Please stop telling people that muscle weighs more than fat

Yurippe
Yurippe Posts: 850 Member
edited September 21 in Health and Weight Loss
http://www.onemorebite-weightloss.com/muscle-to-fat.html

Muscle Does Not Weigh More Than Fat (five pounds is five pounds), but it is Much Nicer to Look at

5 Lb. Fat vs. 5 Lb. Muscle (picture in link above)
As you can see, the 5 lbs. of fat is much bulkier than the 5 lbs. of muscle, but five pounds is still five pounds. Muscle does not weigh more than fat.

Fat is bulky and lumpy so if you carry an extra five pounds of fat, you'll be lumpier than with five pounds more muscle. A five pound pile of fat will take up more space (volume) than a five pound pile of muscle; but five pounds is still five pounds, so for those of you that don't "get" English, you cannot say one thing weighing a certain weight weighs more than another thing at that same weight. It's a common joke to play on an 8-year old. The correct way to state the muscle weighs more than fat scenario is, "Muscle is heavier by volume than fat."

A woman weighing 150 pounds with 19% fat will look much smaller (and be much healthier) than a woman at 150 pounds with 35% fat. They weigh the same, yet the composition is different. Because muscle is more dense than fat the person with less fat and more muscle will look smaller.

Stop being so obsessed with body weight and start paying attention to body composition. How much body fat do you have compared to muscle? Simply seeing how much you weigh isn't very helpful.
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Replies

  • cbirdso
    cbirdso Posts: 465 Member
    You are correct!
  • LuckyLeprechaun
    LuckyLeprechaun Posts: 6,296 Member
    simpler: muscle is denser than fat.

    5 lbs=5lbs, but just like feathers and bowing balls, it is the difference in volume that makes us look chubby or sleek.
  • thirtyby40
    thirtyby40 Posts: 702 Member
    Well put. It is like the old riddle " What weighs more a pound of butter or a pound of feathers?"
  • erickirb
    erickirb Posts: 12,294 Member
    In one way you are right but I disagree, a pound is a pound but the same volume muscle weighs quite a bit more than fat, hence muscle weighs more than fat. This is what people mean when they say muscle weighs more than fat.

    For some reason people like to go to your argument just to say someone is wrong, which completely misses the point the other one was saying. In other words if you loose inches and not weight, most likely you gained some muscle as, for the same volume, muscle weighs more than fat.
  • Naokoheart
    Naokoheart Posts: 161
    The fat replica is repulsive. ;/
    But yes I agree muscle and fat in equal weight measurements are the same weight,
    they just look different and have different volumes/shape.
  • Mirlyn
    Mirlyn Posts: 256
    Semantics. There's no use to argue over them. The saying, "muscle weighs more than fat," is not literal, it's referring to density obviously. I don't think anyone is actually under the impression that a pound of muscle weighs more than a pound of fat.
  • jrkingery
    jrkingery Posts: 107 Member
    In one way you are right but I disagree, a pound is a pound but the same volume of muscle weighs quite a bit more than fat, hence muscle weighs more than fat. This is what people mean when they say muscle weighs more than fat.

    For some reason people like to go to your argument just to say someone is wrong, which completely misses the point the other one was saying. In other words if you loose inches and not weight, most likely you gained some muscle as, for the same volume, muscle weighs more than fat.

    Agreed.

    A pound is a pound it's true. But that isn't the point of someone saying that muscle weighs more than fat. If measured in volume it most certainly does weigh much more. Which is why as you said, you can lose inches and actually remain the same or even gain weight.
  • erickirb
    erickirb Posts: 12,294 Member
    Semantics. There's no use to argue over them. The saying, "muscle weighs more than fat," is not literal, it's referring to density obviously. I don't think anyone is actually under the impression that a pound of muscle weighs more than a pound of fat.

    Exactly my point.
  • BeautifulScarsWECHANGED
    BeautifulScarsWECHANGED Posts: 749 Member
    AMEN SISTA! I had to correct this same statement earlier today. Muscle takes up less space than fat, but a pound is a pound! It all comes back to the age old question, which weights more? A pound of feathers or a pound of gold. They both weigh the same!!

    :laugh:
  • mommamills
    mommamills Posts: 437
    Semantics. There's no use to argue over them. The saying, "muscle weighs more than fat," is not literal, it's referring to density obviously. I don't think anyone is actually under the impression that a pound of muscle weighs more than a pound of fat.


    agreed. I think lots of times it's a nice way of making someone feel a lil better about gaining 2#. As stated before, the weight is equal but it takes longer than a week to gain muscle! The best way to monitor progress is with the use of the scale AND the measuring tape. :wink:
  • Ryhenblue
    Ryhenblue Posts: 390 Member
    I think when most people say muscle weighs more than fat they mean it's denser. Like when some one says they've been working out and eating correctly and they're not losing weigh but are losing inches. So muscle does weigh more (denser) than fat. If you had the same volume of muscle and fat sitting side by side the muscle would weigh more than fat. So telling people that muscle weighs more is not incorrect.
  • questionablemethods
    questionablemethods Posts: 2,174 Member
    Semantics. There's no use to argue over them. The saying, "muscle weighs more than fat," is not literal, it's referring to density obviously. I don't think anyone is actually under the impression that a pound of muscle weighs more than a pound of fat.


    Yup. I think that anyone with two brain cells to rub together understands that a pound of anything weighs a pound, but they understand the intended meaning of the phrase.
  • trainernw
    trainernw Posts: 3
    Finally, somebody gets it! Well put.
  • Tamie_Girl
    Tamie_Girl Posts: 218 Member
    What I think is funny is when I have a set-back in my weight-loss and somebody will say, "well, remember, muscle weighs more than fat, blah, blah, blah"

    I wanted to say, "spare me, I had a set-back because I ate too much".

    People think that just because you started working out that all of the sudden you've got all this muscle to replace the fat rolls. LOL

    :bigsmile: :bigsmile: :bigsmile:
  • RoadDog
    RoadDog Posts: 2,946 Member
    Muscle Weighs more than Fat !! by Volume
  • trainernw
    trainernw Posts: 3
    Yeah, but deep down we all know that the bowling ball weighs just a little bit more!
  • lilmissy2
    lilmissy2 Posts: 595 Member
    I don't really get how '5lbs fat = 5lbs muscle' is relevant to the saying 'muscle weighs more than fat'. The whole point of the saying is that you can have a lower body volume without having a lower weight if you have more muscle... I agree that people definitely get that it's compared by volume.
  • lilmissy2
    lilmissy2 Posts: 595 Member
    Yeah, but deep down we all know that the bowling ball weighs just a little bit more!

    hahahaha love it!
  • ZebraHead
    ZebraHead Posts: 15,207 Member
    This is why you get smaller but still can weigh the same or more.
  • cocacole77
    cocacole77 Posts: 53
    I've never heard anyone say that muscle is heavier than fat BUT, like someone said before, muscle is more dense. So you could have 5lbs of dense muscle and 5lbs of less dense fat. Put them next to eachother and it appears that there is more fat! Another example is what was said before...you could take a 5lb Bowling ball and 5lb's of feathers and there are going to be A LOT of feathers!!
  • trainernw
    trainernw Posts: 3
    More importantly, I think we need to post Body fat % in conjunction with lbs. I would hate to see people lose muscle and celebrate it.
  • hiddensecant
    hiddensecant Posts: 2,446 Member
    Do you also get annoyed when people claim that bricks are heavier than feathers? :tongue:
  • RoadDog
    RoadDog Posts: 2,946 Member
    A pound is a pound, unless you're in England, then a pound equals $1.48 USD.
  • oats4breakfast
    oats4breakfast Posts: 225
    yes more dense so 1 cubic measure of fat will weigh less than 1 cubic measure of muscle, however 1 pound of fat is the same as 1 pound of muscle.
    Another thing people don't always consider when they workout etc and wonder why they don't weigh less, and may/may not be seeing inches drop or muscle increase, is your bones can get more denser too, especially when working with weight.... so the "same bone" may eventually weigh more. Which is heavier ? Our bones when we're couch potatoes or our bones a year later being a gym rat ?
  • Tuckersn
    Tuckersn Posts: 149
    hahaha! My thought exactly. Or they used to tell me this when I was growing up, much chubbier, that muscle weighed more than fat. It wasn't muscle that made me weigh so much, I can tell you now.
  • JStarnes
    JStarnes Posts: 5,576 Member
    A pound is a pound, unless you're in England, then a pound equals $1.48 USD.
    Touché
  • iluvsparkles
    iluvsparkles Posts: 1,730 Member
    A pound is a pound, unless you're in England, then a pound equals $1.48 USD.

    LOL. That's what I'm talkin' about!
  • BarbieCat1
    BarbieCat1 Posts: 82
    This illustrates the problem with relying too heavily on the BMI scale. It only measures weight, not the % of fat vs. muscle [not to mention one's age or skeleton type]

    A healthy, trim looking but muscular person might be considered obese using that scale alone, while a slender but flabby person would rate as fit.
  • BullDozier
    BullDozier Posts: 237 Member
    Stop being so obsessed with body weight and start paying attention to body composition. How much body fat do you have compared to muscle? Simply seeing how much you weigh isn't very helpful.
    Isn't that the whole idea behind the saying "muscle weighs more than fat?" My wife, who exercises like crazy (she teaches about 10 various fitness classes each week) is upset she is not losing weight, but everyone keeps telling her she looks different. Her clothes fit different, and she keeps looking better. Everytime she brings it up this is what I tell her; stop looking at the scale and start looking in the mirror, you're losing fat but the weight isn't changing because your body composition is changing.
  • mworld
    mworld Posts: 270
    actually, here in the USA I tend to believe that fat weighs more than muscle.
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