Body fat measurement on scale

[Anonymous]

If you have a scale that measures body fat, what do you think of it?

Based on my height/weight calculation, my body fat is 25.6, but the scale measures it as 22.5%. I do think I have higher muscle mass than average, but I'm curious how much scales "flatter" people. It's kind of an idle question, because I care less about numbers than about returning to my pre-pregnancy shape/clothing size, but I'm just curious.

[Anonymous]

Those are incredibly unreliable and should not be taken as fact. Actual body fat measurement is pretty complicated and requires much more equipment and tools than a scale providesz

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If you have a scale that measures body fat, what do you think of it?

Based on my height/weight calculation, my body fat is 25.6, but the scale measures it as 22.5%. I do think I have higher muscle mass than average, but I'm curious how much scales "flatter" people. It's kind of an idle question, because I care less about numbers than about returning to my pre-pregnancy shape/clothing size, but I'm just curious.

How do you calculate body fat percentage from height and weight? Are you talking about BMI? That’s a totally different thing.

[Anonymous]

I always thought the idea of BMI was to estimate body fat...

From the NIH:

“Body mass index (BMI) is a measure of body fat based on height and weight that applies to adult men and women.”

https://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/health/educational/lose_wt/BMI/bmi-m.htm

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I always thought the idea of BMI was to estimate body fat...

From the NIH:

“Body mass index (BMI) is a measure of body fat based on height and weight that applies to adult men and women.”

https://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/health/educational/lose_wt/BMI/bmi-m.htm

It isn't, really. It's used as a proxy, but is not a very good one. A man who is very muscular may have an actual body fat percentage of 8 percent but a BMI of 30 because muscle is more dense than fat.

[Anonymous]

My home scale reads my body fat percentage 3.5-4.5% lower than my weight clinic. I have a Weight Gurus home scale that I bought at Target

March 27 - home scale showed 31.2%, clinic scale showed 35.8% (please be kind, I'm working on it)

April 3 - home scale showed 31.3%, clinic scale showed 34.9%

For comparison, my actual weight is 0.3 lbs lower at home, but at home I measure in the morning, and I go to the clinic in the afternoon. BMI is the same at both places.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I always thought the idea of BMI was to estimate body fat...

From the NIH:

“Body mass index (BMI) is a measure of body fat based on height and weight that applies to adult men and women.”

https://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/health/educational/lose_wt/BMI/bmi-m.htm

It isn't, really. It's used as a proxy, but is not a very good one. A man who is very muscular may have an actual body fat percentage of 8 percent but a BMI of 30 because muscle is more dense than fat.

+1

BMI is a good tool, but there are exception. Especially for people who have a lot of muscle mass. Which can include some racial groups who have higher muscle mass.