Protein Intake — How Much Protein Should You Eat per Day?
Because protein is a macronutrient, it’s essential for the proper function of all of your body’s tissues and organs. Protein helps build muscles, keeps bones strong, and maintains a steady energy supply throughout the day.
A high-protein diet can also help you lose weight because it takes more energy to metabolize proteins than carbohydrates or fats. This is called the thermic effect of food, which refers to the number of calories required to digest it.
[1]. Once digested, protein produces fewer calories per gram than both carbohydrate and fat
[2]. In addition, eating more protein can be beneficial before or after exercise because this has been shown to improve strength training performance
[3] as well as muscle gains. Protein works a little differently depending on whether you’re a healthy individual or an athlete.
[4]. In general, strength athletes should aim for around 1.4 – 2 grams of protein per kilogram of body weight each day
[5] while endurance athletes can have as much as 3 – 4 grams of protein per kilo
[6]. If you’re new to exercise, a fat loss program that includes some resistance training is an excellent place to start. This help increase your lean muscle mass and strength
[7] and is also a great way to burn fat.
Protein Intake for Athletes:
Athletes need more protein than the average person because it provides them with the energy and fuel to excel in their sport. Protein also helps build, repair and maintain muscle tissue after strenuous training sessions.
Protein Intake for the Average Person:
The average person can benefit from eating around 0.8 grams of protein per kilo each day. This will help you maintain healthy muscle size and function throughout your life. Consuming adequate amounts of protein also prevents muscle loss when you’re not exercising, which is why this diet approach has been shown to improve weight loss outcomes.
If you don’t exercise regularly or have a chronic illness, you must eat enough protein because your body needs more energy, nutrients, and fuel to keep going daily. Athletes generally need more protein than the average person because they burn more energy and nutrients to fuel their activities.
Protein Intake for Weight Loss:
There are many benefits of including protein in your diet, especially when losing weight. A higher-protein diet helps reduce appetite and boosts metabolism through the thermic effect of food.
This means that your body uses more calories to break down protein foods than it does carbohydrates or fat. Fortunately, increasing your protein intake also doesn’t mean increasing portion sizes or counting calories daily.
You can get all the benefits by making slight changes to your everyday meals. For example, if you typically eat cereal with milk for breakfast each day, switch cereals or add milk to your cereal. This simple change can boost your protein intake significantly while keeping calories and portion sizes the same.
Protein Intake Summary:
A high-protein diet boosts metabolism, fills you up, and reduces appetite, making it easier to lose weight. Because of this, higher-protein diets are beneficial for people who don’t exercise regularly because they generally eat less and burn fewer calories every day.
Athletes also need more protein than average because they’re burning a lot of energy in their sport. Increasing your daily protein intake by even 10% helps improve weight loss outcomes which is why we recommend that everyone increase their daily intake by just consuming one or two low-calorie, high-protein snacks each day.
How much protein does a woman need:
Protein plays a significant role in the building and repairing of muscle mass. For this reason, we must get enough protein into our diets to maintain (or build) these muscles. How much protein do you need per day, and how can you ensure you’re getting enough?
The Recommended Daily Allowance (RDA) for protein for adults is between 46-56 grams daily, with children requiring 30 grams per day. Many dieticians and nutritionists believe that this amount is too low and plan their diets accordingly. Those who work out regularly may need more depending on the intensity and length of their workouts – muscle cells demand more fuel than most other cells in the body, leading many to recommend 1 gram of protein per pound of body weight.
While the RDA guidelines are a great place to start, it’s important to remember that many factors can affect your protein needs. For example, if you’ve just started exercising regularly or you’re cutting calories for weight loss, you may need more than the standard amount.
Your protein requirements will also change if you’re pregnant or breastfeeding; Nourish The Nest recommends 71 grams of protein per day during pregnancy and 62 grams per day while nursing.
Other groups like active children (ages 4-13), teenagers (ages 14-18), and active adults (ages 19+) will also have different recommendations depending on their caloric intake. On average, however, most nutritionists recommend between 0.8 – 1 gram of protein per pound of body weight.
Protein requirements by age:-Protein requirements increase with age. Daily protein needed is based on body weight (not lean body mass).
0-6 months:
7–12 months: 16 grams per day (g/d)
1–3 years: 25 g/d
4–8 years: 34 g/d
9–13 years: 44 g/d
14–18 years (boys): 52 g/d
14–18 years (girls): 46 g/d
19+ years (men): 56 g/day 19+ years (women): 46 g/day
Athletes’ protein needs vary depending upon training goals, intensity, duration, and more. We recommend consulting with a certified athletic trainer or nutritionist to determine your protein needs based on your personal information. According to the Dietary Reference Intakes, healthy adults require 0.4 g of protein per pound of bodyweight daily for maintenance.
There’s a delicate balance between too much and too little protein in health and disease. While some research suggests that high-protein diets may cause damage to the kidneys over time, other studies conclude that it is still safe for most individuals.
The Institute of Medicine recommends against very high protein levels (1g/kg/d) unless you have pre-existing kidney disease. However, suppose you do not have any existing kidney issues or illnesses. In that case, they say that higher intakes are acceptable as long as you keep up with your recommended hydration levels.