How to Figure Out Caloric Requirements for Adults

Everyone needs fuel in the form of calories to make it through the day. But how many you need each day to maintain a healthy weight depends on your personal characteristics and habits. In effect, everyone's number will be different. There are ways to take all of these factors into account to compute what your average calorie intake should be.

Instructions

• 1

  Weigh yourself and then multiply your weight in pounds by 12 if you are a man and 11 if you are a woman. For example, if you are a woman who weighs 165 pounds, your answer will be 165 x 11 = 1,815.

• 2

  Figure out how many hours you are awake each day, and multiply this by a third of your body weight. For example, if you are awake 17 hours a day and your body weight is 165 pounds, the calculation is 17 x (165/3) = 935.

• 3

  Adjust the number of "awake hours" you used in Step 2 if you are less or more than moderately active. If you are a sedentary person who does little or no exercise, take off an hour and recalculate. If you are a very active person who often exercises, add an hour or two and recalculate.

• 4

  Take your answer from Step 1 and add it to your answer from Step 3. The result is the number of calories you need to eat each day to maintain the weight that you currently have. In our example, 1,815 + 935 = 2,750 calories per day.

• 5

  Cut back slightly on the calories you eat, bringing it below that daily number, if you want to lose weight. To take off a pound each week you should cut your calorie intake by about 500 calories each day. Alternatively, cut your calorie intake by 250 and increase your exercise level to burn an extra 250 calories---by walking two miles, for example.