Should i weight every day or not?

andrejjausovec

If you are trying to loose some extra weight, short answer in my opinion: Yes.
In loosing weight, every day is a strugle and it is very motivating if you see next day in the morning a little progrese and therefore you know you are heading in the right direction 💪💪💪

MikePTY

It depends on the person. For some people it is beneficial to weigh every day, for others they find having that much data to be stressful and prefer to do it weekly or even longer. There is really no right answer it depends on the person.

But here is something important: if you weigh everyday, the scale will NOT show progress everyday. Weight fluctuates from a large number of factors and it is very normal if doing daily weigh ins to have days where you are higher and lower. Part of the benefit of daily weigh ins is that it gives you a better understanding that weight fluctuates for a lot of random reasons and paying too much attention to the short term is counter productive. If you weigh in every day expecting the scale to be lower every day, you will be disappointed.

andrejjausovec

MikePTY wrote: »

It depends on the person. For some people it is beneficial to weigh every day, for others they find having that much data to be stressful and prefer to do it weekly or even longer. There is really no right answer it depends on the person.

But here is something important: if you weigh everyday, the scale will NOT show progress everyday. Weight fluctuates from a large number of factors and it is very normal if doing daily weigh ins to have days where you are higher and lower. Part of the benefit of daily weigh ins is that it gives you a better understanding that weight fluctuates for a lot of random reasons and paying too much attention to the short term is counter productive. If you weigh in every day expecting the scale to be lower every day, you will be disappointed.

As you said, one good part of daily weighing is a better understanding of everyday fluctations. As you weigh every day, you will gradually begin to understand which food and drinks... efect on you momentarly weight. Therefore in time you will have a better control and understanding what is going on with your body, therefore less fustratition.
If you have a smart scale, you can see your progres on week, month and year basis.
I understand that for some people can everyday weighing be absurd/stressfull/fustrating/... but it is also more likely that you will have less cheat days. If you set realistic goals (loosing weight should be slow) and you eat as planned then the strugle with weight management will not be so hard.

tinkerbellang83

andrejjausovec wrote: »

MikePTY wrote: »

It depends on the person. For some people it is beneficial to weigh every day, for others they find having that much data to be stressful and prefer to do it weekly or even longer. There is really no right answer it depends on the person.

But here is something important: if you weigh everyday, the scale will NOT show progress everyday. Weight fluctuates from a large number of factors and it is very normal if doing daily weigh ins to have days where you are higher and lower. Part of the benefit of daily weigh ins is that it gives you a better understanding that weight fluctuates for a lot of random reasons and paying too much attention to the short term is counter productive. If you weigh in every day expecting the scale to be lower every day, you will be disappointed.

As you said, one good part of daily weighing is a better understanding of everyday fluctations. As you weigh every day, you will gradually begin to understand which food and drinks... efect on you momentarly weight. Therefore in time you will have a better control and understanding what is going on with your body, therefore less fustratition.
If you have a smart scale, you can see your progres on week, month and year basis.
I understand that for some people can everyday weighing be absurd/stressfull/fustrating/... but it is also more likely that you will have less cheat days. If you set realistic goals (loosing weight should be slow) and you eat as planned then the strugle with weight management will not be so hard.

I don't think cheat days (not something a term I prescribe to) have anything to do with weighing in. Why do you think people are less likely to have a planned day/meal of higher calories (what I understand to be most people's idea of a "cheat day/meal").

I weigh daily and it has absolutely no bearing on what I eat for the day, it's just something I do as part of my morning routine. The affect of food and drinks is largely to do with digestive processes and water retention, not fat loss/gain, so all you would be controlling is how much water your body is hanging on to, which is pointless unless you have a medical reason to be doing so.

For some people, weighing daily helps by allowing them to understand that total body weight fluctuates constantly regardless of whether you're in a deficit or not, thus removing the anxiety/fear/anger of seeing the scale several pounds up after spending a week of "doing everything right". For these people seeing the scale go up and down those couple of pounds and being able to attribute it to a day of higher sodium/carbs, a more intense exercise workout (DOMS) or particularly in women, the influence of hormones (amongst many other things) can be rather liberating.

It's not for everyone though, some people are still not able to separate their emotions from the number on the scale.

Jthanmyfitnesspal

From a preventative point of view, you should exercise regularly, eat a healthy balanced diet that controls your weight, and weigh daily to check your weight over time. If you add to this low or no alcohol and not smoking or vaping, you have significantly lowered your risk of a broad range of diseases.

Of course, you needn't stop there in terms of self-tests. You could also do a pinch test, track your max HR, VO2max, and such. (My watch does it automatically.)

I say all that to point out that weighing yourself daily is one of the simplest metrics you can track. So, unless it puts you into a deep depression, I say yes.

Constance320

If I weigh daily, im likely to eat more because the scale didnt change anyway. I get way to depressed.

missysippy930

andrejjausovec wrote: »

If you are trying to loose some extra weight, short answer in my opinion: Yes.
In loosing weight, every day is a strugle and it is very motivating if you see next day in the morning a little progrese and therefore you know you are heading in the right direction 💪💪💪

As with most things related to weight loss, it’s personal preference.

For me, weighing daily, at the same time and place, keeps me motivated. I fully understand those who weigh less frequently. Showing no loss, and even gains, can be frustrating.

GreenValli

I find it helpful to weigh everyday. My scale weighs tenths of a pound. I lose weight very slowly and even seeing a tenth of a pound less on that scale is a victory for me and motivating.

Shortgirlrunning

I weigh in every day. I feel like it puts me in the right mindset at the start of every day (no matter what the number does) and it’s helped me understand how my weight fluctuates and has made those fluctuations significantly less frustrating.

I also track my weight in Happy Scale to get a moving average.

unstableunicorn

Shortgirlrunning wrote: »

I weigh in every day. I feel like it puts me in the right mindset at the start of every day (no matter what the number does) and it’s helped me understand how my weight fluctuates and has made those fluctuations significantly less frustrating.

I also track my weight in Happy Scale to get a moving average.

I made a post a week ago saying pretty well the same! My weight has been up about 3lbs this week, and although it is a bit annoying I haven’t been stressed about it because daily tracking helped me determine when in my cycle I’ll start retaining water.

threewins

Here's my opinion.

Don't weigh so often that you get scale anxiety for each fluctuation.

Don't weigh so infrequently that zero loss will make you doubt yourself.

Theoretically, you don't need to weigh yourself at all if you track your intake accurately. The problem is that you don't actually know when your tracking has an error until you weigh yourself. Probably weigh yourself once a month just to check the numbers match up.

RelCanonical

I weigh monthly, I didn't like the see the fluctuations. I've done it before, so I had enough knowledge to just trust the process of logging, and enjoy seeing a loss pretty much any time I weigh. I time my weighing to my cycle to reduce the most significant water weight fluctuations.

jhanleybrown

I used to (as in the far distant past of last week) weigh in once per week. I'm losing weight but at a rate of 1 lb per week.

Started weighing in daily based on advice here. When I did it once per week water fluctuations etc could give me an up or down weight. That was very demotivating for me. Weighing every day now and just look at running seven day average of my weight. Don't sweat the high days and get less excited about the low days as they are just 1/7th of my estimate of my actual weight.

Much better for me. Thumbs up on daily.

Just wish MFP would auto calculate my 7 day average running weight.

LyndaBSS

I weigh daily for a few reasons:

It keeps me engaged in the process. It puts my focus on my journey from the moment I wake up which helps keep me accountable.

My scale syncs to a trending app and mfp. I wouldn’t even have to look at the number on the scale if I didn’t want to. But I do look.

I understand that fluctuations and plateaus are a normal and expected part of losing weight. I don’t freak out over the number on the scale. I trust my trending and can actually anticipate when I will hit a stall which eliminates a lot of stress.