How to Use MET Values to Improve Your Workout

When you work out at the gym or home, you may feel like you’re working hard and burning a lot of calories, but are you really? A variety of factors can affect how hard an exercise feels, like what you’ve eaten that day and even your psychological state. That’s why it’s sometimes better to rely on an objective measure of how hard you’re working out and how much energy you’re expending rather than just basing it on how you feel. One way to determine this is to use a number called the MET value. MET value stands for metabolic equivalent of exercise and it varies depending upon the type of activity you’re doing.

How Can Knowing the MET Value of an Activity Help You?

MET is a way of comparing how much energy you burn doing a particular exercise relative to how much you use when you’re quietly at rest. In other words, it’s a ratio of the energy you expend doing a specific exercise to your resting metabolic rate as you rest comfortably in an easy chair. One MET is used to designate baseline energy expenditure at rest. At this rate, the body uses about 3.5 milliliters of oxygen each minute per kilogram of body weight, which is the metabolic rate of an average individual who’s not moving around.

When you engage in an activity, your oxygen requirements increase, and your rate of energy expenditure goes up. Activities are assigned a specific MET value based on how much the particular activity increases energy usage and metabolic rate. MET values have already been assigned by The Compendium of Physical Activities based on the results of tests that measure oxygen consumption and how much carbon dioxide is exhaled during various forms of activity.

MET values aren’t necessarily accurate in an absolute sense since an individual’s metabolic rate varies based on their body weight and other parameters, but it is a useful way to measure energy expenditure relative to energy expenditure at rest. For example, jogging at a moderate pace has a MET value of 7, which means while you’re jogging, you’re expending seven times the amount of energy you would expend sitting quietly in a chair.

MET Values Give You an Idea of Calorie Expenditure

Knowing the MET level of an activity not only gives you a relative idea of how intense an activity is, but it can be used to estimate calorie consumption while doing an activity. To get an idea of how many calories you’re consuming when you do a particular exercise, multiply your weight in kilograms (weight in pounds divided by 2.2) by the MET value of the exercise and the number of hours you’re doing it for.

Here’s an example. A woman who weighs 100 pounds, or 45 kilograms, would burn 315 calories doing an activity with a MET value of 7 for one hour. Here’s how this was calculated:

45 kilograms body weight (100 pounds divided by 2.2) x 7 (MET value) x 1 hour = 315 calories per hour

As you can see, knowing the MET value for an activity is useful for determining how intense the activity is and how many calories are burned doing it. Moderate-intensity exercise has a MET value of between 3 and 6. This would include activities such as walking at a moderate pace (MET of 3.3 to 3.6) or bicycling at a recreational pace (MET of 4.) Jogging at a leisurely pace has a MET level of 7, while running elevates the MET value to 11.

High-intensity exercise has a MET value of 7 or greater. Examples of high-intensity exercise would be jogging (MET of 7) and jumping rope (MET of 10.) Many exercise machines such as treadmills and elliptical machines have a read-out for MET values to give you an idea of how intensely you’re working out. These values are for the average person, and yours may vary based on your individual body weight, fitness level, the temperature of the environment you’re working out in and how fit you are.

Another way MET values can be useful is they tell you how many additional calories you’ll burn if you change activities. To determine this, subtract the smaller MET value from the greater MET value and multiply by your body weight and the time spent doing the activity. For example, if you’re a 100-pound woman (45 kilograms) and you replace jogging (MET value of 7) with rope jumping (MET value of 10,) you’ll burn an additional 135 calories per hour. Here is the calculation:

45 kilograms body weight x 3 (difference in MET values) x 1 hour = 135 additional calories per hour

You can find tables online that list MET values for various activities to use as a reference for your own physical conditioning program. If you’re just starting an exercise program, begin with moderately intense exercise with a MET value of around 3 or 4, and work your way up to higher intensities as you become more conditioned.

MET values are also available for activities you do around the house such as ironing (MET value of 2.5) and sweeping the garage (MET value of 4.) These are useful for monitoring how many calories you burn when you’re not actively working out.

MET Values Are Useful for Monitoring Your Activity Level

All-in-all, MET values are a useful way to monitor the intensity of your activities and determine roughly how many calories you burn while doing them. Tables of MET values are widely available for almost any activity you do during the day. You can use these tables as a way to keep track of how active you are and monitor how many calories you’re burning at the gym. They can also be used to calculate how many calories you burn while doing leisure activities around the house. Use them to maximize your workout and burn more overall calories. And best of all our Workout Manager will do all the math for you.

Sample METS Values

METS                   Activity
1        sitting quietly and watching television
2        walking, less than 2.0 mph, level ground, strolling, very slow
3        loading /unloading a car
4        bicycling, < 10 mph, leisure, to work or for pleasure
5        tennis, doubles
5.5    aerobic, step, with a 4-inch step
6        skiing, downhill, moderate effort, general
7        aerobic, high impact
7.5    aerobic, step, with 6 – 8-inch step
8        circuit training, including kettlebells, some aerobic movement with minimal rest
9        running, cross country
10     swimming laps, freestyle, fast, vigorous effort
11     running, 6.7 mph
14     bicycling, stationary, 201-270 watts, very vigorous effort

 

References:

Exercise Physiology. Theory and Application to Fitness and Performance. Seventh edition. Scott Powers and Edward Howley. 2009.
Med Sci Sports Exerc. 1993 Jan;25(1):71-80.

 

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