If weight loss is your main reason for walking regularly it’s not a bad one. Walking is great for losing and maintaining weight. You might ask yourself how many miles should I walk a day to lose weight? You may just want to know how many calories does walking burn? Well, let’s cover some info on that today.
Why walking burns calories
Though walking is a low impact exercise, it’s still a physical activity. Any type of physical activity will burn calories. Walking is considered a decent way to burn calories. It’s something that employs several areas of your body.
When people think of walking they often think it’s all just leg work. Though, it does employ your legs a ton, it also works your core, arms and backside. You’re getting a general full body workout when you walk. The harder you walk or the rougher the terrain the more calories you should burn.
So, how many calories does it burn?
That’s a bit of a harder question to answer. A heart rate monitor is a good tool help you pinpoint your calorie burns, but you can estimate with calculators online. Basically, you input your gender, age, weight and how far and long your walked. It does not add in terrain. It’s basing your walk on a fairly even terrain or treadmill. Some calculators don’t ask your weight but may give you an option of slope. That is generally useful for treadmills with a sloping option.
I’ll give you an example for a 150lb woman. 
As you can see in this example, a 1-mile stroll of 2mph for 1 mile burned approximately 107 calories. You can use this calculator for your own situation as well here. I also recommend My Fitness Pal. It is fairly accurate for most.
How to burn more during your walk
Calorie burning is almost always proportional to the amount of work you put in. So, if you want to get more of a calorie deficit you have a few options.
- Walk further
- Walk longer
- Walk faster
- Power walk
- Walk more hills
- Lift your knees more in a high-stepping walk
Walking is a middle of the road classification on the burn scale. You can burn major calories if you put in the work, though.
Is walking enough to lose weight?
Since losing weight for most is a numbers game, walking alone doesn’t guarantee you will lose weight. I broke down this calculation in this post. To simplify, though, you need to eat few calories than you burn to lose weight or you need to eat the same amount as you burn to maintain weight.
Walking will help you lose weight if it gets you to a deficit in calories for the day or week. If you eat too many calories you have to walk way more to keep that negative in calories for the day. The example above said that person burned only 107 calories in 30 minutes. So that means if their daily goal was 1500 calories they could eat up to 1607 calories that day and still be at their desired number.
If she doubled the burn she could eat up to 1714 calories. So, yes walking can be enough, but it definitely isn’t the only thing you do to lose weight. You have to keep track of both sides of the calorie equation. There’s what you take in and what you expend. If you’re sure you are taking in less than you burn, then you will lose with walking.
Go calculate your mile.
So, you have the facts now. If weight loss or maintenance is your goal you know the work you need to put in. Walking can definitely help you achieve that goal.
Can’t wait to see you strolling along,
Kimmie