One of the newest health trends on TikTok is the “30-30-30” method, which involves consuming 30 grams of protein within 30 minutes of waking up, followed immediately by 30 minutes of low- to moderate-intensity aerobic exercise.
Proponents of the 30-30-30 method claim that it helps you lose weight steadily and sustainably while preserving muscle. But is that really the case? Maybe. However, the method’s greatest benefit is that it may help you build healthy habits into your daily life.
Start by consuming 30g of protein within 30 minutes of waking up.
Protein is the building block of our bodies, and we need it to provide our cells with the nutrients they need to repair and recover from the wear and tear of daily life.
The amount of protein you need depends on the level of stress your body is under. When you exercise, your body needs more protein to help repair and recover muscles. Typically, you need about 1.2-2g of protein per kg of body weight. Eating more protein is also important when you’re trying to lose weight. Research shows that a high-protein diet (2g or more protein per kg of body weight) may help you maintain muscle while losing weight.
For many people, breakfast is the lowest protein meal of the day and often consists of toast, cereals, pastries and other carbohydrates.
The 30-30-30 method allows you to quickly increase your total daily protein intake by consuming 30g of protein within 30 minutes of waking up, but this alone won’t automatically hit your daily protein goal – your other food choices throughout the day also matter.
To lose weight, you need to eat fewer calories than you burn each day. While eating protein first thing in the morning won’t directly help you lose weight, protein makes you feel full, which means you may eat fewer calories overall for the day. This is one of the reasons why diets recommend eating protein first thing in the morning.
zjuzjaka/ Shutterstock
But the key word is “may.” Some people may not find protein very satiating, some may find it makes them hungrier, and some may snack throughout the day for no apparent reason.
30 minutes of aerobic exercise
Now let’s look at the exercise component of the 30-30-30 method. There are three parts to this workout that need to be considered: timing first thing in the morning, the steady-state nature, and the 30-minute duration.
Some research suggests that exercising first thing in the morning may have positive health outcomes, such as a better metabolism and a lower risk of certain diseases like type 2 diabetes and obesity. But there’s just as much, if not more, research suggesting otherwise, and arguing that the time of day you exercise doesn’t matter to your health or fitness.
So exercising first thing in the morning isn’t inherently better. The best time of day to exercise is probably the time that’s most convenient and enjoyable for you. This increases the likelihood that exercise will become a habit, which is key to consistently getting the benefits from it.
The 30-30-30 method also states that your first exercise should be “steady state” – continuous exercise at a low or moderate intensity, basically anything that gets your heart rate up, like brisk walking or jogging.
There has been much debate about which form of exercise is best for health and weight loss. World Health Organization guidelines recommend incorporating both aerobic and strength training to maintain health.
However, when looking specifically at aerobic exercise, there is little evidence that steady-state training is more beneficial for health or weight loss than other types of exercise. A 2015 study compared steady-state aerobic exercise with high-intensity interval training, finding that both had similar effects on fitness levels in inactive young adults.
Just like the time of day to exercise, the best exercise for you is one you can stick to.
Finally, the 30-30-30 method recommends exercising for 30 minutes. This may just be a catchy title, but it may also have practical applications.
It’s short enough that it’s relatively achievable on a busy day, without tiring you out too much, and long enough to get you sweating and burning calories, and to have a positive effect on your cardiovascular system — in other words, a stronger, more robust heart — but if you can do less than 30 minutes, or want to do more than 30 minutes, this method will still work.
However, it’s important to note that exercising more doesn’t necessarily lead to weight loss: exercise requires energy (i.e. it burns calories), and this benefit doesn’t increase linearly as you increase the amount of exercise you do each day.
This is because your body tries to compensate for the extra energy you burn during exercise by using less energy to carry out other bodily functions, an effect that seems to be even more pronounced when dieting.
But while longer periods of exercise don’t necessarily burn more calories, exercise has many more valuable health benefits beyond weight loss: it improves cardiovascular health and respiratory function, and may even have a positive effect on cognitive function.
Read more: Exercise and the brain: 3 ways physical activity changes the structure of your brain
The 30-30-30 method promotes habits that, when combined, support health and weight loss, and while focusing on these elements first thing in the morning can make it easier to adopt other healthy habits for the rest of the day, it’s by no means a perfect method for weight loss.
