PROTEIN AND WEIGHT LOSS: HOW MUCH PROTEIN DO YOU NEED TO EAT PER DAY?

Decades of scientific research on nutrition and weight loss has uncovered a few key pieces of information on what helps people successfully win the battle of the bulge. 

• First, we know that while exercise is important, a person’s healthy eating habits likely matters more for weight loss than the hours they spend in the gym. 
• Second, when it comes to dieting, there is no single best one for losing weight; many diets can work quite well as long as total calorie balance is accounted for. 
• Third, dietary protein is one of the key “levers” in a diet that increases the likelihood of someone’s ability to lose weight. 

This article is going to cut through a lot of the noise surrounding

protein and tell you how much protein you should be eating to lose weight and some of the things you should consider when planning your diet.

WHAT IS PROTEIN?

Protein is an important macronutrient that is involved in nearly all bodily functions and processes. It plays a key role in exercise recovery and is an essential dietary nutrient for healthy living. The elements carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, and nitrogen combine to form amino acids, the building blocks of protein. Protein and amino acids are primarily use to create bodily tissues, form enzymes and cellular transporters, maintain fluid balance, and more.

HOW MUCH PROTEIN PER DAY TO LOSE WEIGHT?

If you want to lose weight, aim for a daily protein intake between 1.6 and 2.2 grams of protein per kilogram of body weight (.73 and 1 grams per pound). Athletes and heavy exercisers should consume 2.2-3.4 grams of protein per kilogram (1-1.5 grams per pound) if aiming for weight loss.

My practical recommendation to people is that if you carry a BMI of over 30 or a body fat percentage above 25-30% it makes more sense to base your protein recommendations off of your goal weight.

WHAT ARE THE BENEFITS OF PROTEIN IN WEIGHT LOSS?

Dietary protein can be an important part of a diet that is intended for weight loss. 

While there are many benefits to dietary protein, there are four main areas that have direct effects on weight loss: 

1. Satiety 
2. Lean mass
3. Thermic effect of food
4. Storage as body fat

 Let us take a deeper dive into each of these topics.

PROTEIN HELPS YOU FEEL FULL LONGER

One of the biggest things that impedes weight loss is hunger. 

People are far less likely to stick with a nutrition or diet plan if they experience high levels of hunger.

Several different lines of research have all pointed to the same thing: higher protein intakes tend to provide more satiety and less hunger.

For example, in one study, high protein snacks allowed people to go longer between eating and also caused them to eat less at subsequent meals. 

Another study showed that including protein into a glass of water decreased hunger compared to water alone. 

Depending on the source of protein, there does appear to be minor differences in the exact amount of satiety that protein provides, however these differences are minor and don’t really make a meaningful impact for most people.

PROTEIN PRESERVES LEAN BODY MASS

In addition, protein has another benefit on weight loss: it helps preserve lean body mass during periods of caloric restriction.

One study compared the effect of low protein intake (1.0 grams per kilogram per day) to high protein intake (2.3 g/kg per day) on lean body mass over a short term caloric deficit. On average, the low protein group lost about 1.6 kilograms (3.5 pounds) of muscle mass while the high protein group only lost 0.3 kg (0.66 pounds) of muscle mass . 

Another similar study compared 0.8 g/kg per day against 1.6 g/kg per day and 2.4 g/kg per day and found that the two higher intakes (1.6 and 2.4 g/kg per day) spared more lean body mass than the 0.8 g/kg per day diet. They also found that there was no real benefit to 2.4 g/kg per day over 1.6 g/kg per day .

Currently, most evidence suggests that ~1.6 grams of protein per kilogram, or .73 grams of protein per pound is a recommended daily target for protein intake to spare lean body mass loss during periods of weight loss.