Your body consumes and burns calories while performing every activity. It’s a common misconception that you do not burn calories while sleeping. The fact is that sleep plays an equally important role in maintaining your health and well-being by producing heat that works in increasing burn rate. Small details matter while having a good night’s sleep, which includes a good environment, qualitative sleeping products, ambient temperature, and sleeping position. The calorie burn count while sleeping is different for every person and is influenced by many factors.
In this exploration of sleep and calorie burning, we have discussed the factors involved in reducing calories while snoozing. The guide provides some suggestions to improve your sleep and how to calculate your calorie burn during sleep.
Factors That Affect Your Energy Expenditure During Sleep
- BMR:
The Basal Metabolic Rate (BMR) is the minimum amount of energy that your body requires to sustain vital organ functions such as breathing, blood circulation, and cell production while at complete rest. People with higher BMR burn more calories.
- Muscle mass:
People with a higher percentage of fat tend to burn fewer calories than individuals with a higher muscle mass. The reason behind, muscle burns more calories than fat.
- Age:
With the growing age, the rate of BMR decreases. Youngsters are more active and growing, and they keep indulging in physical activities which leads to higher calorie burn. On the other side, older people have lower BMR because they are less active.
- Gender :
Men have a higher BMR than women due to their higher muscle mass, leading to higher calorie expenditure.
- Quality of sleep:
Poor quality of sleep can slow down your metabolism, which may lead to a number of diseases, such as obesity, diabetes, etc.
- Body temperature:
Studies suggest that you can boost the burn rate of calories by maintaining a cooler sleeping temperature of around 60-67°F. The reason behind in cooler conditions, your bodies generate more heat to maintain core temperature.
- Eating habits:
Fast food and caffeine products consume high amounts of fat, leading to low-calorie burn, and consuming high amounts of caffeine can disrupt your sleep pattern. It can become more challenging for you to fall asleep at night. So prefer eating healthy food to burn calories and to fall asleep with less effort.
- Medical Conditions:
Pregnancy, lactation, menopause, and other conditions can affect your metabolism and energy expenditure during sleep. Consulting a doctor can normalize calorie burn by understanding what suits your body the best.
How To Calculate Your Calories Burned While Asleep
It is important to calculate how many calories your body is consuming while asleep. Calculating your calorie burn can help you know how to maintain your body and the precautions you should take while eating, sleeping, or doing any other activity. Here are the different methods described for the calculation:
- Fitness Trackers:
There are a number of wearable devices(smartwatches and fitness trackers) available to monitor the number of calories and hours of sleep. These devices also track your movements and heart rate during sleep.
- Metabolic Rate Equations:
There are two ways to calculate your BMR: Manually and with online calculators. Follow the following information for the calculations:
- Calculating BMR manually
The process of Basal Metabolic Rate is too expensive that a normal person cannot afford this. However, it is possible to have a rough estimation of your calorie expenditure during sleep. The most common formula made by Harris-Benedict is based on age, gender, height, and weight. There are two different equations for calculating male and female BMR, which are mentioned below:
- Male BMR = 66.5 + (13.8 x weight in kg) + (5 x height in cm) – (6.8 x age in years)
- Female BMR = 655 + (9.6 x weight in kg) + (1.8 x height in cm) – (4.7 x age in years)
The Harris-Benedict equation does not explain genetics, race, hormones, muscle-to-fat ratio, or medical conditions, though it differentiates between men and women. To get an idea of your muscle-to-fat ratio, you can try the Harris-Benedict equation.
BMI = weight (lbs) / [height (in)]2 x 703
A Body Mass Index (BMI) between 18.5 and 24.9 is considered healthy, while below 18.5 is underweight, and above 24.9 is overweight. On the other hand, a BMI below 18.5 is categorized as underweight. However, it is essential to note that this BMI formula may not provide accurate measurements for individuals with atypical body composition, such as bodybuilders or pregnant women.
- Calculating BMR Online through apps:
Several online calculators are available to check your burned calories. Before calculating, they take your general information regarding your age, sex, weight, height, and duration of sleep to estimate your calorie burn during sleep. These calculators use some mathematical formulas to calculate your BMR.
How To Improve Your Calorie Burn During Sleep?
- Exercise Regularly:
Exercise can boost your metabolism. A person engaged in regular physical activity tends to burn 5 to 19% more calories at rest as compared to sedentary individuals. These effects are more in men than women. Any kind of physical activity can help you to burn more calories during sleep. So start exercising to stay healthy and fit. It is suggested to workout three hours before bedtime.
- Maintain a healthy and Protein- rich diet:
A protein-rich food is beneficial for you because it can boost your metabolism for several hours.
After consuming a portion of food, the metabolic rate increases by itself, which is known as a thermic effect of food (TEF). It is believed that food with high protein content causes a 17% higher increase in TEF as compared to food with higher carbohydrate or fat content.
Intake of fatty acids for dinner has a detrimental effect on your health. So, preferring light or protein-rich meals before sleeping helps to burn more calories, which automatically leads to weight loss. Some examples of protein-rich diet include:
- Greek yogurt
- Cottage cheese
- Roasted chickpeas
- Low-carb protein bars
- Almonds, walnuts, or pistachios
- Pumpkin seeds
- Chia seeds
- Drink enough water:
Water has a great importance in everyone’s life. It helps to quench your thirst and increase your metabolism rate. Drinking cold water before going to bed can aid in burning calories. This is because the body uses energy to warm up the water, which results in an increase in metabolism. The body works twice as hard to warm the water up while you are asleep since your body is in a state of rest with minimal movement. Studies show that drinking 500ml of water before sleeping can boost your metabolism temporarily by 24- 30%. Moreover, water helps in transporting nutrients and waste products and maintains body temperature, which leads to high-calorie burn during sleep.
- Prioritize Sleep Quality:
Not getting enough sleep can slow down your metabolism and decrease energy expenditure. So try to take deep sleep by changing your bedtime routine and habits.
Initially, make a consistent sleep schedule and turn off your devices like mobile phones, TV, and other electronic gadgets and keep them aside before bed to reduce blue light exposure. Also, change your sleeping position and replace the old mattress with a new one. Sleeping in a dark and quiet environment, moderate temperature, and on comfortable mattresses with lighter blankets can help you in quality sleep.
- Manage Stress:
Acute stress and depression can increase your heart rate and decrease vascular resistance in skeletal muscle, which results in high blood pressure, weight gain, and higher BMR. These chronic diseases happen due to unhealthy eating behavior and disturbed sleep patterns.
Try to manage your stress with stress-relieving techniques such as meditation, yoga, and breathing exercises. This will help you sleep better maintain your metabolism rate and burn your calorie intake.
- Address Health Conditions:
If you are facing any health issues, ignoring them can affect your mental and physical health badly. Reach a doctor or a consultant to treat yourself so that you can get rid of any chronic diseases. Managing your health conditions can help you to improve your metabolism and energy expenditure during sleep.
- Maintain sleeping environment:
Environment plays an important role in every work like, studying, playing, cooking and more importantly while sleeping. Sleep should not be interrupted because of the boring environment. You can use number of sleeping products such as mattresses, adjustable beds, massaging chairs, or candles to make a viby environment.
In conclusion, considering sleep a waste of time is not a good thought. As you have read how the above-mentioned factors can affect your BMR and what precautions you should take to maintain your metabolic rate and calorie burn during sleep. You can track it with the help of BMR calculators or with wearable technology. So stay healthy and take deep sleep everyday.
