How Much Weight Would I Lose Drinking The Right Amount Of Water?

Diet and weight-loss resources sometimes point to drinking water as an easy way to lose weight, or at least as a way to help your efforts to follow a more rigorous weight-loss program. It's true that the zero-calorie nature of water can help you lose weight, and hydration is almost always a good thing. The question that remains is just how much weight can it cause you to lose.

Weight Loss Basics

Losing weight means burning more calories than you take in. If you take in more calories than you burn, your body stores the excess energy as fat for later access. If you burn more than you take in, your body accesses the stored energy. You burn the fat, and you lose weight. Water can contribute to this process in two distinct ways.

Calories Burned

Water is what's known as a "negative calorie food." It takes more calories for your body to process a drink of water than the water carries, meaning you'll burn about 1 calorie per ounce of water your drink. Although this does technically mean drinking water can directly contribute to weight loss, at that rate you would need to drink 27 gallons of water to add up to one pound's worth of calories.

Filling Up

Diet and fitness experts including Bill Phillips and Dr. Mehmet Oz recommend drinking a large glass of water immediately before a meal, and as your first response to any hunger cravings between meals. This practice fills your stomach with water and helps you eat less at mealtimes, and resist the temptation of between meal snacking. According to CNN health correspondent Dr. Melina Jampolis, this practice alone can reduce your eating by enough to lose more than a pound per month --- even when not paired with a weight-loss diet.

How Much Weight Will You Lose?

The specific amount of weight you'll lose will depend on how much you drink, and how little food you eat. However, it's safe to say that even the combination of both water weight-loss plans will result in very slow weight loss, less than a pound per week. If you're serious about losing weight, you should consider drinking water an adjunct to other weight-loss efforts, not a weight-loss plan in and of itself. A reduced-calorie diet and regular exercise are the most common ways to promote weight loss; consult your doctor before beginning any new plan.