Estimate camping meals, calories, food weight, snacks, cooking water, and stove fuel for hiking, backpacking, and group camping trips. This camp meal planner helps you plan breakfast, lunch, dinner, snacks, reserve meals, and total food to pack.
Meals and snacks:
Enter the number of breakfasts, lunches, dinners, and snack servings per person per day. The calculator totals the amount for the whole group.
Calories and food weight:
Food weight is estimated from your calories per person per day and average calories per ounce of food.
Cooking needs:
Hot meals are used to estimate cooking water and stove fuel for dehydrated meals, oatmeal, coffee, soups, and camp dinners.
A camp meal planner helps estimate food quantity, pack weight, calories, cooking water, and stove fuel before a camping or backpacking trip.
Actual food needs vary by appetite, body size, hiking effort, weather, trip length, altitude, meal choices, and whether food is fresh, canned, dried, or ultralight.
This calculator uses a practical camping food estimate:
Total Food Weight = total calories ÷ calories per ounce
For backpacking, many people plan around 1.5 to 2.5 pounds of food per person per day, depending on calorie density, effort level, appetite, and trip conditions.
Many backpackers plan roughly 2,500 to 4,500 calories per day, depending on body size, pace, terrain, weather, pack weight, and trip intensity.
Yes. An extra meal, extra snacks, or a percentage reserve is useful for delays, bad weather, route changes, or higher-than-expected appetite.
Dehydrated meals often reduce food weight because water is removed, but they require cooking water and stove fuel to prepare.