The phrases ‘the best workout to lose belly fat,’ ‘how to get off of belly fat,’ and “how to remove belly fat” are some of the health terms that people search for the most on Google. This alone is proof that stubborn belly fat (also known as belly pooch or lower stomach fat) is a cause of insecurity for many people. In addition to this, 43% of UK women who were polled* by Women’s Health openly told us that an undefined stomach is their most significant source of insecurity when they are naked in front of a partner.
The issue is that when we desire to reduce this amount of weight, we frequently create unrealistic deadlines for ourselves. For instance, searching the internet for solutions to questions such as “how to lose belly fat quickly” (we’ll give you the advantage of the doubt and assume you’re referring to “as effectively and as safely as possible”), “the fastest way to lose belly fat,” or “how to lose belly fat in a week.”
To attain stated goals seems good, we know, but the truth is that these types of tactics mean you’re almost certainly not going to get rid of belly fat, and even less probable to keep it off if you do manage to drop some, even if you do manage to lose some. Developing good habits that you can carry with you throughout your life is the real key to success.
Because it is the most dangerous fat in the body, abdominal fat is linked to a number of different ailments. A flat stomach can be achieved through a number of methods, including working out regularly and avoiding fatty and sugary foods as well as alcoholic beverages.
Learn how to get rid of stomach fat in far less than a week with the help of these helpful hints.
1. Include Aerobic Exercises In Your Daily Routine
There is no way around cardio workouts if you want to get rid of fat as quickly as possible. According to the findings of various studies, this is the type of exercise that is most efficient for reducing fat in the abdominal region.
Your overall health will improve if you consume a large number of calories. Therefore, you should begin engaging in high-intensity activities such as jogging, swimming, or attending aerobic courses; nevertheless, it is crucial to bear in mind that duration and frequency are vital to achieving pleasing outcomes.
2. Reduce Refined Carbs
If one wants to have good metabolic health and decrease fat around the abdomen area, one should refrain from consuming refined carbohydrates.
There is no requirement to follow a rigorous low-carb diet; nonetheless, those carbohydrates should be substituted with unprocessed sources wherever possible. Eat more veggies and whole grains and cut back on the white bread, white rice, and sodas in your diet.
3. Avoid Sugar And Sugar-Sweetened Drinks
Consuming foods that have added sugars is detrimental to your health. Gaining weight is possible if you consume a significant amount of these categories of food.
According to a number of studies, adding sugar is associated with a distinct set of negative consequences on metabolic health.
Numerous studies have found that consuming an excessive amount of sugar, which is primarily caused by high levels of fructose, can lead to fat accumulation around your abdominal region and liver.
Both glucose and fructose are present in equal amounts of sugar. When a person consumes a diet that is high in added sugar, the liver is compelled to produce fat because it is overloaded with fructose.
Some people think that this particular mechanism is the primary cause of the negative impact that sugar has on health. It leads to an increase in belly fat as well as fat in the liver, which in turn causes insulin resistance and a variety of metabolic issues.
The situation is even direr with liquid sugar. Because the brain does not appear to register calories from liquids in the same way that it registers calories from solid foods, drinking sugar-sweetened beverages causes one to consume a greater number of calories overall.
A study found that the risk of childhood obesity increased by sixty percent for each extra daily serving of sugar-sweetened beverages consumed by children.
You should try cutting back on the quantity of sugar you eat, and you should really consider getting rid of sugary drinks entirely. This comprises sodas, fruit juices, and various sports drinks that are rich in sugar. Sugar-sweetened beverages are also included in this category.
Make sure you read the labels to make sure the products you buy do not include any processed sugars. Sugar can be found even in products that are presented to consumers as being healthy food options.
It is crucial to bear in mind that none of the above pertains to the entire fruit, which is not only very healthy but also contains a great deal of fiber, which helps to minimize the bad effects of fructose.
4. Try Curbing Carbs Instead Of Fats
When researchers at Johns Hopkins compared the results of losing weight through a low-carbohydrate eating plan to the impacts of weight loss through a low-fat diet for 6 months — each containing the same amount of calories — those on a low-carb daily intake lost an average of ten pounds more than those who consumed a low-fat diet — 28.9 lbs versus 18.7 lbs. This was the case even though both diets contained the same number of calories.
According to Stewart, one additional advantage of following a low-carb diet is that it leads to better-quality weight reduction than other diets. When someone loses weight, their body fat percentage goes down, but they also frequently experience a loss of lean tissue (muscle), which is undesirable. On both programs, there was a loss of approximately 2 to 3 pounds of healthy lean tissue in addition to the fat loss; however, the percentage of fat lost was significantly greater while following the low-carb diet.
5. Think Eating Plan, Not Diet
In the end, Stewart advises that you should select a healthy eating plan that you are able to maintain. There is no need to keep track of your calorie intake when following a low-carb diet plan because all that is required is learning to make better meal choices. In general, adopting a low-carb diet will cause you to reduce your consumption of problematic foods, such as those that are high in carbohydrates and sugar and do not contain much fiber, such as bread, bagels, and soda, in favor of options that are high in fiber or protein, such as vegetables, beans, and healthy meats.
How much body fat should you have?
Women should approach losing belly fat in a different manner than males should do while trying to accomplish the same goal. Women require a certain amount of abdominal fat in order to function properly. Because fat cells store estrogen, a lack of abdominal fat can throw off a woman’s entire hormonal function, leading to major health problems such as irregular periods and even infertility.
As a consequence of this, it is not in most women’s best interest to try to reduce the amount of fat in their stomachs with the intention of attaining a six-pack. Instead, you should strive to maintain a body fat percentage that falls between 21 and 30 percent. This is the proportion of body fat that is regarded to be within a healthy range for women.
The best diet to lose belly fat
You can’t out-exercise a lousy diet. Fact. You need to have a calorie deficit if you want to lose belly fat, and this is true for losing fat from wherever in your body. This implies ingesting fewer calories than you are expending during the day through activities such as working out and just living your normal life.
“When it relates to understanding how to lose stomach fat, the best place to begin is to control what you eat,” explains Belalij as the beginning step in the process of learning how to reduce belly fat. “When you digest huge numbers of calories, your body assigns some of these to functional systems that function to keep you alive (think of the brain, muscles, and organs),” says Belalij. “When you digest large amounts of protein, your body allocates some of these to fully functioning systems that work to keep you alive.” In addition to that, it makes use of it to top off its reserves of energy. Any remaining surplus is subsequently deposited in fat cells throughout the body, most commonly those found in the abdominal region.
However, as we’ve mentioned before, learning how to lose belly fat shouldn’t come at the expense of your health. Because of this, you should make sure that you aren’t cutting back on your calories too much. Check out the helpful tool that we have provided below to determine what your optimum (and healthy) calorie deficit should be. It will assist you in determining how much kcal you need to consume on a daily basis in order to achieve your objectives without exceeding them. (In just a moment, we’ll talk about the foods you should prioritize!)
6. Add Fatty Fish To Your Diet
High-quality protein and a good source of omega-3 fatty acids can be found in fatty fish like salmon, sardines, and tuna. Consuming two to three pieces on a weekly basis will not only help you lose abdominal fat but also lower your risk of developing diseases like heart disease.
According to a number of studies, the visceral fat that surrounds your abdomen can be reduced by consuming foods rich in omega-3 fatty acids.
7. Start The Day With A High Protein Breakfast
Eat more Greek yogurt, protein shakes, scrambled egg whites, or porridge when you first wake up in the morning. After consuming proteins in the morning, you will not have any feelings of hunger until lunchtime because you will feel full till then.
Proteins speed up your metabolism and help you keep your muscle mass even while you reduce your overall body fat. Every other meal could also benefit from the addition of proteins like eggs, fish, poultry, beans, or dairy products.
8. Drink Enough Water
Maintaining adequate hydration is essential for one’s health in general, even if one has no desire to reduce body fat. It is recommended that you drink between 4 and 5 liters of water every day because doing so will cause you to burn more calories.
Drinking water before a meal not only suppresses your hunger but also lowers the number of calories you consume. Make it a point to steer clear of any other beverages that include a high number of calories or sugars.
If you wake up without having eaten anything, drinking warm water with lemon first thing in the morning will help get your metabolism and digestive system off to a good start.
9. Eat More Protein
When it comes to shedding pounds, protein may be the single most important macronutrient.
According to research, it can cut cravings by as much as sixty percent, raise your metabolism by eighty to one hundred calories per day, and assist you in consuming up to four hundred and forty-one fewer kcals per day.
Increasing the amount of protein you consume may be the most beneficial modification to your diet that you can make in order to achieve your objective of losing weight.
Protein may assist you in not just losing weight but also maintaining your weight loss and preventing any subsequent weight gain.
There is some evidence that eating a diet high in protein can help reduce belly fat. According to the findings of one study, individuals who consumed a higher quality and quantity of protein had significantly less belly fat (16Trusted Source).
According to the findings of another study, women who consumed more protein had a considerably lower risk of gaining belly fat over the course of 5 years.
The consumption of refined carbohydrates and oils was also found to be associated with increased abdominal fat, while the consumption of fruit and vegetables was found to be associated with decreased fat.
In the majority of the studies that found that eating protein helped people lose weight, the participants consumed between 25 and 30 percent of their total calories from protein. As a result, giving this range a shot would be a good idea.
You might try eating more foods that are high in protein, such as whole eggs, legumes, meat, fish, nuts, and dairy products. Whole eggs, seafood, and legumes are particularly good options. These foods are excellent sources of protein for a healthy diet.
Check read this post for more information on how to improve your protein consumption while adhering to a vegan or vegetarian diet.
If you have trouble getting the amount of protein you need from your diet, using a high-quality protein supplement, such as whey protein, is a handy and nutritious method to increase your overall consumption of protein. On the internet, you’ll find a plethora of different options for protein powder.
10 Keep Moving.
Burning calories through exercise are one way to reduce abdominal obesity. According to Stewart, one of the most significant advantages of physical activity is that it offers a high return on investment in terms of the effects it has on the body’s composition.
According to him, exercise seems to be particularly effective in reducing belly fat because it lowers circulating levels of insulin, which would otherwise signal the body to hang on to fat, and it causes the liver to use up fatty acids, particularly those that are located nearby in visceral fat deposits.
The amount of physical activity necessary to achieve your weight loss objectives is contingent upon those goals. This can require anywhere from thirty to sixty mins of moderate to intense activity practically every day for the majority of people.
11. Eat Fewer Carbohydrates
Eating fewer carbohydrates is a very efficient method for reducing body fat.
Various pieces of research point in this direction. When people reduce the number of carbohydrates they eat, their appetite decreases, and they end up losing weight.
There have been more than twenty randomized controlled studies that have demonstrated that low carbohydrate diets can result in two to three times the amount of weight loss that low-fat diets can achieve.
This is true even when participants in the low-carb group are permitted to consume an unlimited number of calories whereas participants in the low-fat group are required to adhere to a calorie restriction.
Diets that are low in carbohydrates also contribute to rapid decreases in water weight, which is another factor that helps people see improvements more quickly. People will frequently notice a difference in their weight within one to two days.
Studies that compare diets low in carbohydrates to diets low in fat reveal that eating a diet low in carbohydrates especially lowers fat in the abdominal region as well as the fat surrounding the organs and the liver.
This indicates that some of the fat shed on a low-carb diet is the dangerous abdominal fat that is stored in the abdominal region.
It should be sufficient to just abstain from refined carbohydrates such as sugar, sweets, and white bread, especially if you maintain a high consumption of protein in your diet.
Some people, when trying to lose weight as quickly as possible, cut their daily carbohydrate intake down to 50 grams. Your body will enter a state of ketosis as a result of this, in which it will begin to use fats as its primary fuel source, and your appetite will decrease.
Diets that are low in carbohydrates have numerous other health benefits in addition to the obvious one of causing weight loss. For instance, they have the potential to greatly enhance one’s health if they have type 2 diabetes.
12. Reduce Your Salt Intake
Salt in the diet causes the body to hold onto water, which contributes to a bloated feeling. Always check the nutrition label before purchasing something to ensure that it does not state that the product contains high levels of sodium. Processed foods typically have high levels of salt, added sugar, and harmful fats.
13. Consume Soluble Fiber
In the same way that proteins do, soluble fibers cause you to feel full for a longer period of time, which means that you won’t need to consume any unnecessary additional calories in your dish as a result.
Someone who is trying to lose weight would benefit from consuming soluble fibers because they are able to take in water and form a gel that reduces the amount of fat that is absorbed by the body. They are found in barley, almonds, seeds, beans, and lentils, among other foods.
Foods to reduce if you’re trying to lose belly fat
Processed foods: Because they are high in calories, carbohydrates, fats, and sweets, they are essentially a mixture that causes belly fat to be gained. In most cases, these foods are nutritionally unsatisfying, but they make you feel quite good, which means you can’t help but eat more of them. And more.
Alcohol: Seven calories per gram might not seem like a lot, but after one or two G&Ts, those calories start to pile up fast. Additionally, because the breakdown of alcohol is prioritized, the energy from alcohol is swiftly used to replenish glycogen reserves, and the remainder is stored as fat.
Inflammatory foods: This could refer to certain kinds of sugar or simply to any food that causes your tummy to become inflamed. This, in turn, triggers the body’s fight-or-flight response, which results in an increase in fat storage as a protective measure.
The calories in condiments like sauces and dressings are sometimes superfluous and hidden. Instead of adding fat and calories, flavor your cuisine with flavorful herbs and spices.
14. Exercise Regularly
Exercising regularly is one of the most effective ways to improve your chances of enjoying a long and disease-free life and stave off the onset of illness.
One of the many remarkable positive effects that exercise has on one’s health is the reduction of belly fat.
This does not suggest that one should focus on spot reduction by performing abdominal exercises, as it is impossible to lose fat from only one area of the body. One study found that strengthening the abdominal muscles alone for a period of six weeks had no detectable effect on either the participant’s waist circumference or the level of fat that was stored in the abdominal cavity.
Body fat can be reduced throughout the body with resistance training and cardiovascular activity.
Walking, running, and swimming are all examples of aerobic activities that can lead to significant fat loss in the abdomen region.
Another study indicated that persons who exercised entirely stopped themselves from regaining stomach fat after losing weight. This finding suggests that exercise is particularly beneficial during the maintenance phase of weight loss.
Inflammation is also reduced, blood sugar levels are lowered, and other metabolic issues connected with extra belly fat are improved as a result of exercise.
How to measure whether you’re losing belly fat
There are a lot of methods you may use to determine whether or not your body is transforming in the way you want it to, but some of these methods are not as effective as others.
Because scales do not take into consideration muscle mass, the easiest approach to assess your progress is by taking images, as explained by Belalij. “Remember that scales do not take into account muscle mass.” “Do it first thing in the morning, preferably in the same lighting, and evaluate your physical condition weekly.”
If you look at your stomach in the mirror every day, it’s likely that you won’t notice any changes, which might be discouraging.
Buy a set of smart scales if you do prefer to base your decisions on numbers, but limit yourself to weighing yourself once every seven days.
You may also use a tape measure to determine the circumference of your waist, or you might select your favorite pair of jeans, pants, or dress and evaluate the degree to which they differ from one another in terms of how well they fit. Calipers, which are equipment used for measuring fat, are far less accurate and can be subject to human error.
The Bottom Line
The accumulation of fat around the abdomen, sometimes known as belly fat, has been related to an elevated risk of a number of ailments.
Changing certain aspects of one’s lifestyle, including eating a diet rich in lean protein, fruits and veggies, and legumes, and engaging in regular physical activity, can help the majority of people reduce the amount of belly fat they carry.