TDEE Calculator for Office Workers & Desk Jobs
Sitting for 8+ hours a day significantly lowers your total daily energy expenditure compared to active jobs. Most office workers fall into the sedentary activity category (TDEE multiplier: 1.2). Knowing your true calorie needs helps you make smarter food choices and avoid the gradual weight creep that comes with a desk job.
Sitting at a desk all day means your non exercise activity thermogenesis, or NEAT, is very low. NEAT includes everything from fidgeting and walking to the stairs to standing up for a coffee. In a sedentary office worker, NEAT may account for only 200 to 300 calories per day, compared to 1,000 or more for someone with a physically active job. This has a bigger impact on your TDEE than most people realise. An office worker who exercises for one hour three times a week still spends the vast majority of their waking hours sitting. Honest assessment of your activity level usually means selecting sedentary or lightly active, even if you go to the gym regularly. The gym session itself burns 200 to 400 calories, but it doesn't offset 8 to 10 hours of sitting.
- Select sedentary or lightly active for your activity level. Going to the gym three times a week does not make you moderately active if you sit all day otherwise.
- Stand up and walk for two minutes every hour. Small movement breaks throughout the day can add 100 to 200 extra calories burned.
- Consider a standing desk or a walking pad under your desk. Standing burns about 50 calories more per hour than sitting.
- Pack protein rich lunches instead of relying on canteen food or takeaway, which tends to be higher in calories and lower in nutrients.
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