Calories Burned Jumping Rope Calculator

Calories burned jumping rope is the energy your body uses while the rope is turning. It depends mostly on how heavy you are, how long you jump, and how fast you skip. This calculator is for adults and uses published energy values for three skipping paces.

What Jumping Rope Calories Measure

The result is an estimate of the total energy you use during the minutes you actually jump. It does not measure your own heart rate or oxygen use. It also does not tell you how many calories you should burn or eat.

The Formula

The calculator multiplies an activity value called a MET by your weight and your time. One MET is defined as 1 kcal per kilogram of body weight per hour¹.

Calories burned = MET x body weight (kg) x active time (hours)

The MET values come from the 2024 Adult Compendium of Physical Activities, a large catalogue of measured energy costs for adults².

How This Calculator Computes Your Result

Enter your weight in kilograms or pounds, your active jumping minutes, and a pace. Pounds are converted to kilograms, minutes are converted to hours, and the answer is rounded to the nearest whole calorie. You also get a table showing calories for 10, 20 and 30 minutes at each pace, using your weight.

Active minutes means only the time the rope is turning. If you jump for one minute and rest for 30 seconds, ten rounds count as 10 active minutes, not 15.

What Your Result Means

The Compendium lists three paces for rope jumping, each with its own MET value³.

For a 70 kg adult jumping for 20 active minutes, that works out to about 194 kcal at a slow pace, 275 kcal at a moderate pace and 287 kcal at a fast pace. The jump from slow to moderate is large. The jump from moderate to fast is small.

Why Pace Changes the Number

One study of skipping at 125, 135 and 145 skips per minute found almost no difference in energy use between those rates (about 11.7 to 12.5 METs)⁴. The Compendium lists rope jumping in separate pace bands³. The two upper bands are close (11.8 and 12.3 METs), so going from 110 to 150 skips per minute adds less than you might expect on paper. Count your skips for one minute with a timer if you are unsure which band you are in.

Active Minutes and Rest Intervals

Most people jump in sets with rests, not in one long block. A 20 minute session with 30 seconds on and 30 seconds off is only 10 active minutes. Enter 10, not 20. The same weight and pace would then give about 138 kcal at a moderate pace instead of 275. Entering the full session time is the most common way to overstate the result.

Where MET Estimates Fall Short

A MET value is an average from the people who were measured. It assumes everyone uses the same amount of oxygen at rest, and research shows that one standard value does not fit all people equally⁵. Skill, jump height and rope type matter too, and the three paces do not capture them. Your real number could be higher or lower than the estimate.