You wont ever starve if your meal is 700kcal one day. You will want to eat more the next day, your head will tell you. Or maybe you want some ice cream after in the same window?
On the other point, very few people who sit around all day need 2000kcal, unless they're relatively huge in any dimension. Either way you will find out if you count for a couple of weeks and if your weight is constant your average intake is your TDEE. If you're sedentary my bet is it's less than 2k.
I feel so much obesity is down to people thinking 2k or even 2500kcal is right for them despite an activity level that means they might be closer to 1500kcal-1800kcal.
Absolutely concur with your advice to count for a couple of weeks, and I'd back that bet...
I'm trying to bulk now and the online calculators I'm using are telling me to take in 3,100 calories, which feels like way too much.
But I am 6'3", 195 lbs, and I'm hitting the gym 5-6 days a week, so maybe?
After years of dieting and weight loss it's hard to eat that much.
But your experience will vary massively depending on how active you are, including how hard you hit the gym.
It's not impossible it's right, but really just count for a few weeks and keep track of your weight, and then adjust up/down up to a few hundred kcal until your weight is changing the way you want it tp.
Unless you're super-lean there's very little reason to add more than 300-400 kcal above maintenance at most (I do less these days) - big bulking cycles take a lot of discipline to break out of. I generally favour slow but steady these days as I'm back into lifting.
Age also factors in - you can expect slower progress the older you get and accordingly you'll need fewer extra calories if you want to avoid adding fat. Conversely, if your testosterone levels and metabolism are at their peak, you might well burn more.
Counting and tracking is really the only thing that will tell you the right numbers for you.
