; therefore, each person burning calories while walking will have a unique level of calorie expenditure while performing an identical walk.

This guide will cover how walking burns calories, how to calculate your calorie burn based on steps taken, and how to use practical means to estimate your daily energy expenditure with greater accuracy. The number of calories burned through walking will differ for every person based on a range of factors.

Energy Expenditure Facts

Key Insights About Walking

Walking at a slow pace will burn the lowest amount of calories per step. These factors help explain why the estimates for calories burned are so varied and differ from real-world estimates.

Impact of Body Weight

One significant factor in estimating the number of calories burned while walking is your body weight. Larger people use up more calories when moving around as their body requires more energy to perform an action. The World Health Organization suggests that energy spent on physical activity depends on an individual’s body composition.

Key Factors Affecting Calorie Burn

There are a combination of environmental and physical characteristic factors that determine your caloric expenditure while walking. These variables combine to create a more complicated formula than simply relying on the number of steps taken.

Body Mass and Composition
Speed and Intensity of your Walk
Stride Length and Economy
Surface Configuration (Flat, sloped, or irregularly configured)

Formula for Calculating Calories Burned

To calculate how many calories you spend by engaging in the total number of steps taken, it will be more accurate using a formula than only using averages.

Basic Formula

Calories Burned = Distance Walked * Weight Coefficient.

Average Estimates

Fitness gurus from Harvard Medical School all indicate that the average adult expends approximately 50 to 70 calories for every kilometre they.

A Simple Way To Calculate Calories

Use the following process to estimate calories consumed: 1 Step = Average stride length = 0.0008 km. Distance = Steps X Step Length.

Using Digital Calculators and Devices

Many digital companies such as Apple and Samsung have health tracking options pre-loaded onto their devices, which will automatically calculate this information for their users. How the calculators do this is by using a standard formula to convert steps to distance.

Then, the distance is multiplied by your weight and the intensity of the activity to provide an estimated calorie count. Although the estimates provided by these calculators are accurate, they are based on average estimates and assumptions.

Ways to Effectively Use a Calculator

Enter your actual body weight—updating your body weight on a regular basis as needed for accurate results.
Record the number of steps you take on a daily basis—do not estimate.
Consider walking speed (if the tool allows you) when entering data.
Sync your data with your wearable device to improve tracking accuracy.

Consistency Matters

Continuity will help minimize the inaccuracies found in multiple calculations; thus, improving your ability to obtain meaningful insight.

Digital vs Manual Calculation

While manual calculation provides you with an understanding of the calculation process through transparency, digital calculations do save you a little bit of time and energy. Digital applications combine both caloric data (when using MyFitnessPal) and step count to provide a full picture of your fitness activity.

In practical application, it is recommended to utilize both forms for convenience, but also to understand how to make sense of the results by understanding the equation used for calculation and using your results to create an accurate estimation of where you are on your progress journey.

Accuracy Of Fitness Trackers & Applications

Fitness trackers continue to make it very popular for step tracking, but many of the estimates of calories burned is often inaccurate. Tracking devices such as the Garmin Vivosmart and the Apple Watch use motion sensors and proprietary equations to estimate how many calories you have burned.

Fitness trackers depend upon motion sensors, heart rate monitoring and personal data inputted into the device, and while dependant upon retrieving all of your individual unique metabolic parameters, they are still not precise in calculating your unique metabolic response for all of us.

Reasons for Variations in Results

Variations in the design of their algorithm.
Variations of how your heart rate is measured have an impact on the calorie calculation.
Variations in your personal data input into the device.
Differences in how steps are counted.

Research Insights

What research results suggest: Research results provided by various research facilities including the Mayo Clinic demonstrate that fitness trackers can provide a range of estimated errors from 5% to 20% in terms of how many calories have been burned. However, they can still be used as good indicators of general trends but should not be used for estimating your calories burned to the point of being exact.

Improving Calorie Burn While Walking

You can do this by making small changes to the way you walk and the way that you exercise; both of which should lead to greater calorie burn as a result of improvements in the overall activity level.

Simple Strategies

Simple things that you can do include adding faster bursts of speed either by walking faster or by breaking up your regularly-scheduled walks into shorter segments and adding a few bursts of faster walking within each section.

Expert Recommendations

All types of these walking strategies are effective at increasing calories burned and have been highly recommended by both American Heart Association and other fitness experts.

Estimate Errors and Best Practices

Use general formulas for calculating calories burned as a base and then compare it against what your tracker reports to find an accurate average.

Studies from the National Institutes of Health recommend combining diet awareness with physical activity awareness to provide you with a more complete picture of calorie deficit or caloric intake. This will give you a more balanced view of the calories you have consumed versus the amount of calories you have burned.

Avoiding Common Mistakes

To ensure that you are using your step tracker as a reliable step-counting tool and making the most of its potential as an exercise tool, follow these guidelines to avoid estimating mistakes.

When Step Counting is Most Helpful

Counting steps gives you an easy and reliable way to motivate yourself to be active while also tracking your physical activity for calories burned with little effort. Organizations like the World Health Organization stress the importance of being active on a regular basis to reduce the risk of illnesses related to your lifestyle.

Having step counters is an easy way to help reach that goal. Step counting provides specific and measurable targets for keeping off excess weight.

Perfect Examples To Use Step Counting

Starting a daily physical activity programme from nothing

When More Than Steps Are Needed

Although counting steps alone can be a very helpful tool when trying to reach your personal fitness goals; if you want to improve your cardiovascular endurance, build muscle and improve your athletic ability, you will need to supplement your steps with some more structured forms of exercising.

To truly reach your ultimate goal—the way to achieve that is to combine walking with other forms of exercising to create the most rounded workout. Fitness apps such as Nike Training Club provide you with work outs that can enhance the effectiveness of your daily steps.

Final Thoughts

Therefore there is no set universal figure that can apply to everyone who goes walking. However, the true value in counting your steps is not found in counting numbers, it is rather found in forming a habit of consistently being physically active.

The benefit of either walking regularly and increasing the intensity at which you are walking or improving your knowledge of your body's response to exercise and improving upon your health is more than simply achieving a set number of steps.

How Many Calories Do Steps Burn? Formula and Calculator Guide