How Many Calories Do Squats Burn? Per Rep, Per Minute And By Body Weight

A set of 100 squats can leave your legs shaking for a full minute afterward. The calorie bill for all that effort is about a quarter of a banana, whatever your watch shows.

So how many calories do squats burn?

About 4 to 8 calories a minute of actual squatting, which comes to roughly 15 to 30 calories per 100 bodyweight squats for a 155 lb person. Add weight or add a jump and the number climbs, so those get their own rows below.

You will find tables for 130 to 220 lb, what labs measured for slow and loaded squats, why your watch disagrees, and how many squats 100, 500 or 1,000 calories really takes.

Key Takeaways

• A bodyweight squat burns roughly 0.15 to 0.3 calories at a normal pace, so 100 squats is about 15 to 30 calories, and 50 squats about 8 to 15, for a 155 lb person.
• Slow six-second reps cost up to about half a calorie each, and loaded squats about 0.7 to 1.4 calories a rep, so a hard set of 12 is about 16 calories.
• Jump squats burn the most per minute, about 13 to 14 calories at 155 lb, but nobody keeps that pace up for long.
• Burning 500 calories takes roughly 1,900 to 3,400 bodyweight squats, which is the wrong job for this exercise.
• After-burn adds only a few calories. Squats earn their place by building leg muscle you keep while your diet does the fat loss.

How Many Calories Squats Burn: Per Minute, Per Rep And By Body Weight

You can get a number for your own body weight in about a minute, and it will be closer than any app.

Every squat calculator on the internet runs on the same research table, the Compendium of Physical Activities, which files easy bodyweight squats at 3.0 METs (metabolic equivalents), hard or fast ones at 6.5, loaded squats in a lifting session at 5.0, and interval training built on squat jumps at 11.0.

A MET is the energy you burn sitting still. Easy squats run your engine at three times idle, and a hard, fast set at six and a half times.

To turn that into calories, multiply the METs by 3.5, then by your weight in kilograms, and divide by 200.

Pounds divided by 2.2 gives you kilograms. At 155 lb, or 70 kg, easy squats come to 3.7 calories a minute and hard ones to 8.0, which is where “about 4 to 8 calories a minute” comes from.

Calories Per Minute By Body Weight

Body weight	Easy bodyweight squats (3.0 METs)	Hard or fast bodyweight squats (6.5 METs)	Loaded squats in a lifting session (5.0 METs)	Jump squats or HIIT (11.0 METs)
130 lb	3.1	6.7	5.2	11.4
155 lb	3.7	8.0	6.1	13.5
180 lb	4.3	9.3	7.2	15.8
200 lb	4.8	10.4	8.0	17.5
220 lb	5.2	11.4	8.8	19.2

Calories (kcal) per minute of actual squatting, from the Compendium MET values. HIIT is high-intensity interval training. Rest between sets does not count.

Heavier people burn more because they move more weight on every rep, and a 2023 lab study of squat sessions found the same thing: men and heavier people burned more.

The rest minutes between sets burn close to the sitting rate, and counting them at the working rate is where most estimates go wrong.

Between rows, scale by weight: a 170 lb person sits about 10 percent above the 155 lb row, a 240 lb person about 10 percent above the 220 lb row.

Calories Per Squat And Per 50, 100 Or 200 Reps

Most people manage about 25 easy squats or 30 fast ones a minute. At that pace one squat costs about 0.15 calories at an easy effort and 0.27 going hard, for a 155 lb person.

Reps	Easy pace	Hard pace	Slow six-second reps	Minutes at easy / hard pace
10	1	3	5	under 1
25	4	7	13	1 / 1
50	7	13	26	2 / 2
100	15	27	53	4 / 3
200	29	53	106	8 / 7
500	74	133	265	20 / 17

Calories for a 155 lb person. Multiply by your weight divided by 155. The slow-rep column scales the lab’s half-calorie squat, measured in 146 lb men, up to 155 lb.

Prefer your own number? Enter your weight and the squats you did below.

So 10 squats is 1 to 3 calories, 50 squats roughly 8 to 15, 60 squats about 9 to 16, and 100 squats roughly 15 to 30. The slow-rep column is why some pages say about 50 calories per 100, and that story comes next.

Why Say 100 Squats Burn 50 Calories (And Your Watch Says More)

Where The Half-Calorie Squat Comes From

Look this question up and you will find anywhere from 15 to 50 calories for the same 100 squats. Both ends are honest. They measured different squats.

The half-calorie squat is real, and it took a six-second rep to get there. Fifteen young men averaging about 146 lb squatted at three seconds down and three seconds up in a lab study while their breathing was measured, and each squat cost about 0.50 calories.

The researchers added that faster reps are expected to cost less per rep, and only the slow speed was tested.

A normal one-to-two-second squat lands at 0.15 to 0.3 calories, the 15 to 30 per 100 in the table above. Half a calorie is the ceiling for an unloaded rep, not the headline.

Under load, speed earns its keep: a 2007 study on a squat machine found explosive reps burned about 13 percent more per minute than slow, grinding ones with the same weight.

Why Your Watch Counts More Than You Burned

Some pages claim squats burn 15 to 25 calories a minute. At 155 lb that means working at 12 to 20 times your resting burn without stopping, hard-running territory that no squat set reaches.

The “8 calories a minute” figure on social media is true only for nonstop hard squats at about 155 lb, not a set with rest.

Your watch has a different problem. It guesses from heart rate with models built on running and cycling, where a faster pulse tracks fuel use closely.

A hard squat set spikes your pulse through straining and breath-holding, so the watch reads effort as fuel.

Log squats by reps and minutes, use the tables above for your weight, and treat the watch number as a rough mood rather than a measurement.

How Many Calories Do Squats Burn With Weights And Jump Squats

What A Weighted Squat Set Really Costs

A hard set of 12 heavy squats burns about 16 calories. A longer, lighter set of 30 burns more, around 22, and both are measured numbers rather than calculator guesses.

They come from a 2025 lab study in which 29 young adults averaging about 150 lb did half squats on a lab squat machine with their breathing measured throughout.

A 30-rep set at half of their max cost about 21.5 calories. A 12-rep set at three quarters of their max cost about 16.4.

By our arithmetic that is about 0.7 and 1.4 calories a rep, so a loaded rep costs 1.5 to 3 times a bodyweight rep. Heavier reps cost more each, more reps cost more per set, and the five-minute rests between sets count only at the sitting rate.

Leg day still feels like cardio for a reason. A 2024 lab study of trained men found that by the fifth set of ten barbell squats, oxygen use briefly reached the level of a max cardio test. Those peaks last seconds, and the rests between sets pull the average right back down.

Squat Variations Ranked By Calories Burned

Squat type	Calories per rep	Why
Easy bodyweight squat	0.15	Steady pace, 3.0 METs
Hard or fast bodyweight squat	0.27	6.5 METs, nonstop
Slow six-second bodyweight squat	about 0.5	The tempo the 2022 lab measured
Jump squat in an interval block	about 0.7	11.0 METs, a generous estimate
Loaded squat, half of max, 30-rep set	about 0.7	2025 lab, 21.5 calories per set
Loaded squat, three quarters of max, 12-rep set	about 1.4	2025 lab, 16.4 calories per set

For a 155 lb person unless stated. Rest between sets is not included.

Goblet squats sit between the bodyweight rows and the loaded rows, because you move more weight on every rep without the long rests of a heavy set.

Jump squats burn the most per minute, about 13 to 14 calories at 155 lb, but most people last under a minute before form slips, which is why dumbbell squat jumps belong in short sets.

Done nonstop, 100 jump squats would land near 70 calories, a pace almost nobody holds in one go.

In all-out bodyweight bouts, burpees beat jumping jacks and push-ups, which beat squats, then lunges, then planks.

Pick the variation for the leg strength you want, not the calories, because even the costliest rep stays under a calorie and a half.

How Many Squats To Burn 100, 500 Or 1,000 Calories

Burning 100 calories takes roughly 375 to 700 bodyweight squats, about 13 to 27 minutes of nonstop squatting at 155 lb, and that counts only the seconds you are moving.

If you came here hoping to squat off dinner, this is the table that changes the plan.

Goal	Hard pace (0.27 per rep)	Easy pace (0.15 per rep)	Time at hard pace
100 calories	about 380 squats	about 680 squats	13 minutes
300 calories	about 1,130 squats	about 2,040 squats	38 minutes
500 calories	about 1,880 squats	about 3,400 squats	63 minutes
1,000 calories	about 3,760 squats	about 6,800 squats	125 minutes

For a 155 lb person. Heavier people need fewer reps.

A daily habit adds up slowly. Fifty squats a day is about 8 to 15 calories, roughly 210 to 390 a month, and 100 a day is 15 to 30, roughly 450 to 800 a month.

The “200 extra calories a day from 20 squats an hour” claim you may have seen comes to 160 squats, which is closer to 25 to 45 calories.

Depth decides more than you would think. A quarter squat moves you about half as far as a full one, so it costs about half as much, and only full reps earn the numbers in the table.

For scale, a 30-minute brisk walk sits at 4.8 METs in the same Compendium table, about 175 calories at 155 lb, the cost of 650 to 1,170 squats.

One hundred hard push-ups is about 46 calories, since how many calories push-ups burn runs higher per rep than squats, and 10 minutes of burpee-style intervals is about 135.

Squats are a strength move, not a calorie engine. Their payoff is stronger legs and hips and the muscle you keep while dieting, which is where the real benefits of squats live.

The After-Burn Myth And What Actually Moves Fat Loss

How Big Is The After-Burn From Squats

Do squats keep burning calories for hours after you rack the bar? A little, and far less than the posts claim.

The after-burn adds roughly 6 to 15 percent of what the workout itself burned, according to a 2006 review of the research. For 100 hard squats at about 27 calories, that is 2 to 4 extra calories.

A lab checked this on loaded sets, too. In the ten minutes after a hard squat session the metabolic cart recorded about 15 to 26 calories, and at least half of that is what you would burn just sitting in a chair.

More muscle does raise your resting burn, slightly. A few pounds of new leg muscle will not show up on the scale by itself.

Where Squats Fit In A Fat-Loss Plan

The CDC puts it plainly: most weight loss comes from eating fewer calories, and keeping it off takes a high amount of regular activity unless you also adjust your diet.

The same guidance asks adults for at least 150 minutes a week of moderate aerobic activity.

Squats count toward the strength side of your week and almost nothing toward those cardio minutes. They also do not burn belly fat specifically, because fat comes off your whole body, in an order you do not get to choose.

Their job in a diet is to keep and build leg and hip muscle while the fat comes off. For the daily-count question, see how many squats you should do a day.

Squats are the strength tool. Your plate and your weekly walking, cycling or running minutes are the engine.

FAQs

How Many Squats Burn 100 Calories?

About 375 to 700 bodyweight squats for a 155 lb person, which is roughly 13 to 27 minutes of nonstop work. Fast, hard reps sit near the low count. Heavier people need fewer reps, lighter people need more, and rest between sets does not count.

Are Squats Good For Weight Loss?

Yes as a strength tool, not as a calorie burner. One hundred squats burn only 15 to 30 calories, so their value is keeping leg muscle while you eat a little less and stay active. Your diet and weekly cardio minutes do most of the fat loss.

What Happens If I Do 100 Squats A Day?

Stronger legs that last longer within a few weeks if your form holds, plus about 450 to 800 extra calories a month. Expect soreness in week one, take easy days, and move to harder variations once 100 feels routine. Our guide to daily squat counts covers the progression.

Do Squats Burn Belly Fat?

No exercise burns fat from one spot. Squats build leg and hip muscle, and belly fat comes off along with the rest of your body fat when you eat fewer calories than you burn over several weeks, whichever muscles you train.

How Many Calories Do 50 Squats Burn?

Roughly 8 to 15 calories for a 155 lb person at a normal pace, about two minutes of work. Slow six-second reps push it past 25 calories, holding a dumbbell raises it further, and resting between sets adds almost nothing to the total.

Bottom Line

A bodyweight squat burns roughly 0.15 to 0.3 calories at a normal pace and up to about half a calorie when you go slow, so 100 squats is about 15 to 30 calories for a 155 lb person.

Weighted reps cost about 0.7 to 1.4 each, jump squats burn the most per minute, and all of it is a bit more if you are heavier and far less than your watch says.

So how many calories do squats burn in a real session?

Enough to notice on a spreadsheet, not on a scale. Squats build stronger legs and protect muscle while your diet and your weekly cardio minutes handle the calories.

Your next move: time your next set of 50 from first rep to last, find your row in the body-weight table, and try one harder variation next week, slow tempo, goblet or jump.

You get a real number and a harder squat in the same week.

References

• Herrmann, S. D., et al., 2024, Conditioning Exercise, 2024 Adult Compendium of Physical Activities, Compendium of Physical Activities
• Nakagata, T., Yamada, Y., and Naito, H., 2022, Estimating Energy Cost of Body Weight Resistance Exercise Using a Multistage Exercise Test, Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research
• Del-Cuerpo, I., et al., 2025, Effects of squat training on energy expenditure, oxygen consumption, and heart rate in young healthy adults, Scientific Reports
• Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2026, Physical Activity and Your Weight and Health, CDC