How Many Grams of Fat per Day for Optimal Health?
Updated 29.01.2012
How many grams of fat per day is the question that will be answered conclusively in this short and informative post.
Then, after the brief answer, I will cover some more details as usual, like: which fats are smart, which should be avoided, what’s the minimum and how much is too much.
How many Grams of Fat per Day
Short and Sweet:
This amounts to 20-30% of total daily calories.
*Based on a 2000 calorie diet.
The maximum per day should range around 45%, so in the above example that would be 88 grams of dietary fat for men and 65 for women, tops! Ladies, in case you were wondering, your fat percentage is 75% that of men. 
And now for the specifics…
How many Grams of Fat per Day
The longer, more detailed answer:
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How many grams of fat per day is a good question to ask, but the probably even more important one is how many grams and what kind of fat!
You might have heard the truism “Not all calories are created the same.”
Whilst this is definitely correct, the same applies to fats, possibly even more so…
Basically there are smart fats and then there are…not so smart fats.
Smart fats are extremely good, essential even, while some others, like trans fats for instance, are pure poison.
So the answer to how many grams of fat per day relates to those, the smart, the good fats, not the bad. Those bad boys should be kept to a absolute minimum, a good number being 0 gram.
When on a fat loss diet, it’s OK to temporarily reduce your fat intake to less than the recommended 30%, maybe to around 20%. The word is temporarily though, because your body needs good fats to function properly and even to survive.
| Important hormones like testosterone are made with fats, and the nervous system requires a certain body fat percentage to work efficiently. |
If you want to drop weight, I’d recommend to focus more on reducing carbohydrates, especially the processed kind: sugar and starches like wheat.
How to choose the right fats?
Here a short list of some of the more common smart fats:
Aloha...Coconut Oil is a SUPER Smart Fat!
How to save on fat calories?
Some quick tips on how to reduce fat calories
Why are fat calories important? Because they pack the mightiest punch: 1 gram of fat contains about 9 calories, the highest of all macro nutrients. The next one down, btw, is alcohol with 7 calories on a gram, and then it’s protein and carbs with around 4 calories each per gram.
So, how many grams of smart fats per day? Approximately 30% of total calories is a good ballpark number.
To your good health,
Mark
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