For much of my 20 years as a fitness professional, conventional nutrition advice said that people are better off eating four, five, or even six times per day than eating one, two, or three times per day. Early on in my career, I encouraged clients to eat every few hours, which meant that they snacked multiple times each day.



In recent years, research has emerged showing that snacking may actually be detrimental to your health and weight management.



My personal experience, as well the results coming from my personal training clients, reinforce my second nutrition guideline:



Eat meals, not snacks.



In case you were wondering, my first nutrition guideline is to eat high-protein.





Why Dietitians  and fitness professionals recommend snacking



Fitness professionals recommend small, frequent meals for a myriad of reasons. However, science doesn’t support them.



In case you ever confront these reasons, I’ll briefly address them.



To avoid a metabolic slowdown



Each time you eat, your body burns calories to digest and absorb the nutrition from your food. If you measure your metabolic rate throughout the day, you will notice it rise each time you eat.



That led people to believe that eating more often led to a faster metabolism. But, in reality, if you eat the same foods over two meals or six meals, the food has the same net impact on your metabolism.



Along the same lines, some fitness professionals recommend eating every few hours to avoid going into a starvation state and slowing your resting metabolic rate. It turns out that idea is way off base, as well. Your metabolic rate actually increases even after a few days on a fast. It won't slow down after only a few hours.



There’s no metabolic benefit to eating more often.



To avoid muscle loss



Aside from physique competitors or those with chronic wasting diseases, you don’t need to worry about losing muscle if you don’t eat every few hours.



For most people who aren’t on steroids, eating more than three times per day is unlikely to help you build muscle faster, either.



What’s most important is getting enough nutrition and total protein.



To maintain a more steady blood sugar level



To keep patients from riding a blood sugar roller coaster and messing with their medication, conventional dietitians recommend eating smaller, more frequent meals. 



It’s sort of like recommending an alcoholic drink a little bit all day long rather than a lot all at once. 



The issue for a person with diabetes is carbohydrates, just as the issue for an alcoholic is alcohol. Both should abstain from the substance that causes problems.



The difference is, the person with diabetes can get cured and eat carbs again, whereas the person with alcoholism needs to abstain indefinitely.



All that to say that the dietitian’s diet advice isn’t good for treating someone with diabetes, and it certainly isn’t good for the person without it.



The Case Against Snacking



Though the rationales above for eating more often sound good, research and experience don't support them. In fact, coaching people to eat more often likely contributes to obesity and health problems. It doesn't prevent them.



I recommend avoiding snacks for multiple reasons. Some relate to your behavior. Others relate to your hormones and metabolism. 




a “grazing” temporal eating pattern was modestly but significantly associated with poorer diet quality and adiposity among women
Leech RM, et al.



Eating often conditions you to eat often



If you intend to eat five times per day, that means you’ll have to eat every three to four hours.



Not long after your current meal, you’ll have to think about your next meal.



It doesn’t take much for your thoughts about eating to become an obsession.



If you eat less often, you’ll think about eating less often because you have to plan to eat less often.



Snack foods are some of the most addicting foods on the planet.