Can Coffee Increase Your Metabolism and Help You Burn Fat?

Coffee contains caffeine, the most widely consumed psychoactive substance in the world.

Caffeine is also included in most commercial fat-burning supplements today, and for good reason.

Also, it is one of the few ingredients known to help integrate fats from adipose tissue and increase metabolism.

But does coffee really help you lose weight? This article will take a closer look at the evidence.

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Coffee contains stimulants

Many of the biologically active substances found in coffee beans make it the ultimate beverage.

Most of these can affect metabolism:

Caffeine: The main stimulant of coffee.

Theobromine: The main stimulant of cocoa; It is also found in small amounts in coffee.

Theophylline: Another stimulant found in both cocoa and coffee; It has been used to treat asthma.

Chlorogenic acid: one of the biologically active compounds in coffee; It can help slow down the absorption of carbohydrates.

The most important of these is caffeine, which is very potent and thoroughly studied.

Caffeine works by blocking an inhibitory neurotransmitter called adenosine.

By blocking adenosine, caffeine increases the activity of neurons and releases neurotransmitters such as dopamine and norepinephrine, which in turn makes you feel stronger and more alert.

Thus, coffee helps keep you active when you would otherwise feel tired. In fact it can increase exercise performance by an average of 11-12%.

SUMMARY:

Coffee contains several stimulants, mainly caffeine. Caffeine not only boosts your metabolism, it makes you more alert.

Coffee Can Help Mobilize Fat From Fatty Tissues

Caffeine stimulates the nervous system, which sends signals directly to fat cells, telling them to break down fat.

It does this by increasing blood levels of the hormone epinephrine.

Epinephrine, also known as adrenaline, travels through the bloodstream to fatty tissues, telling them to break down fat and release it into the bloodstream.

Of course, the release of fatty acids in the blood does not help you lose fat unless you are burning more calories than you eat through your diet. This condition is known as negative energy balance.

You can balance negative energy by eating less or exercising more. Another complementary strategy is to take caffeine-like fat burning supplements.

The caffeine described in the next chapter can also speed up your metabolism.

SUMMARY:

Caffeine stimulates the release of fatty acids from fatty tissues by increasing blood levels of epinephrine (adrenaline).

Coffee can increase your metabolism

The rate at which you burn calories while resting is called your resting metabolic rate (RMR).

The higher your metabolism rate, the easier it is to lose weight and eat without gaining weight.

Studies show that caffeine can increase RMR by 3 to 10%, and that larger doses have more effects.

Interestingly, most of the increased metabolism is due to increased fat burning.

Unfortunately, obese people are less likely to be affected.

One study found that caffeine increased fat burning by 29% in obese people, but this increase was about 10% in obese people.

The effect appears to decrease with age and is more common in younger people.

For more fat burning strategies, check out this article on 10 Easy Ways To Boost Your Metabolism.

SUMMARY:

Caffeine increases your resting metabolic rate, which means it increases the number of calories you burn at rest.

Coffee and weight loss

There is an important caveat: people become more tolerant of the effects of caffeine over time.

In the short term, caffeine can increase the rate of metabolism and increase fat burning, but after a while, people become tolerant of the effects and stop working.

But even though coffee doesn't burn more calories in the long run, there is a possibility that it can reduce your appetite and help you eat less.

One study found that caffeine had an appetite-reducing effect in men, but not women, by feeding them less food after ingesting caffeine. However, another study shows no effect on men.

Whether coffee or caffeine can help you lose weight, in the long run, depends on the person. At the moment, there is no evidence of long-term effects.

SUMMARY:

People can develop a tolerance to the effects of caffeine. For this reason, drinking coffee or other caffeinated beverages can be an ineffective long-term weight loss strategy.

BOTTOM LINE

Although caffeine can increase your metabolism in the short term, this effect is decreasing among long-term coffee drinkers due to tolerance.

If you are initially interested in coffee for the sake of fat loss, it is best to stick with your coffee drinking habit to build stamina. Maybe a two-week cycle, a two-week vacation is best.

Of course, there are many other good reasons to drink coffee, including the fact that coffee is one of the greatest sources of antioxidants in the Western diet.

Article source healthline.com