Cold water therapy is an age-old practice touted for a host of health and wellness claims, including fat burn. Plenty have sworn by the benefits of ice baths, from professional athletes and fitness enthusiasts to celebrities. But with the lack of evidence directly linking to cold plunging and fat burning, it leaves plenty of confusion and questions. Do ice baths burn fat? Can cold plunging improve your metabolism and eventually help you lose weight?
New research says yes. It turns out that taking an ice bath for weight loss is not a myth. More recent studies show that taking repeated dips in cold water can increase metabolic rate, reduce unhealthy body fat percentage, keep you trimmed, and lower the risks of diabetes, too.
Let’s have a closer look at the science of how ice baths affect your metabolism and help with weight loss.
How Do Ice Baths Affect The Body’s Metabolism?
To understand the ice bath benefits for weight loss, let’s go in-depth about how it works. How do ice baths burn fat? How does it affect your metabolism?
When the body is exposed to cold temperatures during cold immersion therapy, it finds alternative ways to keep itself warm. When your core body temperature declines, it revs up your metabolism, burning calories to generate enough energy to produce heat and keep the body warm. This process of heat generation is called thermogenesis. Part of this process is using brown fat cells to create heat energy.
What Is Thermogenesis?
Thermogenesis is the body’s way of producing heat to keep it warm. It kicks into overdrive at certain conditions, like when you exercise, during cold exposure, or when eating certain foods.
Heat production due to cold exposure is called cold thermogenesis or cold-induced thermogenesis (CIT). When cold, the body works harder to regulate core temperature and maintain homeostasis. In theory, the body uses more calories during cold thermogenesis to produce more heat, enough for the body to stay warm and survive. In turn, the process stimulates your metabolism.
What Is Brown Fat in the Body?
Brown Adipose Tissue (BAT), or brown fat, is one of the two types of fat cells. The other is white fat or White Adipose Tissue (WAT). Brown fat cells are metabolically active fat tissues that help keep with temperature regulation of the body and control blood sugar and insulin levels.
Brown fats are packed with iron-rich mitochondria, which is why they are darker. They are predominately located around the neck and collarbone. Their primary function is to produce heat without shivering or nonshivering thermogenesis. You can consider brown fat as a built-in heater that keeps you warm when the body gets too cold.
Newborns have higher brown fat levels than adults. It comes in two forms: “constitutive” brown fat (cBAT), the kind you’re born with, which depletes with age, and “recruitable” brown fat (rBAT), found in white fat that turns brown or muscle tissues, achievable under the right conditions.
When your body is exposed to cold temperatures, the brown fat is activated. As it happens, it signals the mitochondria to break down glucose (blood sugar) and fat molecules (white fat cells) to create heat and regulate body temperature. In addition, once brown fat cells get activated, irisin and FGF, hormones that burn up white fats, get released. As a result, it increases the rate at which your body burns calories.
Proof That Ice Baths Can Aid in Weight Loss
Losing weight by taking cold baths sounds like a dream—you submerge into ice-cold water a couple of times a week and may shed those extra pounds. Hence, it’s been a widely debated topic in the science community.
So, let’s dig in and find out what science says about the concept that cold therapy helps with weight loss.
In a small clinical study in 2014, researchers recorded that exposure to mild cold for a month had increased brown fat volume by 42% and fat metabolic activity by 10%.
The findings are supported by another clinical study that looked at the effects of cold exposure on irisin levels, a hormone that boosts metabolism by triggering browning in white fat cells. The research showed increased circulating irisin levels, significantly for people who shivered upon cold exposure. The result also showed another brown fat activator called fibroblast growth factor 21 (FGF21) was affected with the cold exposure.
In addition, there is data to suggest that:
- Cold-induced thermogenesis can increase energy expenditure by 10%, and prolonged acute cold exposure increases metabolism by 80%.
- Upon cold exposure, with the skin temperature decreased but the core temperature preserved, calories burned rose by 48% as part of the thermogenic response.
Moreover, in a recent study published in the International Journal of Circumpolar Health, researchers support the concept of ice bathing to help with weight loss and obesity. They found that the body generates extra heat through shivering and nonshivering thermogenesis. In fact, shivering thermogenesis as a result of cold exposure can increase the body’s basal resting metabolic rate (RBR) by about 3-5 times.
Different studies have also highlighted that the reduction and/or transformation of adipose tissue due to ice bathing can be considered a protective measure against diabetes. Deliberate cold exposure increases adiponectin levels by up to 70%. Besides helping with glucose metabolism, this hormone also has anti-diabetic effects by improving insulin sensitivity.
With the growing studies and evidence available, it’s reasonable to conclude that you can take regular ice baths to boost your metabolic health and help you lose weight, among other health benefits of cold water, like improved mental health and immune system.
How Long to Sit in an Ice Bath to Burn Fat
Now that you know about cold therapy for weight loss, it’s time to figure out the correct way to do an ice bath to maximize its fat-burning benefits.
While studies have shown the weight loss benefits of a cold plunge, they’ve yet to show precisely the optimal length you have to stay in an ice bath to activate weight loss. That being said, an ideal ice bath routine is somewhere that lasts anywhere from 2-10 minutes at a time, or even 15 minutes for those who have acclimated to the cold. It maximizes the cryotherapy benefits of ice bathing without inducing excessive stress and risking frostbite or hypothermia.
It’s not advised to stay too long in ice-cold water as it can be dangerous for your health. If you find the idea of cold water immersion promising for your weight loss journey, it’s recommended to start slowly and build up your body’s tolerance to the extreme cold temperature over time.
Of course, understanding ice bath temperature plays a vital role in how long you should stay in an ice bath. Naturally, the colder the water temperature, the shorter the time you need to spend in a cold plunge to experience its benefits.
Do Ice Baths Burn Fat? FAQs
Does ice water help you lose weight?
Yes. Ice water can help you lose weight a little when you drink it, more if you take an icy plunge, by revving up your metabolism.
Drinking ice water at 39°F can cause water-induced thermogenesis, which, according to a study, causes a small 25% increase in energy expenditure. Meanwhile, a dip in ice water at 57°F increases metabolic rate by 350%.
How many calories does an ice bath burn?
There isn’t an exact way to figure out or any scientific proof about how many calories an ice bath can burn. But, a study found that three hours of cold exposure can help you burn an extra 250 calories when brown fat is activated. Also, when entirely activated, 100 grams of brown fat can burn up to 3400 calories per day.
To give you an idea, you can burn 1-2 calories per minute in an ice bath.
How often should you take ice baths for weight loss?
The research is fairly limited regarding how often to take ice baths to experience its weight loss benefits. Some take ice baths multiple times a week, while others prefer hopping in the cold water for a couple of minutes daily.
With that said, there’s no recommended limit to taking ice baths to increase your metabolic capacity for burning fat. But the goal is to hop in an ice bath about three times a week.
Does an ice bath burn belly fat?
Yes, taking ice baths can help burn belly fat. Belly fats may be a combination of fat under the skin (subcutaneous fat) and fat surrounding abdominal organs (visceral fat). Both are white fat cells, which can be minimized as the brown fat burns glucose and other white fat deposits to produce heat energy during an ice bath.
Conclusion
Weight loss is a common goal for many, but it can often be a frustrating and painful pursuit. It may sound like torture, but there’s plenty to appreciate in the benefits of immersing the body in extremely low temperatures, whether using an ice barrel or a cold plunge tub.
And the science is clear—researchers have found more evidence that ice baths burn fat. While it’s not likely that an ice bath is a magical tool for weight loss, plunging in water that’s colder than your core body temperature increases metabolism and energy expenditure as your body tries to produce heat to keep itself warm. And this key point potentially helps you lose weight.
But while ice baths alone can aid in fat loss, a combination of cold plunge and sauna can be the perfect pair to amplify the effects.
