How Much Should You Exercise to Lose Weight?

 

 

This article was written by Leta Shy and repurposed with permission from POPSUGAR Fitness.

The contestants on The Biggest Loser spend hours a day in the gym with one goal in mind—to lose the most weight. But how frequently should you exercise to drop pounds in the real world? For Michelle Bridges, a trainer on the Australian version of the show and author of Total Body Transformation, the amount of time you work out every week can unlock a key to weight-loss success that is about more than just caloric burn.

Bridge's magic number for her weight-loss clients: six days a week, ideally for 50 to 60 minutes at a time. But while hours of exercise a week will surely help you create a calorie deficit, that's not the only reason the trainer wants her clients to find time for a work out almost every day. "We're setting up habits and rituals," says Bridge. "Think about the last time you had to psych yourself up to brush your teeth," she says. In other words, when your workout becomes just another part of your day, you're more likely to do it without a second thought.