How much protein do you need?

If you are carrying extra body fat

The per kg numbers come from studies on fairly lean, trained people. Apply them to someone who weighs 125 kg with a lot of body fat and you get a target of 200 g or more, which is hard to eat, expensive and not necessary.

A simpler approach is to use your goal weight or a sensible midpoint. Someone at 125 kg aiming for 95 kg can base their target on 95 kg and aim for around 150 to 190 g. That still gives the muscle-sparing and appetite benefits that make protein so useful when you are in a calorie deficit.

Protein is also the most filling of the three macronutrients, which is one reason higher intakes make dieting feel easier. There is more on this in our guide to protein for fat loss.

Spread it across the day

Your body cannot store protein the way it stores carbohydrate and fat, and muscle building responds to each protein feed. That is why a pattern of three or four decent servings tends to work better than a light breakfast, a small lunch and a huge dinner.

A practical per meal target is around 0.3 to 0.4 g per kg, which for most adults works out at 25 to 40 g. A 75 kg person eating four times a day could look like this:

• Breakfast: three eggs on two slices of wholemeal toast with a glass of milk, about 30 g
• Lunch: chicken and salad wrap with a pot of Greek-style yoghurt, about 40 g
• Afternoon: a pint of semi-skimmed milk or a protein shake, about 20 to 25 g
• Dinner: a salmon fillet with rice and vegetables, about 30 g
• Total: roughly 120 to 125 g, the bottom of the target range

Who needs a bit more

Some people should deliberately aim for the upper end of the range, or slightly above it for a while.

• People losing fat. Eating less makes it harder to hold on to muscle, and extra protein helps protect it.
• Adults over 50. Muscle becomes less responsive to protein with age, so larger servings of around 0.4 g per kg per meal make sense.
• Vegans and vegetarians. Many plant proteins are slightly less digestible and lower in leucine, so a little more total protein covers the gap.
• People in a hard training block. Heavy HYROX preparation or two sessions a day increases the repair work your body has to do.

Teenagers, pregnant women and anyone with a medical condition have different needs. In those cases a GP or registered dietitian is the right person to set a figure.

Is too much protein harmful?

For healthy adults, intakes in the 1.6 to 2.2 g per kg range have not been shown to damage the kidneys or bones. The old worries mostly came from studies in people who already had kidney disease.

If you have kidney disease, diabetes affecting your kidneys, or you have been told your kidney function is reduced, do not raise your protein intake without speaking to your GP or a registered dietitian first. The same goes if you have been prescribed a specific diet.

The more common downside of chasing a huge number is practical. Protein-heavy plates can squeeze out fibre, fruit, vegetables and the carbohydrate you need to train well. It also gets expensive. Once you are in the right range, extra protein adds cost more than results.

How to hit your number without tracking forever

You do not need to weigh every meal for life. Track three normal days in an app to see where you are starting from, then build a few repeatable habits.

1. Put one clear protein food at the centre of every meal: meat, fish, eggs, dairy, tofu, beans or lentils.
2. Use your palm as a guide. A palm-sized portion of meat or fish is roughly 20 to 30 g of protein. The hand portion guide explains the full method.
3. Keep two or three easy backups in the house, such as Greek-style yoghurt, tinned tuna or a tub of cottage cheese.
4. Check again every few months, because habits drift.

If you like more structure, nutrition and accountability coaching is one of the services at Lycan Strength, and having someone check in each week makes these habits far easier to keep. For ideas on what to eat, see our guide to the best protein sources.