Is working out at night bad for weight loss?

Working out at night is not bad for your weight loss progress, but you have to take some practical implications into consideration.

Introduction

Is working out at night bad for weight loss? If you search the internet for an answer to this question, you'll find mixed results. Some articles state that working out at night is good for weight loss, while others say that the best time to work out is in the morning before having any breakfast.

I too was wondering what the answer to this question was in the past, but I quickly found out that in reality, it doesn't matter at all when you do your workouts. No matter if your goal is weight loss or gaining muscle mass, what's most important is putting in the necessary work, eating clean and hitting your macros, and doing all of this consistently. That's what brings results!

So does working out at night negatively (or positively) affect your weight loss. I'd say no, not at all, based on my own experience in the past. In this article, I'm going to elaborate on my answer.

Time of day does not matter

What's most important, is having a solid nutrition plan and working out regularly and consistently. The rest are all details that don't matter much in the grand scheme of things.

Think of your whole weight loss plan as a journey with a big goal, which is to lose X amount of pounds by the end of some preset time interval. To accomplish that goal, you need to put in a lot of work.

This work consists of eating healthy every day, resisting the temptations of having too many cheat meals, and working out hard and more importantly, regularly and consistently! By regularly working out, I mean that you need to try to work out at least 3 times a week (or better yet, 4 times a week).

This is more of a scheduling problem than anything else because you need to plan your whole week in advance and make time for your workouts, next to all other tasks and obligations of your daily life.

And when doing your workouts, you need to actually put in real, physical work! A workout where you're having 10-minute rest periods between your sets and talking with your friends, or screwing around, isn't an intense workout.

You need to focus while doing the exercises, with only short resting periods in between. There is not much room for socializing with your friends while you're working out (whether they are there in person or by texting them on your phone). You are there to do WORK! You are there to fatigue your muscles! You are there to give your body impulses to burn fat and build muscle tissue! And you are there to complete your workout in a sufficient amount of time and be as efficient as possible regarding time management.

You have to work out with heavy weights that you can handle without losing the correct form and technique. You need to exert force and use a lot of energy during your workouts. You need to sweat and really feel you're getting tired as muscle fatigue kicks in throughout your workout.

This all is part of 'putting in the work' to reach your weight loss goals.

Think of all these tasks (i.e., eating clean, hitting your macros every day, resisting cheat meals. snacks, and junk food, and working out regularly, hard, and consistently, etc.) as the bulk of the work that needs to be done, week in and week out for multiple months.

Picture all of the above in your mind, and hold that picture for a moment while you read the next paragraph.

Now, with that sheer amount of work ahead of you, do you really think such minor details as the time of working out (whether that's in the morning, right after work, or working out at night) matter? Well, to give you the answer based on my own experiences: they don't matter -at all-.

Work out at any time that best suits YOU

But why do some people work out in the morning? Why do others work out in the evening or at night?

The reality is, people often don't have a choice. In the perfect world where you have no obligations and don't have to work or do any other obligatory tasks, you can work out at any time of day that you'd like. But if you're like me and most other people, you probably have a job, you need to clean your house regularly, you need to cook, do laundry, and keep in touch with your friends and family, next to all other things you need to do in daily life.

Generally speaking, we can't always choose at which times we want to work out. If you have a job with different working hours, where one day you need to work between 9AM-5PM, while other days you have an evening shift and find yourself coming home at midnight, then your workout plan and schedule need to somehow workaround that.

If that means that for some days, it works out best for your schedule if you exercise at night after 2AM, then by all means go work out at 2AM.

Because as mentioned above, what's important is that you hit your daily goals regarding fitness and weight loss, which are eating clean and working out regularly, hard, and consistently.

The worst mistake you can make is not working out at all because you're thinking that it'll be bad for weight loss should you work out at some time of the day.

Tips on working out at night

As you can read above, I don't mind working out at night at all. Currently, I work out in the evening though because I can't permit to work out at night since I have a day job that requires me to be present at 8AM in the morning.

With a day job, you can't permit to workout in the middle of the night simply because you won't be able to sleep enough afterward.

However, when I was studying in the past I occasionally went to a 24/7 gym and did my workouts at 2AM in the night. It worked perfectly for me during that time, although I couldn't do it consistently, again due to lectures often starting at 8:30AM.

Nowadays, I occasionally work out at night, but this happens mostly during holidays when I don't have to work the next day and only if I have no other choice (I found the best time I feel comfortable working out, is around 1PM or around 8PM).

If you happen to expect some days when you have to workout at night because your schedule doesn't allow you otherwise, and haven't done night workouts before or would like to know what to watch out for to prevent a terrible experience, then below you'll find some tips that I found out working for me during my night workouts.

Sleep

First, and probably the most important, is to not neglect sleep. It's obvious that if you have a day job, then it's best not to work out at night. You need to have a good sleeping pattern and sleep sufficiently (which means 7-8 hours for a regular adult person).

If you have to wake up between 6AM-7AM to go to work (or go to school), then you need to sleep between 10PM and 00AM (at least, that's what works for me). That leaves no room for night workouts.

If, on the other hand, you can sleep in the next day and have the energy to work out the night before, then try to finish your workout at least 30 minutes before you plan on going to bed.

I found out that I had trouble falling asleep when I finished my workout, took a shower, and immediately went to bed. Doing everything one after another left me in bed all alert and with an active mind. For me, I noticed

I needed about 30-45 minutes after coming home and taking a shower, to get 'in the zone' for some sleep. After coming to rest mentally (and physically), I could fall asleep much easier.

Food

No matter what time you work out, it's wise to eat something after having an intense exercise session. When I work out during regular hours I often have a big meal after my workout, but when I was working out at night I found out that eating too much after my workout resulted in feeling too bloated to fall asleep.

As a result, I couldn't fall asleep for hours despite 'getting in the zone', because my stomach was so full.

After some trial and error, I noticed that despite being very hungry after an intense night workout, if I forced myself to eat only a small and light meal, the feeling of intense hunger would quickly go away and I'd have a much easier time falling asleep.

So my tip is, do eat something after your night workout, but make sure it's something small and light, otherwise you'll have a hard time falling asleep.

Conclusion

So is working out at night bad for weight loss? Well, I'd say not at all! You want to know what is bad for weight loss? Not working out at all!

In my opinion, if you have the choice and possibility to workout at any time of the day, for example, if you don't have many obligations, don't have a family, or have a job where you can choose your own working hours (for example, if you're running your own business or are self-employed), then by all means, work out at a time that best suits YOU.

Work out at a time when you feel most comfortable exercising. If that means working out at night, then by all means, just work out at night! Grind your own gear and do what works for YOU.