How Many Meals Per Day Provide the Most Weight Loss?
You’ve probably heard some variation of the myth that you need to eat every 2-3 hours to keep your body in fat burning mode. Some claim this stokes the metabolic fire. Others claim it keeps your body out of starvation mode. Whatever the reasoning, they are wrong. Eating every 2 to 3 hours does not increase your fat burning or total fat loss.
The myth that eating every 2 to 3 hours is based on the thermic effect of food (or TEF). This is the increased metabolic rate you experience after consuming a meal. Thus, some believe that if one meal increases your metabolic rate then more meals will increase your metabolic rate even more! Unfortunately, this is not true.
TEF is based on your caloric intake and is a percentage of the calories consumed. Different macronutrients require more calories to metabolize, but on average TEF will account for 10% of your diet. So, if you are eating 2,000 calories in 2 meals or 6, the TEF would still be 200 calories.
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