How to pick a daily calorie target you can keep
Most people pick a calorie target from ambition, then quit in a week. The trick is to start at TDEE minus 500 and let the scale tell you whether to trim or add. Here is how to find the number you will actually keep.
You open Burnie for the first time. You want to lose weight fast. So you think, I will eat very little. Maybe 1,000 calories. Maybe even less. It feels brave. By day four you are hungry, cross, and sneaking samosas at midnight. The number you can keep beats the number you wish for. This short read is about finding that real number.
A lower calorie target always gives you faster fat loss.
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A super-low target looks like a shortcut. It is not. Sticking to your food plan is what drives weight loss. One study put it plainly: the harsher the cut, the harder it is to stick. People who pick harsh numbers usually quit. A target you drop in a week loses no fat in month two. The lower number wins on paper. The kept number wins on the scale.
Start at TDEE minus 500
Here is the simple maths. Your body burns a daily total. It is called TDEE (say tee-dee-ee-ee). It is your resting burn plus your movement. To lose about half a kilo a week, eat 500 fewer than that each day. Harvard Health says one to two pounds a week is safe, and you get there by eating 500 to 750 fewer calories than you burn. So your starting target is TDEE minus 500. A quick way to guess maintenance is to times your weight in pounds by 15. A 70 kg adult weighs about 154 pounds. That gives about 2,300 kcal a day to stay the same. Minus 500 leaves about 1,800. That is the number to try first.
Three targets — which one can you keep?
Adjust by results, not by ambition
The bottom line
Your target is not a wish. It is a maths sum: TDEE minus 500. Start there. Then let two weeks of honest logs and morning weights tell you what to do next. Weight loss slows over time as your body changes, so adjust the number when the scale goes flat. A harsh number you quit loses no fat. A steady number you keep loses it all.