Weight Goal & Deficit Planner
Find the daily deficit or surplus to reach a goal weight by a target date — with an honest feasibility check against safe limits. Free, no signup.
At 0.5 kg/wk it takes about 16 weeks to lose 8 kg — that's −550 kcal per day.
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About this calculator
This planner connects three things: how much weight you want to change, how fast, and what daily calorie adjustment that implies. Work from a target date and it returns the deficit (or surplus) per day to get there; work from a weekly rate and it projects when you’ll arrive. The important part is the feasibility check. Roughly one kilogram of body mass stores about 7,700 kcal, so a given rate demands a given daily deficit — and past about 1% of your bodyweight per week, that deficit gets large enough to cost muscle, wreck training, and rebound. We flag aggressive plans and refuse to dress up an unsafe one as achievable. A slower, sustainable rate with the occasional maintenance break almost always beats a crash plan on a stopwatch. Treat the timeline as a plan to adjust, not a promise — real rates vary with adherence and metabolic adaptation.
Sources
7,700 kcal per kg of body mass; daily adjustment = weekly rate × 7700 / 7. Safe-rate cap ~1% of bodyweight per week (§7.5).
FAQs
How fast can I safely lose weight?
A common guideline is up to about 1% of your bodyweight per week. Leaner you get, the slower you should go to protect muscle. Faster is possible short-term but tends to cost lean mass and rebound — this tool flags anything past that band.
Why does the plan look slower than I hoped?
Because the math is honest. Reaching a big goal in a short window can require a deficit that isn’t safe or sustainable. We’d rather show you a realistic date than a number that leads to burnout and regain. Extend the timeline and the daily target eases.
What is metabolic adaptation?
As you diet, your body burns slightly less energy, so a fixed deficit produces smaller losses over time. It’s why progress stalls and why planned maintenance breaks help. Treat the projected date as a plan to revisit, not a fixed contract.