Heart rate monitors calculate and track your heart rate during exercise. This allows you to adjust the intensity of your workout to match your training goals. Most heart rate monitors also display the approximate total calories you burn during exercise. Although you can wear a heart rate monitor all day to track calories, there are several drawbacks to doing this.
Calories Burned
The formula that heart rate monitors use to estimate the number of calories you burn takes into consideration your heart rate and personal information, such as your age and weight. This formula presupposes that your heart rate is elevated because you are working out. Heart rate monitors are not as accurate at tracking your heart rate at lower beats per minute. They are made to read your heart rate and estimate the calories you burn during exercise, not at other times. Although manufacturers do not make heart rate monitors that track calories all day, you could technically use one for that purpose; however, it will not provide you with the most accurate feedback since it is not designed for that function.
Wireless Heart Rate Monitors
A wireless heart rate monitor uses a chest strap to wirelessly transfer data about your heart rate to a wrist monitor. If you use this style of heart rate monitor to track your calories all day, you have to wear the chest strap all day. This may not be the most comfortable accessory.
To start the monitoring functions of a heart rate monitor, you have to activate the exercise mode. This initiates the heart monitor, the timer and the calorie counter. Running your heart rate monitor all day will wear the battery down. Most heart rate monitors have various alarms that sound when you go above or below your target heart rate. Since you are not working out, you have to turn these alarms off if you want to track your calories all day.
Touch Heart Rate Monitors
Touch heart rate monitors do not have a chest strap; they only have a wrist monitor. The wrist monitor has one or two sensors, usually on the face of the watch. Touch and hold these sensors with your fingers to check your heart rate. Since heart rate monitors use your current heart rate, along with other data, to calculate calories burned, touch heart rate monitors are not practical for all-day calorie tracking.
Calorie Counters
Calories counters are devices that use other data, besides your heart rate, to calculate calories burned. Depending on the device, they use body temperature, skin temperature and other measurements. These devices do not act as heart rate monitors. You wear them on your upper arm all day and they track the calories you burn. Calorie counters and heart rate monitors serve different functions. Depending on your fitness goals, you may use both, one or neither device as part of your fitness routine.
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