Calories Burned Standing vs. Sitting: Facts, Risks, and Hacks

When you are an office worker, you probably struggle with numerous challenges, including trying to incorporate new habits into your routine to guarantee that you are healthy. If you’ve read about the calories burned standing vs sitting, you might want to know more, especially if you’re thinking about trying it out. This article tells you everything you need to know about the subject, including the best hacks. 

The Basics

Clarifying a few key terms when discussing metabolism is essential if you want to understand what’s healthier for you. The two most crucial definitions to keep in mind are metabolic equivalent and caloric expenditure. 

A metabolic equivalent is the amount of oxygen your body uses per minute when you are performing a specific task. 

Caloric expenditure, on the other hand, is also known as calorie-burning, and it’s the energy your body uses in a specific period of time.  

How Many Calories Do You Burn Standing vs. Sitting?

Many people ask, ‘does standing burn calories?’ especially when you’re an office worker with little time to set aside and do some exercise routines. If you want to lose some weight or improve your health, you might be looking for ways to make things easier. 

You can burn from 100 to 200 calories when you’re standing. Therefore, the crucial question arises: how many calories do you burn sitting down? 

Unfortunately, when you’re sitting, you only burn from 60 to 130 calories. Consequently, you might be able to burn from 120 to 210 more calories just by adding three more hours of standing time to your routine. 

Fact or Fiction?

Many people don’t believe standing up makes much of a difference when you’re trying to burn calories, but as you know now, it does. There have been many debates on the subject, especially because it concerns those who work while sitting down, such as office workers. The debate has lasted a long time. 

It might be challenging to believe that a slight change in your position can benefit your health. However, it’s the truth, and it’s also why numerous workers go online and Google ‘standing desk calories burned’ - they might be interested in new furniture that helps them increase their daily standing time! 

Differences in Calories Burned Between Females and Males When Sitting and Standing

Generally speaking, men burn more calories than women because they usually have more muscle mass, and the more you have, the more calories you burn.  

After sitting for eight hours, a 100-pound woman usually burns 453 calories, while a guy burns 500. If they sit for four hours and stand for four, then numbers can rise to 693 and 762, respectively. 

You must keep in mind some crucial facts, for example, that the number of calories burned standing vs sitting depends on many factors, including your weight. Thus, the best idea is usually to calculate things yourself, and for that, you need to use a table.  

How to Calculate How Many Calories You Burn a Day (Table)

To determine how many calories you’re burning per day, you have to use the Harris Benedict equation. One of the good things about this is that it considers your age, physical activity level, weight, and height. 

When you want to calculate how many calories you burn in a day (which is a fantastic way to work on a healthy office routine), you must use this equation. In turn, this calculation method uses a specific number that represents the metabolic equivalent (MET) of the activities you perform.  

If you’re wondering ‘does standing burn calories?’ and ‘how many calories do you burn sitting?’ then doing the calculations is the best idea. To use the equation, you must determine your MET, for example, 1.5 for sitting all day. 

Once you have your MET, you must multiply your height, age, and weight by the number. Therefore, to determine the total number of calories, you have to do the math for both sitting and standing. 

Benefits of Standing Over Sitting

Overall, many people go online and look for information about ‘standing desk calories burned’ and they wonder ‘is standing better than sitting?’ 

However, people have debated over sitting vs standing for a long time. Some professionals say it's not very different, whereas others believe you can burn calories with standing desks.  

Overall, remember that your body burns more calories when it’s moving. Thus, when you're on your feet, it means you’re activating muscles while you’re sitting, so making some adjustments to your routine could significantly impact your life, especially the number of calories you burn every day. 

Even though it doesn’t sound like much, stretching, standing up, and moving just a few of your muscles can make a difference over time. You might feel more energy, improve your flexibility, and even boost your mood. At the same time, it can help you burn calories without changing too much of your daily to-dos. 

Therefore, you should reconsider the next time you’re considering slouching on your couch and working with your laptop on your lap. Instead, think about enjoying the benefits of a standing desk. 

How to Add More Standing Time to Your Routine

On numerous occasions, people start looking for the calories burned standing vs sitting and they’re keen to improve their health. However, they believe this might take up much of their time, and if you’re already a busy office worker, things could be very challenging.

Nonetheless, you should keep in mind that there are some adjustments you can make without it being a drastic turn of events for your routine. Here are some ideas you can try: 

Start Small

Firstly, you can add 10 to 15 minutes of standing time to your daily activities. The purpose of this is to change your routine, but while making sure that it's not a drastic, unrealistic transformation. Now that you know the answer to ‘does standing burn calories?’ It's time to take action. 

In some cases, standing for 10 minutes might be too much. If this is something you can identify with, you can always split it into two, for example, and stand for five minutes at a time.

Change Your Work Habits

One of the best aspects of being an office worker is that you can stand while you’re completing your to-dos, and you can also sit down from time to time.  

A way to quickly incorporate this into your routine is to get a stand-up desk. These types of tables allow you to switch between sitting and standing, so they're the ideal addition to your workspace.  

There are several standing desk exercises that you can also add to your routine if you want to be healthier. Overall, you can incorporate innovative things into your workdays without making any drastic changes. 

Change Your Habits at Home

Wondering ‘how many calories are burned standing?’ and ‘how many calories do you burn sitting?’ is an effective way to start being interested in your health, but you should integrate changes into every aspect of your life. 

When you’re at home, try to do some things differently. Instead, take a walk around your house. Don't sit on the couch immediately after dinner - try to be more active! 

If you work from home, it’s even more crucial that you’re not sitting down all the time. Alternatively, take a short walk every half an hour - it doesn’t even have to last more than five minutes at a time. 

Each time you’re using your smartphone to text or call someone, stand up. Understanding how many calories are burned standing vs sitting might have given you enough information to know the importance of making these changes, and associating new behaviors with old ones is a straightforward way to foster habits. 

In other words, if you’re already used to picking up your phone from time to time while you’re at home, standing up when you do it can help you foster the habit of standing up more. Don't focus on the act of standing. Your brain will do the work for you and associate it with using your smartphone, which you already do on a regular basis. 

Posture and Disease Risk

Numerous people wonder ‘how many calories are burned standing?’ and ‘how many calories do you burn sitting?’ but don’t do anything about it, and they never incorporate changes into their lives. This is very dangerous, particularly if you work from home and you already spend hours sitting down. 

Sitting for long hours is associated with being at risk of developing various diseases, such as obesity, type two diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and more. This doesn’t mean that standing is the cure for these issues, but incorporating more movement into your daily routine is one of the best strategies to prevent health problems. 

At the same time, standing is beneficial for your posture, which you can’t take advantage of when you’re sitting down all day. Therefore, people often ask about standing desk calories burned before they buy one of those tables. 

Incorporate Solutions

Overall, you now know the answer to ‘does standing burn calories?’ which means that you have two options: you can either take action now or keep doing things the way you used to. If you care about your health, you know what you should do, so why not start today? 

Incorporating new things into your routine might be challenging at first, and you should never put too much pressure on your shoulders. The world won’t end if you skip a day of your standing-up routine, and you don’t need to buy a standing desk immediately if you can’t afford it. 

Instead, focus on realistic, affordable solutions that you can immediately incorporate into your routine, for example, standing up for five minutes every half an hour. When you're getting started, it might not sound like much, but you can start building new habits from there. 

Once you can stand up for at least five minutes every now and then, you can increase the time until you’re ready to work for hours while standing up. 

Implementing Habits Is Challenging

Starting new things is exciting, and you might be motivated to incorporate more standing time into your routine. Nonetheless, you have probably set goals and didn't follow through before, so you know that implementing new habits is not as straightforward as some think. 

When you’re getting started, it’s not enough to know how many calories are burned standing or how many calories you burn when sitting - you also need to be committed to changing your routine and improving your health. 

Even though there’s much discussion about the calories burned standing vs sitting, what’s true is that incorporating more movement into your daily life is always beneficial. It can help you feel more energetic, improve your health, and even boost your mood. 

Set small goals for yourself, which allows you to guarantee that you’ll achieve them. Instead of striving for a perfect routine where you stand the whole time, focus on increasing the time you already spend standing.  

If you do that, you’ll allow your brain to process new habits and understand them as a regular part of your daily activities. Therefore, you can get used to standing up for a few minutes every day, which can lead to doing so for as long as you want.  

Everyone Struggles

When you’re trying to incorporate a new habit into your routine, things are going to be challenging. Thus, you have to be committed to the process, and you must make sure that what you’re doing is beneficial for your health. 

Since standing has so many benefits, you probably want to try it out right now, and you should! Nonetheless, remember that if you’re not used to it, struggling is normal when you’re getting started. With time, you’ll be able to stand as much as you want! 

Keynote Takeaways

Many people ask, ‘does standing burn calories?’ and some experts say it does. Therefore, incorporating more standing time into your daily routine can change your life for the better since it helps you improve your health.