Can you lose fat and gain muscle at the same time?

I spend a lot of time answering questions as a Registered Dietitian and online weight loss coach - with our clients, people I meet at parties, on the Orangetheory subreddit, instagram, tiktok…. the list goes on. I love it, its super fun for me and I love helping people. That's what keeps me going!

There's been a trend lately where I keep seeing one question pop up over and over: How can I lose fat while gaining muscle?Muscle building is an additive, or anabolic process. Fat loss is a subtractive, or catabolic process.  

These are directly opposed to each other, and trying to do both is going to leave you frustrated and feeling like you're failing. You aren't, it's just really hard to do both of these together!

But… there are some specific cases when you can gain muscle while losing fat:

1. If you're starting a new lifting program or returning to training after a long break

2. If you were previously not eating a high protein diet, and start eating more protein

3. You're eating maintenance calorie levels, and slowly trading fat for muscle *note when I say slowly, I mean that you'll see results over many months or years. This takes patience.

My Recommendation: Pick one goal.

You're either in a calorie deficit (fat loss),calorie maintenance, or surplus (muscle gain). Don't try to do both. If you end up gaining a bit of muscle during fat loss, that's awesome! But if you don't, that's normal too. 

The goal in a calorie deficit (fat loss) phase is to MAINTAIN the muscle you've got. This will make it look and feel like you've gained muscle, because the % of your body weight from muscle will go up and it will be revealed from under the fat!

What should you prioritize for fat loss?

1. Strength train. Strength training will tell your body that you need the muscle you have, and not to use it for fuel. The exact frequency of strength training that you need is not known yet, but I'd say 2 hours per week with a program that balances all the groups would be sufficient.

2. Eat protein. Your body doesn't store protein very well, so if you don't eat protein and your body needs it, it will break down your skeletal muscle to get it. You need to eat enough protein every day, ideally spread throughout the day, to make sure this doesn't happen. (check out my favorite high protein, macro friendly snacks here!)

3. Recovery & Sleep: if you don't get enough sleep, you'll be hungrier and it'll be hard to stay in a calorie deficit. Your workouts also won't be as good, and you'll be more sore. Plus all the other benefits we get from sleep!

4. Cardio: cardio helps to increase your calorie deficit. Some people also find it decreases their stress and therefore stress eating, which is a big benefit too. If you find that cardio makes you more hungry, try walking for cardio instead

5. Supplements. Don't worry about this unless your nutrition and training are on point! If they are, I recommend looking into magnesium glycinate, vitamin D, iron (during menstruation), and creatine 

   For muscle gain, the principles are similar. You still need to strength train, but 2 hours a week won't get you far. I'd recommend 4-6 hours per week. You don't need more protein because your body isn't in “breakdown” mode, but you will need to eat more calories so that your body is maintaining or gaining weight. 

How much protein do you need to maintain muscle while losing fat, or to gain muscle?

Here's an easy calculation:

Women: 100g protein + 5g for every inch of height over 5 feet. So for example, a 5' 4" woman would need about 120g per day.

Men: 106g protein + 6g for every inch of height over 5 feet. So, for example, a 5' 10" man would need about 166g protein per day. 

What about Maintenance or Body Recomposition?

Body recomposition is when you keep your bodyweight the same, but lose fat and gain muscle changing your overall body fat and muscle percentages, as well as your physique.

In order to do this, you need to eat a mainenance level of calories and adequate protein, as well as strength train 4-6 hours per week.

This is great if you have just a few pounds you’d like to lose, but if you want to lose a substantial amount of weight (more than 5-10 lbs) then its going to prove very slow and frustrating. Generally body recomposition will start to show results in a few months. It’ll be faster if you’re new to weight lifting as you will gain muscle quicker, and it’ll be slower the more advanced you are since you’ll already have a solid baseline of muscle.

If you choose this route, make sure that you are taking measurements regularly with a measuring tape. Fat calipers or some other way to measure body fat can also be useful, and so can doing periodic strength tests to see if you’re gaining strength. Since you’re relying on the scale staying the same, you won’t be able to use it as a measure of your progress, but you do want to make sure that your efforts are paying off!

Get my Protein Power Plan with more information about protein as well as a week of 125g a day protein examples here!