How many calories should I be eating every day?

A calorie is a unit of measurement. It’s designed to show you how much energy a given food provides.

Every cell in your body requires energy, so calories are essential for your health. But a calorie count won’t tell you how a meal affects your health. 

At ZOE, we believe that the quality of the calories you eat is more important than the number of calories. 

With ZOE's personalized nutrition program, you can learn how to eat for your health and long-term weight goals.

Take our free quiz to get started.

Daily calorie needs

The Dietary Guidelines for Americans recommend that women eat around 1,600–2,400 calories a day, while men should aim for about 2,000–3,000 calories.

But these are general guidelines. Your actual calorie needs depend on:

• your age

• your body size

• your activity levels

• your overall health goals

• whether you’re taking medications

• whether you’re pregnant or breastfeeding

Energy needs vary considerably from person to person. For example, not all 50-year-old women need the same number of calories, not all men need more than women, and calorie needs aren’t the same for every pregnant mother. 

Calories on food labels

Counting calories may seem straightforward: Tally up the numbers on the nutrition labels of everything you consume in a day and compare the total with your recommended calorie intake.

But there’s a hitch. 

The figures on labels are estimates of how much energy a given serving of food provides, based on the calories in each ingredient. 

But the serving sizes on labels are often much smaller than what people typically eat. This can make it challenging to accurately count calories, unless you’re meticulously weighing all your food. 

And, again — the label doesn’t necessarily tell you how much energy your body can get from the food.

There can be big differences between how many calories different people take in from the same food. Particularly from food that’s harder to break down, like nuts. 

In a recent episode of the ZOE Science & Nutrition podcast, Dr. Sarah Berry — ZOE’s chief scientist and a reader in nutritional science at King’s College London — said, “In my opinion, the back of pack labeling or the nutrition composition and the calories only tell us one piece of a thousand-piece puzzle.”

The idea behind calorie counting is: If you take in more energy, or calories, than you use up, your weight will increase.

The problem is that you don’t just take in calories, you eat food. And foods are complex. Their structure (the food matrix), how you prepare them, and how you combine them can all affect how your body responds.

What are your energy needs?

General guidelines give you a broad range of calories to aim for. But ultimately, the number of calories you need every day is unique to you. 

A number of factors can influence your daily needs, and a nutrition expert, such as a registered dietitian, can help identify what’s right for you.

ZOE’s PREDICT program — the largest nutritional research program of its kind — shows that everyone has different responses to foods.

You can take our free quiz to find out how ZOE’s personalized nutrition program can help you eat for your body and long-term goals. 

Quality over quantity

If you want to improve your overall health, it's better to focus on the quality of your calories rather than their number.

Some healthy foods have more calories. For example, foods rich in healthy fats, like avocados, vegetable oils, and nuts, provide lots of energy — and they can benefit your health in a number of ways.

A great way to improve your diet is to include a variety of minimally processed, nutrient-dense plant foods, including:

• vegetables, such as spinach, carrots, broccoli, cauliflower, and kale

• fruits, such as apples, pears, oranges, avocado, raspberries, and peaches

• whole grains, such as quinoa, barley, oats, buckwheat, and bulgur wheat

• legumes, such as chickpeas, kidney beans, black beans, peas, and lentils

• nuts and seeds, such as almonds, pecans, sunflower seeds, and hemp seeds

• spices and herbs, such as turmeric, oregano, basil, and rosemary

• healthy oils, such as extra virgin olive oil

Risks of calorie counting

Calories play a role in health and weight management, but continually counting them may not be the best approach. For example:

• It’s unsustainable. It takes time and work to count all your calories, and it can be hard to stick with in the long term.

• It’s probably not accurate. As we mention above, the numbers you see on labels may not really reflect how many calories you’re taking in, even if you measure servings perfectly every time.

  Plus, estimating calories gets even more complicated when you’re dining out or eating things like pasta, casserole, or soup. 

• It can lead to an unhealthy relationship to food. Counting calories can be all-consuming, which can interfere with a healthy relationship to food.

• It ignores important nutrients. Calories measure energy, which is only one part of a very complex puzzle. Foods also provide you with vital nutrients, and the calorie count can’t tell you what nutrients are in your food. 

Summary

Calories are a way to measure the amount of energy a type of food provides.

The Dietary Guidelines for Americans recommend that women eat 1,600–2,400 calories every day, while men should aim for 2,000–3,000 calories.

However, your age, height, activity levels, and several other factors influence your calorie needs. How your body responds to food also plays a role. 

Simply focusing on calories can carry some risks. It can be tough to sustain, and it can lead you to develop an unhealthy relationship to food. Plus, coming up with accurate calorie estimates can be very difficult.

At ZOE, we believe that one of the best ways to promote your health is to focus on the quality of your food and to choose options that are best for your unique biology.

A healthy, balanced diet will include a diverse range of vegetables, fruits, grains, legumes, nuts, seeds, herbs, and oils.

With the ZOE at-home test, you can learn about your blood sugar and blood fat responses, as well as which “good” and “bad” bugs live in your gut. Based on your unique results, we can give you personalized nutrition advice so you can learn how to eat for your body and long-term goals.

Take our free quiz to get started.