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• What’s the difference between Kcal and Calories?

TrendingLab Grown GoldAncient Fish SpeciesRice Water For HairHair Growth OilsBill GatesRagi Sattu and Sattu Laddu RecipeZone 2 CardioRam Dass QuoteSrikanth BollaCervical Cancer PreventionLab Grown GoldAncient Fish SpeciesRice Water For HairHair Growth OilsBill GatesRagi Sattu and Sattu Laddu RecipeZone 2 CardioRam Dass QuoteSrikanth BollaCervical Cancer PreventionLab Grown GoldAncient Fish SpeciesRice Water For HairHair Growth OilsBill GatesRagi Sattu and Sattu Laddu RecipeZone 2 CardioRam Dass QuoteSrikanth BollaCervical Cancer PreventionWhat’s the difference between Kcal and Calories? Jan 4, 2021, 20:00 ISTShareAA+Text Size

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​Is Kcal and calorie different?

Do you often find yourself struggling to understand the calorie game, especially understanding the calorie measurement mentioned as Kcal or calories. For most of us these may mean the same thing, but you would be amazed to know that both the things are different and here’s how you can distinguish between Kcal and calories. Read on…

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​What are calories?

Calories are nothing but a measure of energy converted from the intake of food. Calories are calculated either in the form of energy derived from foods or loss of energy by burning calories while exercising and other sports.

However, the measurement and mention of calories also depends on geographical region and may vary from country to country. In some places it is measured in kilocalories (kcal) and kilojoules (kJ), this may lead to confusion especially in terms of measuring calories in a pack of food or beverage.

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​Understanding the calorie game

Understanding the calorie game may be a bit tricky as there are two types of calories small as well as large.

If the “C” in calories is written in uppercase, it indicates a large calories, and if it’s lowercase, it indicates a small calories.

On an average, large calories can be estimated to generate the amount of energy required to raise the temperature of 1 kg of water by 1°C (34°F).

In the context of small calories, the estimated calories needed to raise the temperature of 1 gram of water by 1°C (34°F).

In fact, 1 large calorie may be equal to 1,000 small calories, as 1 kg equals to 1,000 grams. However, this may seem confusing and to avoid this confusion between both large and small calories, the prefix kilo means 1000 and is generally used to refer to large calories.

In fact, calories and kcal are used interchangeably and refer to the same amount of energy in relation to food or energy burned with exercise.

Therefore, you don’t need to convert them, as 1 kilocalorie equals 1 calorie in nutrition and may also be expressed as kilojoules (kJ).

Almost all packaged or processed food come with a nutrition label, which lists the amount of energy a food product contains. Some of the foods label contains a mention of calories, kcal, kJ, or a combination of these.

Most calories are used interchangeably and referred to the same amount of energy. Calories or kcal may also be defined as kJ.

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