Maintenance Calories: How to Find Your Real Number

On this page

1. What maintenance really means
2. Step 1: get a starting estimate
3. Step 2: test it against your scale
4. Step 3: adjust in small steps
5. Maintenance after a diet
6. Maintenance phases and diet breaks
7. Holding your weight long-term
8. Holidays, travel and eating out
9. Building muscle at maintenance
10. Maintenance calorie questions

What maintenance really means

Maintenance calories are the intake that matches your total daily energy expenditure (TDEE). Eat that amount on average and the energy you take in equals the energy you use, so your body neither stores nor burns extra fat.

Note the words “on average”. Nobody burns the same amount every day, and nobody eats exactly the same amount either. A day at a wedding and a day in bed with a cold are both part of normal life. What matters is that, over a week or two, intake and output roughly match. That is why it helps to think of maintenance as a range of perhaps 100 to 150 kcal either side of a middle number, and of your weight as a band of a kilo or two rather than one fixed figure.

Step 1: get a starting estimate

A calculator gives you the middle of the range. The maintenance calorie calculator uses the Mifflin-St Jeor equation and your activity level, and shows a ±5% band. Two tips make the estimate much better:

• Be honest about activity. If you are between two levels, choose the lower. Most people overestimate.
• Use your weight today, not your goal weight or last year’s weight.

For most adults the estimate will be within about 10% of the truth. That still leaves room for an error of a few hundred calories, which is why step 2 exists.

Step 2: test it against your scale

Eat close to your estimate every day for at least two weeks, three or four if you can. Log everything you eat and drink. Weigh yourself every morning after the toilet, before food or drink, on the same scale.

Then look at weekly averages. Here is a real-looking fortnight for someone eating 2,200 kcal a day:

Single days swing across a range of more than a kilo, but the two averages are almost identical. This person is at maintenance. Had they looked only at Tuesday of week 2, they might have cut calories for no reason.

Step 3: adjust in small steps

The figures come from the rough rule that a kilo of body weight holds about 7,700 kcal, so a steady change of 0.2 kg a week is about 220 kcal a day. Make one change at a time and give it two weeks. Changing every few days chases water, not fat.

Prefer to let a calculator do it? Enter your average intake and your start and end weights in the adaptive TDEE calculator.

Maintenance after a diet

When a diet ends, your new maintenance belongs to your new body. If you lost 10 kg (22 lb), your TDEE is probably 140 to 190 kcal a day lower than before you started, just from weighing less, and it may be a little lower again for a while because of adaptation and moving less.

1. Recalculate with your current weight and activity.
2. Step up to that number, either straight away or in two or three steps over a few weeks.
3. Expect the scale to rise 1 to 2 kg (2 to 4 lb) in the first week or two. Your muscles refill their glycogen stores, each gram of which holds roughly three to four grams of water, and there is more food in your gut. This is not fat. Hold steady.
4. Run the two-week test from your new starting point.

“Reverse dieting”, adding calories back very slowly over months, is popular. There is little good research showing it works better than stepping up to maintenance directly, but if small steps help you feel in control, there is no harm in it.

Maintenance phases and diet breaks

Maintenance isn’t only for the end of a diet. Planned periods at maintenance help during long diets and between building phases:

• Diet breaks. In the MATADOR trial, men with obesity who dieted in two-week blocks separated by two weeks at maintenance lost more fat, and kept more of it off six months later, than men who dieted continuously.
• Between a cut and a bulk. A few weeks at maintenance lets your weight settle and gives you a solid measured TDEE to build from.
• Busy or stressful periods. Exams, a new baby, a house move: switching to maintenance for a while is a smart choice, not a failure.

Holding your weight long-term

Keeping weight off is a different skill from losing it. The US National Weight Control Registry follows thousands of people who have lost at least 13.6 kg (30 lb) and kept it off for a year or more. Their most common habits, reported by Wing and Phelan in 2005:

• high levels of physical activity, about an hour a day on average;
• a fairly consistent eating pattern across weekdays and weekends;
• eating breakfast;
• weighing themselves at least once a week;
• catching small regains early instead of waiting.

These are observations, not proof that each habit causes success, but they point the same way: keep moving, keep a routine and keep an eye on the trend. A useful rule is to set a “trigger weight” about 2 kg (4 to 5 lb) above your target. If your weekly average crosses it, go back to tracking food for a couple of weeks.

Holidays, travel and eating out

A week away usually adds a kilo or two on the scale, much of it water and salt, and it comes off within a week of normal eating. If you want to limit it, keep protein and vegetables in most meals, walk a lot (holidays often make that easy) and don’t try to “save up” by starving before big meals, which tends to backfire. Then return to your normal routine; there is no need to punish yourself with a crash diet.

Building muscle at maintenance

Maintenance isn’t only for standing still. If you are new to strength training, returning after a break or carrying some extra fat, you can often lose a little fat and gain a little muscle at the same time, a process called body recomposition. Eat at maintenance, get 1.6 to 2.2 g of protein per kg of body weight and train with progressive overload. The scale may barely move while your waist shrinks and your lifts climb, so measure both.

Maintenance calorie questions

Are maintenance calories the same as TDEE?

Yes, in practice. TDEE is what you burn; maintenance is eating the same amount. See Is TDEE the same as maintenance calories? for why apps sometimes show different numbers.

Do maintenance calories change every day?

Your burn does, depending on how much you move, by a hundred calories or several hundred. Maintenance is the average over a week or two, so plan with the average and judge with weekly weights.

How do I know I’m at maintenance?

When your weekly average weight stays within about 0.2 kg (half a pound) for two to three weeks in a row while you eat a fairly steady amount.

Why did my weight go up when I increased to maintenance?

Mostly glycogen, water and more food in your gut. A rise of 1 to 2 kg (2 to 4 lb) in the first week or two is normal after a diet. It levels off if you hold your intake steady.

Should I reverse diet?

It’s optional. Stepping straight up to your new maintenance is simpler and there is no strong evidence that a slow reverse diet protects your metabolism. Choose whichever you find easier to follow.

What is a healthy weight range to maintain within?

Expect your weight to move within a band of about 1 to 2 kg (2 to 4 lb) even when you are truly at maintenance. That is water, salt and food, not fat. Only a change in your weekly average that lasts two weeks or more is worth acting on.

How often should I recheck my maintenance?

After every 4 to 5 kg (10 lb) of change, or when your job, training or daily steps change. When your weight is stable, a quick recheck every few months is enough.

Sources

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2. Wing RR, Phelan S. Long-term weight loss maintenance. Am J Clin Nutr. 2005;82(1 Suppl):222S-225S. doi.org/10.1093/ajcn/82.1.222S
3. Byrne NM, Sainsbury A, King NA, Hills AP, Wood RE. Intermittent energy restriction improves weight loss efficiency in obese men: the MATADOR study. Int J Obes (Lond). 2018;42(2):129-138. doi.org/10.1038/ijo.2017.206
4. Kreitzman SN, Coxon AY, Szaz KF. Glycogen storage: illusions of easy weight loss, excessive weight regain, and distortions in estimates of body composition. Am J Clin Nutr. 1992;56(1 Suppl):292S-293S. doi.org/10.1093/ajcn/56.1.292S
5. Rosenbaum M, Leibel RL. Adaptive thermogenesis in humans. Int J Obes (Lond). 2010;34(Suppl 1):S47-S55. doi.org/10.1038/ijo.2010.184
6. Barakat C, Pearson J, Escalante G, Campbell B, De Souza EO. Body recomposition: can trained individuals build muscle and lose fat at the same time? Strength Cond J. 2020;42(5):7-21. doi.org/10.1519/SSC.0000000000000584