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Maintenance calorie calculator — hold your weight.
Your maintenance calories are the daily calories that keep your weight steady — your total daily energy expenditure. This calculator finds them with the Mifflin-St Jeor equation and your activity level: BMR times an activity factor of 1.2 to 1.9. Enter your details below — the number updates instantly, no signup.
Maintenance is a starting point: eat at it for two to three weeks and watch the weekly trend, not daily noise. If the scale drifts, your true maintenance is off — adjust by 100 to 200 calories.
The maintenance math, explained.
No black box. BMR from Mifflin-St Jeor, times an activity factor, equals the calories that hold your weight.
10 × kg + 6.25 × cm − 5 × age + s The Mifflin-St Jeor equation, where s is +5 for men and −161 for women — your resting burn before any movement.
maintenance = BMR × activity factor Multiply BMR by 1.2 (sedentary) up to 1.9 (extra active). The result is the calorie figure that holds your weight steady.
cut −20% · maintain · bulk +10% Eat here to maintain. Drop 20% to cut fat, add 10% for a lean bulk. Same baseline, different intent.
Worked example: a 30-year-old man, 178 cm and 80 kg, has a BMR of 1,768 calories (10 × 80 + 6.25 × 178 − 5 × 30 + 5). At a moderate activity factor of 1.55, his maintenance is 1,768 × 1.55 ≈ 2,740 calories per day.
| Activity level | Factor | Who it fits | Maintenance |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sedentary | ×1.2 | Desk job, little or no exercise | — |
| Lightly active | ×1.375 | Light exercise 1–3 days/week | — |
| Moderately active | ×1.55 | Moderate exercise 3–5 days/week | — |
| Very active | ×1.725 | Hard exercise 6–7 days/week | — |
| Extra active | ×1.9 | Twice-daily training or manual labour | — |
Maintenance at each activity level for the details you entered — see how much a more active week shifts the number.
Who maintenance calories are for
- Recomp lifters. Eating at maintenance with hard training and enough protein lets you lose fat and gain muscle at once — no bulk-then-cut cycle required.
- Reverse dieters. Coming off a long cut, maintenance is the ceiling you climb back toward slowly, restoring intake without a rebound of fat.
- Anyone who wants a stable baseline. Even if your goal is a cut or a bulk, you need the maintenance line first — every deficit or surplus is measured from it.
Related nutrition calculators.
Once you know your maintenance line, set a goal target, split it into macros, or log against it.
Maintenance calorie questions.
What are maintenance calories?
Maintenance calories are the number of calories you eat each day to hold your weight steady — no gain, no loss. They equal your total daily energy expenditure (TDEE): your resting metabolism plus everything you burn digesting food and moving. Eat above maintenance and you gain; eat below it and you lose. It is the baseline every diet goal is built around.
How do I find my maintenance calories?
Estimate your basal metabolic rate with the Mifflin-St Jeor equation from your sex, age, height, and weight, then multiply it by an activity factor from 1.2 (sedentary) to 1.9 (extra active). That product is your maintenance number. This calculator runs the math instantly, then a scale check over two to three weeks confirms it — if your weight drifts, adjust by 100 to 200 calories.
Why is my weight not changing at maintenance?
That is exactly what maintenance should do — hold weight steady — so a flat scale over two to three weeks means the estimate is right. If you actually want change, maintenance is not your target: eat below it to lose or above it to gain. Day-to-day the scale still swings a kilo or two on water, sodium, and glycogen, so judge maintenance by the weekly trend, not a single morning.
Do maintenance calories change over time?
Yes. Maintenance falls as you lose weight, since a smaller body burns fewer calories at rest and in motion, and it rises as you add muscle or move more. Age and metabolic adaptation from sustained dieting shift it too. Recalculate every 4 to 6 kg of weight change, or whenever your training volume changes, so your baseline stays accurate.
Is maintenance the same as TDEE?
Effectively, yes. Maintenance calories and TDEE (total daily energy expenditure) are the same number — the calories your body burns in a day, and therefore the amount you eat to stay the same weight. "TDEE" names the energy your body spends; "maintenance" names the intake that matches it. This tool computes both at once from BMR times your activity factor.
Should I eat back the calories I burn exercising?
Not if you picked an activity level that already reflects your training — that burn is baked into your maintenance number. Eating exercise calories back on top double-counts them and nudges you into a surplus. Choose your activity level honestly once, trust the maintenance figure, and let the weekly scale trend confirm it.
Know your line. Hold it daily.
Free in your browser — Nishaana saves your maintenance calories and logs every meal against them, so your weight stays exactly where you want it.
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