With over 70% of Americans considered overweight or obese, effective weight loss tools and programs are more in demand than ever before. Losing weight often feels like an uphill battle, but having the right tools and resources can make the process easier and more sustainable. From apps to track calories and activity to meal delivery services that take the guesswork out of healthy eating, today’s weight loss tools are designed to provide the structure, guidance, and accountability needed to achieve weight loss goals.
When used properly, weight loss tools can help people overcome obstacles, stay motivated, and develop healthy lifelong habits. However, not all tools work for everyone. It’s important to find options that fit your lifestyle and preferences. The most effective weight loss tools plans incorporate multiple tools and techniques. This provides people with various resources to support their efforts. Having a multifaceted approach increases the chances of long-term success.
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Calorie Counting Apps Weight Loss Tools
Calorie counting apps like MyFitnessPal and Lose It! have become extremely popular weight loss tools in recent years. These apps allow you to easily track your daily food intake and exercise, keeping a running tally of calories consumed and burned.
MyFitnessPal is one of the most widely used calorie counters, with over 100 million users worldwide. You can scan barcodes on food packages to automatically log calories, or manually enter your meals and snacks. The app has an enormous database of foods to make logging easy. You can also enter your weight loss goals, and MyFitnessPal will calculate the daily calorie intake you need to reach them. The app syncs with many fitness trackers and apps to bring in your exercise data.
Lose It! offers similar food logging and barcode scanning functionality. One advantage of Lose It! is that it provides a weekly calorie budget rather than a daily one. This allows for more flexibility day to day. Lose It! also offers social features like groups for sharing recipes and workouts.
The best calorie counting apps make tracking nutrition simple and streamlined. They provide useful data like macronutrient breakdowns and have large food databases. For many people trying to lose weight, these apps are an essential tool for monitoring calorie intake and staying on track with weight loss goals. Combining calorie counting with exercise tracking provides a complete picture of your daily energy balance.
Fitness Trackers Weight Loss Tools
Fitness trackers like Fitbit and Apple Watch have become popular weight loss tools in recent years. These wearable devices track your steps, calories burned, heart rate, sleep patterns and more. Seeing your daily activity quantified in the app can motivate you to move more and reach your fitness goals.
Fitness trackers with continuous heart rate monitoring can provide a more accurate estimate of calories burned. Some trackers also have built-in GPS to track the distance, pace and route of outdoor workouts. Fitness trackers sync to the app on your smartphone to provide insights into your activity and progress.
Many fitness trackers allow you to log food and water intake as well. This makes it easy to track calories consumed versus calories burned. Newer models have more advanced features like workout detection, on-screen workouts, blood oxygen monitoring, sleep tracking and stress management tools.
Using a fitness tracker can encourage healthier habits like taking the stairs, going for a walk after dinner, standing more during the day, and getting better sleep. Seeing your activity trends over time and setting daily movement goals can motivate you to get more active and lose weight. Fitness trackers provide metrics, accountability and awareness about your daily behaviors.
Smart Scales
Smart scales go beyond just measuring your weight. They use bioelectrical impedance analysis (BIA) technology to estimate metrics like your body fat percentage, muscle mass, bone density, and more. These scales send the data to an app on your phone or tablet via Bluetooth or WiFi. This allows you to track your body composition over time.
Features that smart scales may include:
- Body fat percentage
- Body mass index (BMI)
- Muscle mass
- Bone mass
- Hydration levels
- Heart rate
- Daily calorie needs
Tracking body fat percentage can be more insightful than just weight. As you lose fat and gain muscle through diet and exercise, the number on the scale may stay the same but your body composition is improving.
Smart scales provide at-home convenience so you can check your weight and other metrics on a regular basis. Some even allow multiple users to track their own profiles. Make sure to find a smart scale that integrates with the fitness app or platform you already use.
While BIA technology can estimate body composition, it is not as accurate as clinical methods like hydrostatic weighing or DEXA scans. Smart scales are best used to spot trends rather than taking the exact numbers as fact. Make sure you place the scale on a hard, even surface and measure under consistent conditions for optimal accuracy.
Meal Delivery Services
Meal delivery services have become increasingly popular weight loss tools in recent years. Companies like Nutrisystem, Freshly, and Factor provide pre-made, calorie-controlled meals delivered fresh to your door. These services take the guesswork out of meal planning and calorie counting by providing balanced, portion-controlled meals for weight loss.
Nutrisystem is one of the most well-known meal delivery diets. They offer plans tailored to men and women, with meals containing high protein and fiber to promote satiety. Freshly delivers fresh, chef-prepared meals with simple heating instructions. All their meals are designed by nutritionists for calorie-controlled weight loss. Factor provides gourmet, chef-prepared meals that you can fully customize. You select your meals each week from a rotating menu of calorie-controlled options.
The convenience of having nutritious meals delivered takes the stress out of weight loss. You don’t have to meal prep or count calories. These services provide an easy, fool-proof approach to eating fewer calories for weight loss, while still enjoying delicious, satisfying meals. The price of the plans may be a downside, but many feel the convenience is worth the cost for successful weight loss. Meal delivery makes sticking to a weight loss plan simple.
Intermittent Fasting
Intermittent fasting (IF) has become a popular approach for weight loss in recent years. It involves cycling between periods of fasting and eating. There are several different IF methods:
- 16/8 method – This involves fasting for 16 hours per day and restricting eating to an 8-hour window. For example, skipping breakfast and only eating between 12-8pm.
- 5:2 diet – For two non-consecutive days per week, you restrict calories to 500-600 per day. The other 5 days you eat normally.
- Alternate day fasting – Fasting every other day, limiting calories to 500 on fast days.
- Eat-stop-eat – Fasting for 24 hours 1-2 times per week, eating normally on other days.
There are several benefits to intermittent fasting for weight loss:
- Promotes calorie restriction – By limiting the hours for eating, it becomes easier to reduce overall calorie intake.
- Helps control hunger – After adapting to IF, people report less hunger compared to traditional dieting. Fasting periods can help control ghrelin, the “hunger hormone”.
- Triggers ketosis – During the fasting window, your body can enter ketosis which promotes fat burning.
- Improves metabolic health – IF may help lower insulin resistance and reduce other risk factors for diabetes and heart disease.
- Easy to follow – Many people find IF more sustainable long-term compared to typical calorie counting.
Overall, intermittent fasting can be an effective approach for weight loss, especially when combined with healthy eating habits during non-fasting periods. People should choose a method that best fits their lifestyle.
Low-Carb Diets
Low-carb diets like keto, paleo, and Atkins have become very popular for weight loss in recent years. These diets all focus on reducing carbohydrate intake to help promote fat burning.
Keto
The ketogenic or “keto” diet aims to get your body into a state of ketosis, where your body switches from burning carbs to burning fat as its primary fuel source. To do this, keto limits carbs to 20-50 grams per day. Keto has been shown to lead to rapid weight loss in the first 3-6 months. However, the highly restrictive nature makes it challenging to sustain long-term for many people.
Paleo
The paleo diet encourages eating whole, unprocessed foods like meat, fish, eggs, vegetables, fruits, nuts and seeds. It avoids grains, legumes, dairy, refined sugar and highly processed foods. By focusing on protein and produce, paleo can help reduce calorie intake while still feeling satisfied. The diet has been linked to weight loss and improved health markers.
Atkins
The Atkins diet is a popular low-carb weight loss program. It emphasizes protein and fat while severely restricting carbs to 20-25 grams per day initially. The diet has four phases, gradually reintroducing carbs back into the diet once weight loss goals are met. Atkins works by lowering insulin levels and causing the body to burn stored fat for energy. Research shows Atkins may be effective for short-term weight loss.
Group Weight Loss Programs
Group weight loss programs provide structure, accountability, and community support to help people lose weight. Some popular programs include:
Jenny Craig
Jenny Craig provides pre-packaged meals and one-on-one counseling. Members meet weekly with a personal consultant who provides tailored meal plans, weighs clients, and offers motivation and accountability. The program focuses on reducing calories, fat, and portions. Members purchase Jenny Craig food which makes it easy to follow but can be expensive.
Weight Watchers
Weight Watchers (WW) uses a points-based system that assigns every food and beverage a point value based on its nutrition. Members get a personalized daily point budget to spend however they want. There are no forbidden foods but healthier choices have lower point values. Members attend weekly meetings for weigh-ins, education, and motivation. There is also an online program option.
Noom
Noom takes a psychology-based approach by promoting lifestyle changes through daily lessons on nutrition, exercise, and mindset. A personal coach checks in and provides feedback. Noom uses calorie counting and weight data for accountability. But the program goes beyond food tracking to focus on building healthy habits for the long term. There are online and in-person Noom group meetings.
Group weight loss programs can provide the structure, education, and support needed to develop healthier eating habits and achieve weight loss goals. Finding the right fit depends on each individual’s preferences and learning style. Many people benefit from the community aspect of in-person meetings while others prefer the flexibility of online-only options.
Bariatric Surgery
Bariatric surgery, also known as weight loss surgery, refers to a variety of procedures performed on people who are obese. Weight loss surgery works by reducing the size of the stomach and/or rerouting the digestive system in order to change how the body absorbs calories and nutrients. The three most common types of bariatric surgery are:
Gastric Bypass – This procedure divides the stomach into two sections and connects the upper pouch directly to the small intestine, bypassing a portion of the stomach and small intestine. This results in reduced calorie absorption as less food can be consumed and fewer nutrients are absorbed.
Sleeve Gastrectomy – This procedure removes approximately 80% of the stomach, leaving a narrow tube-like section that remains. Removing this portion of the stomach restricts the amount of food that can be consumed in one sitting.
Gastric Banding – This involves placing an inflatable band around the upper portion of the stomach to create a small pouch. The band can be adjusted to limit the passage of food to the lower part of the stomach. Gastric banding does not reduce absorption of nutrients and calories as drastically as other procedures.
Bariatric surgery can be an effective weight loss method for severely obese individuals who have not had success losing weight through diet, exercise and medication. However, these procedures involve major surgery and lifelong diet and lifestyle changes. The benefits and risks should be thoroughly evaluated with a medical professional before undergoing bariatric surgery. When performed correctly, weight loss surgery can help obese patients lose substantial weight and reduce obesity-related conditions like diabetes and heart disease.
Conclusion
When it comes to weight loss, having the right tools can make all the difference in being successful. Though there are many options to choose from, some tools tend to be more effective than others for most people.
Calorie counting apps like MyFitnessPal allow you to easily track your calorie intake, an important factor in weight loss. Paired with a fitness tracker like a Fitbit, you can get an accurate picture of your daily calorie burn as well. Using a smart scale helps track your progress through body fat percentage readings and other metrics beyond just weight.
Intermittent fasting and low-carb diets have shown tremendous success for weight loss in studies, likely due to their ability to control appetite and calories. Group programs like Weight Watchers provide accountability through weekly weigh-ins and support from others going through the same journey.
For those with severe obesity, bariatric surgery is an option that research shows can enable dramatic weight loss of 50 pounds or more within the first 6 months to a year after surgery. However, it does carry risks and lifestyle changes are still required afterward.
Overall, having tools that help you track calories, activity, and progress can boost your chances of losing weight successfully. Combined with dietary approaches that control hunger and peer support, you can develop the habits needed for lasting weight management.
