There’s no doubt that the keto diet is one of the most effective weight loss diets for many people.
But just like any other diet, it’s possible that it may not be sustainable due to your lifestyle, food preferences, and personal choice.
It may also take some time to get used to all the substitutes, carb restrictions, and macro counting. If you’re not careful, it can get expensive as well.
But the good news is that there are so many other ways to lose weight with different dietary approaches.
The top 3 diets for weight loss also come with other health benefits such as more energy, an improved immune system, and better digestive health.
Before we look at the alternative weight loss diets, let’s look at what the keto diet is.
What is a keto diet?
A keto diet is a high-fat, low carb diet that helps the body to burn fat for energy, instead of glucose. On a regular high carb diet, your body would break down the carbs that you eat into glucose and use that for fuel.
On a keto diet, only a very limited amount of carbs are consumed while the amount of fat in the diet increases.
The body then turns to this fat for energy, while also using the fat that’s already stored. This metabolic shift is why the keto diet is so popular for weight loss. The diet also has a lot of benefits, but it’s not the only one.
Best Weight Loss Diets #1- Paleo Diet
A paleo diet embraces the foods that our ancestors ate before mass production and processed food was popular. This means food that could be hunted and gathered like fruits, vegetables, nuts, meat, and fish.
Paleo vs Keto
A paleo diet is similar to a ketogenic diet. Both diets eliminate refined carbs and embrace vegetables and animal protein. But that’s about were the similarities end.
A paleo diet is lower in fat than a keto diet because of the emphasis on plant-based foods. Due to this, it’s also higher in carbs because it doesn’t eliminate ground produce like potatoes and carrots.
This weight loss diet also doesn’t promote calorie tracking, so if that’s not something you enjoy, you might want to give this diet a shot.
How Does It Help to Reduce Weight?
The paleo diet wasn’t actually created to be one of the weight loss diets. However, restricting the processed foods that are a part of the Standard American Diet (SAD) will automatically reduce your carb and caloric intake.
This will lead to weight loss.
You can learn more about the paleo diet here.
2- Plant-Based Diet
A plant-based diet means that you incorporate more plant foods into your diet and reduce your animal protein. It doesn’t mean a vegan diet, although that’s a preference for many people. However, vegan and plant-based are not the same.
On a plant-based diet, you have more room to define what it means for you. Do you want to reduce red meat, dairy or chicken? Aside from weight loss, what are your dietary goals?
You can customize the diet in this way to reap the health benefits that you want.
Plant-based vs Keto
Like a paleo diet, a plant-based diet has more carbs than a keto diet depending on what you choose to eat. Plant-based products also have a lot more fiber so that means less constipation and other side effects of keto.
On a plant-based diet, there’s also less emphasis on counting carbs and you will still eat less because of the type of foods that you’re eating.
How Does It Help to Reduce Weight?
As with paleo, plant-based diets help you to lose weight because you’re eating foods that have more fiber, which can help you to feel full.
Protein plays a very important role in this diet because it helps you to feel the satiety that will prevent overeating and curb hunger.
You can learn more about the plant-based diet here.
3- Low Carb Diet
A low carb diet is low in the carbohydrates that are found in refined foods, sugar, and most processed food products.
A low carb diet can be as strict or as moderate as you want it, but the key is to eat more protein and fat and lower the processed carbs in your diet.
This means that you’ll stick to whole grains, fruits, and vegetables instead of refined bread, flours or pasta.
On a regular low carb diet. you can simply substitute the refined versions of your favorites foods for the whole grain version. Not only are these foods more fulfilling, they also have more nutrients and fiber that will be beneficial to your body.
Low Carb vs Keto
A keto diet is the strictest type of low carb diet, but not all low carb diets are keto. On a low carb diet, you can eat whole grain bread, pasta, rice, and even oatmeal because their net carbs (total carbs- fiber) is lower. You can also opt out of these food items and go for plant-based foods as well.
However, on keto, it’s recommended that these processed foods be completely removed from your diet so that you can focus on eating vegetables for carbs.
Finally, while keto focuses on increasing fat intake and lowering carbs, a regular low carb diet mostly focuses on cutting out refined carbs and sugars.
You can read this post to find out more about how to lose weight on a low carb diet.
Which of the weight loss diets should you choose?
Each of the weight loss diets above is different in the macronutrient composition and the way that the body uses the nutrients that it gets.
However, don’t forget that your diet is only half of the equation. Exercise or any fat-burning activity will also help you to lose weight.
The best thing is to choose the diet that will help you to be as healthy as possible.