Intermittent Fasting

Admission up front: I didn't IF to lose weight, or to maintain. I have nothing against IF, though. It can be a good choice for those whom it suits.

Even with IF, in order to lose weight, a person needs to eat fewer calories than they burn. If that were not true - if IF automatically and inherently triggered weight loss - people would need to give up IF when they reach goal weight, in order to stop losing. Some people maintain fine with an IF eating schedule.

Some people find that limiting their eating hours automagically reduces their calorie intake, so they can succeed at weight loss without calorie counting alongside. But not everyone has that experience: Some can readily fit excess calories into a shorter eating window and gain on the IF schedule.

If you track your calories, you'll know where you stand. If you find you're easily eating in a calorie deficit on the IF schedule without much extra effort, you may be able to stop calorie counting, or at least take a break from it until your weight loss stalls out for a month or so. If you find you'd still tend to over-eat even on a IF schedule, then calorie counting will help you with weight loss.

Myself, like I said, I didn't limit eating hours at all. I just counted calories, and stayed within goal (on average). That worked fine for me.

P.S. Some people don't like the term "intermittent fasting" for the kind of schedule you're talking about, thinking it should be used only for cases where people (say) stop eating entirely some days. Those people prefer the term "Time Restricted Eating (TRE)" for the kind of schedule you've mentioned. Personally, I don't care what term you use as long as we know what talking about, and you've been quite clear. But you might get some quibbles or alternative terminology from others.

Best wishes for success with IF!

Welcome to the community!

You are very wise to recognize that time-restricted eating is no magic bullet. You still have to be in a caloric deficit to lose fat. I could totally eat more than my allowed calories in eight ours.

I'm doing 16:8 too. I sleep eight hours, and I only eat when I'm awake. Clearly I also have to log and use the tools here to make sure I stay close to my target plus or minus a little bit to be in maintenance or be in deficit when losing.

The other thing you probably already know is that you also have to STICK TO IT! If it turns out that time-restricted eating doesn't work for you, you can still succeed if you use the tools here. I think you'll do it.