Meal frequency is one of the most heavily debated topics in the nutrition industry. Some people advocate for eating 6 meals a day, while others advocate that intermittent fasting is the key to health, but where does the truth lie? Here is a breakdown of the pros and cons of meal timing for various goals and an answer to the age-old question: how often should you eat?

Meal Timing 101

The first rule of meal timing is that what and how much you eat is more important than when you eat.

While the timing of your meals can impact energy levels, blood sugar, and performance, consuming nutrient-rich whole foods has more health benefits than when you eat, and the number of calories you consume has a greater impact on weight and body composition than when you eat those calories ⁽¹⁾.

One of the most commonly debated arguments for meal timing is that more frequent, smaller meals boost metabolism, while less frequent, larger meals slow metabolism. This theory is based on the idea that there is an increase in the thermic effect of foods (TEF) after eating, which provides a bump in metabolic rate.

Unfortunately, while TEF does contribute roughly 10% to the calories burned via digestion, it is directly proportional to the total calories consumed ⁽²⁾. For example, if a woman has a calorie target of 1,800 calories a day for weight loss, her meals and calories burned through TEF could break down as follows:

Overall, the total calories burned through TEF are the same regardless of meal frequency, which further reinforces the idea that what and how much you eat is more important than when you eat. The “best” meal timing and meal frequency strategy comes down to the individual, their lifestyle, and their goals.

Factors in Optimal Meal Frequency

If you’re wondering how often you should eat, here are some factors to consider:

1. Personal Preference

The biggest factor to consider when determining how often you should eat is personal preference. As the evidence shows, there is no single rule or best strategy when it comes to meal frequency, rather, it comes down to what works best for the individual. Whether you prefer to eat 3 times a day or 6 times a day, the best approach is the one you like and can adhere to.

2. Schedule

A person’s schedule also plays a big role in determining what meal frequency strategy to choose. People with busy schedules may find a couple of larger meals a more practical choice, while individuals with more flexible schedules may find smaller snack-size meals more appealing.

3. Hunger Cues

While eating when you’re hungry and stopping when you’re full may seem like the obvious approach to meal frequency, it’s not always as simple as it may seem. Not only can lifestyles and schedules get in the way, but intuitive eating can be difficult for certain individuals, especially those who have spent years dieting.

For some eating fewer larger meals may help some with portion control and feelings of fullness, while for others simply cannot function without multiple meals and snacks throughout the day. Regardless of the approach, it is best to use the hunger and fullness scale to help get in tune with your body’s natural cues to ensure you’re eating in a way that honors it.

4. Digestion

Digestive symptoms also play a role in determining how often you should eat. If eating larger meals less frequently leaves you sluggish and fatigued, smaller meals more often may be a better approach. Moreover, in addition to the frequency of meals, the macronutrient balance of meals can worsen or improve blood sugar control, which can influence the hunger cues and the need for more or less meals throughout the day.

5. Goals

Your personal goals are very important to consider when determining how often you should eat. While meal frequency does not directly affect metabolism or fat loss, it can increase dietary adherence, making goals easier to achieve. Moreover, sport-specific goals, such as increased strength, improved speed, or improved physique, may require unique dietary strategies and meal timing.

6. Culture

Culture also plays a role in the pattern of meals throughout the day. Not only does our culture impact what we eat, but it impacts meal frequency and timing, as well as preparation methods, mealtime etiquette, and more. While some cultures are known to eat 3 times a day, “breakfast”, “lunch”, and “dinner”, other cultures are known for eating only once a day.

Meal Frequency for Weight Loss

Contrary to popular belief, the idea that eating smaller meals more frequently boosts metabolism to increase fat loss is a myth. While digestion does slightly increase metabolic rate, the frequency of your meals has little to no effect compared to the total calories consumed throughout the day.

Multiple studies have shown that eating many smaller meals or fewer larger meals, given an equal amount of daily calories, has no significant effect on weight loss ^{(3, 4, 5)}. Rather, it is the creation of a calorie deficit and the net balance of calories at the end of the day, week, and month that supports weight loss, not when you eat those calories.

Furthermore, the concept of skipping breakfast to accomplish “fasted cardio” (i.e. cardio occurs when you exercise on an empty stomach) has long been claimed to enhance the fat loss process but is largely irrelevant for weight loss. While there may be greater fat oxidation (i.e. fat “burning”) during exercise done in a fasted state, this does not translate directly to body composition changes over time, given it is the net fat balance that matters at the end of the day ^{(6, 7)}. This means that even if you burn fat during exercise, if you over-consume calories, your body will store the surplus of calories as body fat, resulting in a neutral or positive body fat balance.

For weight loss, calories are king, not when you eat them. Ultimately, whether you choose a time-restricted eating or flexible dieting approach or eat 3 or 6 meals a day, meal frequency has little to no effect on weight loss, as long as your calorie expenditure exceeds your calorie intake over time.

Meal Frequency for Muscle Building

Much like weight loss, meal frequency has long been touted as vital for muscle building; however, more recent research has shown that it’s less important than once believed.

The post-exercise “anabolic window”; a limited timeframe after training to optimize training-related muscular adaptations, was long said to be integral to muscle growth and development ⁽⁸⁾. The concept suggested that a specific amount of protein should be consumed within 30-60 minutes of exercise to optimize muscle building, which became a deeply ingrained mantra in the fitness industry.

However, decades of additional research and meta-analyses have found that the anabolic effect of a protein-rich meal is roughly 3 to 5 hours, potentially longer depending on the size of the meal ^{(9, 10)}. While consuming protein after a workout may be helpful, muscle protein synthesis is largely supported by total protein intake throughout the day, not during a specific window of time.

The recommended protein intake for maximizing muscle growth is 0.7 to 1.0 grams of protein per pound of body weight per day, and including protein in pre-workout snacks and post-workout meals can help support muscle protein synthesis.

Is snacking ok?

Snacking can be incorporated into a balanced diet and can even help with weight loss and muscle building, however, it must be used strategically. While snacking can increase adherence for certain individuals, for others, it may lead to excessive consumption.

Therefore, it’s imperative that you consider your personal preferences and behaviors and truly pay attention to your hunger-fullness cues to determine if your desire to snack is for physical or emotional reasons. The exact timing and frequency of snacking comes down to personal preference. If your goal is weight loss, you can snack as little or as much as you desire, as long as you adhere to your caloric intake. If your goal is sports performance, snacking at strategic times (i.e. before a game or race) can improve outcomes.

Moreover, contrary to popular belief, snacking late at night won’t cause weight gain, unless it drives you to eat more.

Is it ok to skip meals?

Yes, it’s ok to skip meals, particularly if you’re not hungry. Your body’s natural hunger and fullness cues are the best indicators of when to eat and should, almost always, be prioritized ahead of dietary guidelines. Unless an individual goal is healthy weight gain, where they may need to occasionally eat when they are not hungry or to a point of discomfort, you should eat when you’re hungry, stop when you’re full, and repeat.

In fact, while it’s often said that breakfast is the most important meal, you don’t need to eat breakfast to be healthy or lose weight, the same way eating breakfast won’t make you healthy or cause weight loss. When you choose to eat and what meals you choose to eat should be determined by your personal preference, cues, and goals.

Furthermore, time-restricted eating (TRE), a more strategic form of meal skipping, is completely safe to implement and can be beneficial for some. Not only can it be used as a form of calorie restriction to support weight loss without counting calories, but it has been shown to have additional health benefits. TRE and other forms of intermittent fasting (IF) have been shown to cause improvements in insulin sensitivity compared to normal or baseline diets ⁽¹¹⁾. That said, it’s important to note that it has no specific benefit for weight loss and weight-related outcomes when compared to traditional calorie restriction via other forms such as calorie or macro counting.

Overall, skipping meals to create periods of feasting and fasting can put you in a favorable state for fat loss, but they’re never going to negate calorie balance.

So, how often do you really need to eat?

Overall, the quality of the food you eat and your total caloric intake matter more than when you are consuming them. How many meals you should eat per day is influenced by personal preference and your goals.

If your goal is general health, you can break your meals up any way you desire as long as you’re prioritizing whole foods and balanced meals. If your goal is weight loss, as long as you remain in a calorie deficit, you can consume as many or as few meals per day as you like. If your goal is muscle building or weight gain, as long as you’re consuming adequate protein and are in a calorie surplus, you can use any meal frequency to achieve it.

If you’re confused as to the best approach to support your goals, it’s best to work with a registered dietitian to create a plan that works for you.

The Bottom Line

How often you should eat per day is based on personal preference, schedule, hunger cues, digestion, goals, and culture. Generally speaking, eating smaller or larger meals less frequently has no direct effect on health outcomes, weight loss, or body composition. What and how much an individual eats is more impactful than when they choose to eat.

Cheat meals are a polarizing topic in the fitness community, as some experts tout their health benefits and others suggest their name alone is problematic. So, are cheat meals a good idea? Here is a breakdown of the pros and cons of cheat meals and some alternative strategies you can use instead.

What’s a “cheat meal”?

The term cheat meal is scientifically defined as the “discrete, planned, or spontaneous, periodic departure from one’s muscularity-oriented dietary regimen, in a manner that includes consumption of an array of prohibited or restricted foods” (1). Put simply, a cheat meal is a meal that doesn’t adhere to the rules of your typical diet plan.

Cheat meals typically involve calorie-dense foods, higher in carbohydrates, sugar, and saturated fats such as pizza, burgers, French fries, candy, and desserts, in volumes ranging from 1,000-9,000 calories (2). Interestingly, cheat meals are often used as part of a goal-oriented strategy and scheduled ahead of time to be used reward for sticking to a strict diet plan.

While the term cheat meal was popularized by the fitness and bodybuilding community, where they are commonly referred to as “refeeds” or “diet breaks”, cheat meals are now used by everyday gym-goers looking to lose body weight, build muscle, burn body fat, or eat in a certain way to achieve some component of health. A recent study of adolescents and young adults found that 60.9% of men and 53.7% of women have engaged in cheat meals in the last 12 months (3).

What’s the difference between cheat meals and cheat days?

Cheat meals are scheduled meals when you can enjoy foods or a calorie intake that does not adhere to your diet plan, while cheat days are scheduled days when you can consume cheat meals, “off-limit foods”, or excessive caloric intake as much as you like throughout the entire day.

Benefits of Cheat Meals

Here are some of the potential benefits of cheat meals and cheat days.

Increases motivation and dietary adherence.

The use of cheat meals may increase motivation to stick to a diet plan as the prospect of indulging helps increase discipline the rest of the time. Research suggests that “planned hedonic deviations” may increase the motivation to pursue goals and help regain self-regulatory resources, which all contribute to long-term goal adherence (4). Moreover, multiple studies have also shown that people who follow diets with greater flexibility have greater long-term weight loss success (5, 6).

Provides a mental break.

There may also be psychological benefits to cheat meals. Including planned goal deviations, such as cheat meals, during extended goal striving, compared with following a straight and rigid goal-striving process, improves the emotional experience (4). This temporary diet break provides a psychological release where individuals can indulge without guilt or shame.

Temporarily increases metabolic rate.

Not only can cheat meals help to satisfy a craving, but they can temporarily increase metabolism. This increase in metabolic rate is caused by increased levels of leptin, a hormone secreted by fat cells that regulates your energy balance and appetite. Some studies have shown that periods of 3-4 days of consuming more calories than normal, especially from carbohydrates, resulted in increases of 7-8% in Total Daily Energy Expenditure (TDEE) (7, 8). 

However, this increase in metabolism is only temporary and does not account for the amount of excess calories it took to create the increase in the first place. That excess energy still needs to be accounted for and, therefore, if used in excess or abused, cheat meals won’t necessarily provide additional benefits for weight loss or body composition goals.

Improves athletic performance.

When used strategically, cheat meals can support and/or improve athletic performance. Known as “refeeds” in the fitness community, increasing calorie intake, namely from carbohydrates, in a planned and strategic manner can help to top up glycogen stores. High glycogen levels can increase energy, improve endurance, increase strength, and improve recovery after a hard training session, all of which can boost performance several days after consumption (9, 10).

Drawbacks of Cheat Meals

Here are some of the potential drawbacks of cheat meals and cheat days.

Encourages an all-or-nothing mindset.

The concept of cheat meals reinforces the idea that you must eat perfectly “clean” to be eating healthy. This dichotomizing of foods as “good” or “bad” creates an unnecessary morality around found choices, which can lead individuals to believe they are being “good” when they follow their diet and being “bad” when they indulge.

Not only does this create a false dichotomy – as whole foods and processed foods can be included in a healthy diet – but this can lead to an unhealthy relationship with food and promote binge eating behaviors.

Promotes disordered eating.

A major concern with cheat meals is their potential to provoke disordered eating behaviors and perpetuate binge eating cycles (11). For certain individuals, cheat meals and the extension of the all-or-nothing mindset can provoke guilt and shame and be accompanied by a sense of loss of control around food. This can cause individuals to ignore their body’s natural hunger and fullness cues, often leading them to eat to a point of discomfort, only to restart the binge eating cycle again.

Slows weight loss progress.

Depending on how indulgent cheat meals or cheat days are, they may drastically increase total weekly calorie intake which will slow or impede weight loss. If abused or done to excess, the calories consumed on cheat days may take an entire week of dieting to lose, contributing to weight loss plateaus or weight gain.

Cause digestive discomfort and fatigue.

Certain foods or meals may also cause gastrointestinal discomfort, such as heartburn, bloating, and constipation, and/or spikes in blood sugar, which can contribute to sluggishness.

So, are cheat meals a good idea?

Overall, the research on cheat meals is mixed and truly depends on the individual. While some will find the incorporation of planned cheat meals helpful in reaching their weight loss, body composition, and health goals, others may find the trigger disorders eating behaviors, impede progress, and make adherence more challenging.

While incorporating “indulgent foods” and “treats” into your dietary plan is the only way to create a balanced diet, how to do so is best determined by the individual. Creating a healthy and balanced diet, complete with whole foods and indulgent foods, is a matter of controlling the dose and frequency per day, week, and month. While the strong majority of your calories (80-90%) should come from nutrient-dense foods in amounts and ratios that support personal goals, the remaining calories (10-20%) can be used as discretionary calories and consumed in any way the person desires.

For example, if a woman is aiming to consume 2,000 calories per day, if 1,600-1,800 calories are used to consume balanced meals with nutrient-dense foods, the remaining 200-400 calories can be used as discretionary calories to enjoy chocolate, chips, or a glass of wine without concern.

The concept of discretionary calories can also be applied on a daily or weekly basis. Meaning that she could choose to use these calories in smaller installments daily (e.g. 200 calories of chocolate per day), or use them in larger installments weekly (i.e. one restaurant dinner with wine and dessert for 1,400 calories).

Furthermore, it is important to consider that it is possible to prepare foods in a manner that exempts them from the “junk food” and discretionary calorie categories by making them with nutrient-dense foods. For instance, a homemade pizza crust with whole-food toppings has far more nutritional value than a greasy take-out slice or ultra-processed frozen pizza with 100 ingredients, additives, and preservatives.

Alternatives to Cheat Meals

If you struggle with cheat days, it may be a sign that your chosen dietary approach is not working for you. So instead of planning for cheat days and cheat meals, here are some strategies you can consider.

• Don’t put any foods “off limits”. Instead of identifying foods as “good” or “bad”, focus on creating a balanced diet by focusing on nutrient-dense foods MOST of the time. Dietary approaches such as flexible dieting are a great way to learn how to meet your calorie and macronutrient needs while eating the foods you enjoy.
• Follow a diet pattern you enjoy. Any overly restrictive diet, be it vegan, keto, or intermittent fasting, can make dietary adherence incredibly difficult and further enforce the all-or-nothing mentality. For instance, if you enjoy carbs, don’t cut them out. Instead, practice moderation – even if it takes a while – and learn how to incorporate both nutrient-dense carbohydrates (i.e. rice, potatoes, oats, and bread), and indulgent carbohydrates (i.e. candy, pastries, and desserts) in quantities and ratios that support your goals and make you feel good.
• Regularly enjoy discretionary calories. Remember that balance does not exist without indulgence. There is room for everything in a healthy diet, even when eating in a calorie deficit for weight, as long as you are mindful of the quantity and frequency. If you’re eating 80-90% of your calories from nutrient-dense foods, the remaining 10-20% can be used as discretionary calories to eat your favorite foods.
• Practice intuitive and mindful eating. Mindful eating focuses on bringing awareness to our eating experience, while intuitive eating focuses on eating based on internal cues, satisfaction, and the health of the mind and body beyond mealtime. When used together, these dietary approaches can help individuals get more in tune with their body’s natural hunger and fullness cues and learn to make healthy food choices without the need for external tools or rigid rules.
• Aim for consistency, not perfection. While moderation can be difficult, it is integral to making healthy eating sustainable. The objective is to be as consistent as possible with healthy food choices, not perfect. It is possible to indulge in your favorite foods while hitting the calorie and macro targets that support your health goals.

Cheat Meals FAQs

The Bottom Line

A cheat meal is a scheduled meal that doesn’t adhere to the “rules” of your typical diet plan. The potential benefits of cheat meals include increased motivation and dietary adherence, mental relief, increased metabolism, and improved athletic performance, while the potential drawbacks include promoting an all-or-nothing mentality, encouraging disordered eating behaviors, slowing weight loss progress, and causing digestive discomfort and fatigue. Whether or not cheat meals are a good idea largely depends on the individual, their relationship with food, personal eating behaviors, and goals.