Different diets have varying rules regarding how many carbohydrates you can eat each day. Most low-carb diets forbid the simple carbs from milk and sugar, and limit you to complex carbs, such as those found in whole-grain products, legumes and starchy vegetables. MedlinePlus recommends consuming between 40 and 60 percent of your calories each day in the form of carbohydrates, but low-carb diets contend these proportions are too much for weight loss.
Atkins Diet
In its Induction phase, the Atkins Diet limits total carbohydrates to 20 g per day. After Induction, you may begin adding complex carbohydrates into your diet in increments until you complete the plan and figure out how many carbs you can consume daily without gaining weight. In the final two phases, Pre-Maintenance and Lifetime Maintenance, you increase your servings of complex carbohydrates by an additional 10 g per day each week. If you do this, as the diet advises, you should have one 10 g serving of complex carbohydrates per day the first week and 20 g the second week, increasing 10 g per week until you stop losing weight. A 10 g serving would amount to about 1/2 cup of lentils or 1/4 cup of brown rice.
South Beach Diet
The focus of the South Beach Diet is switching carbs that are high on the glycemic index for carbs low on the glycemic index from the beginning of the diet. High glycemic carbs hit your bloodstream in a rush and cause your blood sugar to spike. Low glycemic foods, such as complex carbohydrates, are converted to blood sugar, or glucose, more slowly. The South Beach Diet encourages you to eat complex carbs. It's a moderate low-carb diet, and it allows about 140 g per day in its final phase. If you balance this out over three meals and two snacks per day, you should have five servings of about 28 g each.
The Zone Diet
The Zone Diet does much of your thinking for you in terms of servings. The diet suggest getting 40 percent of your calories from carbohydrates each day and it assigns your food selections into "blocks" to make this easy. An average woman can consume 11 blocks each of carbohydrates, fat and protein per day. You should eat three blocks of carbohydrates at each meal and one block with each of two snacks. Each carbohydrate block equals 9 g. The Zone Diet limits you to "healthy" carbs, which include complex carbohydrates and the simple carbs found in fruit. You should eat 27 g with each of your meals and 9 g with each snack, for a total of five servings per day.
Tip
You can design your own low-carb diet to suit your individual needs and weight-loss goals. If you decide you want to limit yourself to 100 g of carbohydrates per day, decide how many meals and snacks you're going to allow yourself. If you choose to have three meals and two snacks per day, you could allow yourself a serving of complex carbohydrates at each meal of about 26 g each, and about 10 g for each snack. This would total five servings a day.
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