BMI -- where do you stand?

I'm a 21 on the BMI scale, which says that I'm healthy, but how accurate is this thing, because I'm kind of skinny now and if I was to build up some muscle, it would put me towards the overweight reading.

I can't do BMI because I always come out overweight. My ratios are different because I'm very active.

BMI can't be trusted. Also, aren't there different BMI charts for male and female bodies? Might make a bit of a difference.

This chart is why people can't be happy the way they are.

The BMI index is stupid. I am curvy, so I am listed at the very edge of overweight, heading towards obese. It really makes no sense at all. I am in my 40s, and I am not going to have the body of a college kid. Sorry. Get over it.

So it seems like EF is pretty on-par with most of America.

I used to be underweight but have since worked my way up to a healthy weight.

This chart is more lenient than some of the BMI calculators I've seen. I'm a 25.4 on a standard calculator, and just on the far edge of "healthy." A few more lbs and.... Yet, I'm just at the start of "healthy" on this chart. Almost underweight. If you saw me, you would not think I was underweight. (Although I was when I was younger, due to pretty serious IBS and just a high metabolism. I was so underweight that my OB wanted me to gain 40 lbs with my first pregnancy. the 25 or more for a healthy pregnancy then an other 15 to "get to normal." I only gained 35 lbs, but the baby was OK.)

Actually, the best way to get an accurate BMI is to get weighed on a special underwater scale. You push all the air out of your lungs and get totally submerged and it calculates almost the exact amount of body fat. It takes into account people with a lot of muscle, as muscle weighs more than fat and can give a false BMI reading on those charts and calculators that only take into account weight and height.

I've never been weighed on one of these scales, though.

I fall on the "obese" part of the BMI, because I'm short, curvy, and have a higher muscle distribution than the BMI says I should have. However, I would like to point out that the BMI is not (despite how badly it's been misused and abused), a measure of health, by any sane standard. It only came into popularity because it gives insurance company's a standard they can use to charge people more. While the BMI purportedly gives you a measure of 'fatness,' it is actually almost completely useless on an individual basis, simply because it has nothing to do with your actual fat content or your health. It correlates your weight and the square of your height, multiplies by a constant, and attempts to correlate overarching patterns of body weight and height within a population. It does not account for various body types, including differently built skeletal frames, bone density, muscle mass, or actual fat content. In order for it to actually be applicable on a case by case basis, you'd need to have identical body types across the board. I don't have the links handy for back up, but any decent google search on the limitations of the BMI would bring these points, and many, many others, up.

According to the BMI I am obese. I'm short and rather curvy. I don't know that I trust it too much though. According to the chart my boyfriend is severely underweight. He doesn't have an eating disorder or anything, his whole family is just really tall and skinny *shrugs*

healthy!

"And this one is just right"

I fluctuate between healthy and overweight. Right now I'm actually almost underweight due to a recent illness, but I've started gaining it back. I find that BMI is an extremely flawed system of measurement because it does not account for body type, body fat percentage or the overall health of the person. But for a quick, general measurement, it's ok.

I'm on the cusp between underweight and healthy. I've always been petite though, and my body frame is very slight.

Between obese and morbidly obese depending on the chart I look at. :/

Between 24-25% (underweight to healthy). 5'6'' and 145-150 pounds depending on how fat I decide to be that day :p Kidding. Which is weird, I have always thought I was very overweight and wanted to lose a few pounds and slim down.

I am considered morbidly obese. That being said: I can run nearly 5 miles no problem at all, kick over my head, have below normal blood pressure, and don't subscribe to most of the fat stereotypes. I'm also losing weight rather quickly.

Extremely obese because my scoliosis is making me shrink...2 inches ago I was just 'obese'. Given that more and more doctors are completely disregarding BMI these days because of how inaccurate it is in terms of health, though, I don't let it bother me. I can still run and go up stairs and be active, so what's the big deal? After I had a doctor refuse to treat me until I dropped over 15 BMI points (which is ridiculous and highly unethical), I stopped letting numbers affect me. And I damn sure got a new doctor.

overweight but im okay with that!!

The chart always says I'm healthy, but I usually feel underweight. BMI is a nice reference, but not for people who exercise for a living/hobby.

i am right over obese to morbidly obese but its dropping!

I dropped from healthy to underweight, hahaha.