Most adults need between 1,800 and 2,500 calories per day to maintain their current weight. Your exact number depends on your age, height, weight and how active you are. This is your maintenance calorie level — eat below it to lose weight, above it to gain.
What affects how many calories you need?
Four factors determine your calorie requirement:
- Age — calorie needs typically decrease after 30 as muscle mass reduces
- Sex — men generally need more calories than women
- Body weight and height — larger bodies need more energy
- Activity level — a desk worker needs significantly fewer calories than someone doing physical labour or regular exercise
A rough starting point: sedentary women need around 1,800 kcal/day; sedentary men around 2,200 kcal/day. Add 200–400 kcal if you exercise regularly.
Calories for weight loss
To lose weight, you need to eat fewer calories than you burn. A deficit of 300–500 kcal per day is sustainable and leads to roughly 0.3–0.5 kg of weight loss per week. Think of it less as restriction and more as a small, consistent adjustment — one fewer chapati, a little less oil in the tadka, a smaller portion of rice. Cutting too aggressively tends to backfire — hunger increases, energy drops, and the deficit becomes hard to maintain. Slow and steady genuinely does win here.
Calories and Indian food
Indian cuisine is often misunderstood as calorie-heavy. Dishes like dal, sabzi and roti are naturally moderate in calories — the issue is usually portion size and how much oil goes into cooking. A paratha with extra ghee can double the calorie count of a simple one. The good news is that Indian cooking is incredibly varied — the same dal makhani made with less cream is still delicious, and a dry sabzi is just as satisfying as a rich gravy. Knowing your calorie target matters more than which cuisine you eat. You do not need to give up the food you love to hit your number.
How nYOOtrition helps
nYOOTRI, our AI Meal Planner, calculates your personal daily calorie target and builds a full week of Indian meals around it — automatically. Your Food Diary then tracks what you actually eat against that number each day.
No manual calorie counting required. If you’re weighing up a food diary against a calorie counter app, read our guide on calorie counters vs food diaries — and for portion guidance, correct portion sizes for a healthy diet is a useful companion.