Burn Calories With Drinking Cold Water

When in the realm of health and fitness there are not very many absolute truths. Topics that seem fairly straightforward often result in confusion or cause people to have conflicting views. In some cases, differing opinions can all be correct, but each one may only true under certain circumstances. However, when it comes to the question of whether drinking cold water burns more calories than drinking warm water, there is one absolute truth.

The interesting thing about this issue is the question can be easily answered just by researching the scientific definition of a calorie. The word calorie has several definitions, but one of them is: the quantity of heat needed to raise the temperature of 1000 grams of water by 1°Celsius. This may sound a little confusing, but with a small simplification and some conversions to US measurements, it becomes obvious that drinking colder water unquestionably burns more calories.

The most important included in this definition is that calories are defined by the sheer ammount of energy it takes to raise the temperature of water within your body. To calculate the amount of calories burned with US measurements, we just need to do a couple conversions. First, 1000 grams of water weight is equal to 1 liter in volume, which corresponds to 33.8 ounces or 4.2 glasses of water (8oz each). To convert the temperature of water, you can use the following equations: 1°Celsius = (Fahrenheit temperature - 32) divided by 1.8 or 1°Fahrenheit = (Celsius temperature multiplied by 1.8) + 32.

Now by putting together a few pieces of information, we can start to see how this all comes together. First, a glass of ice water is around 38°Fahrenheit or 3.3°Celsius, in relation to how much ice and water is in the glass. Also, the normal temperature of the human body is about 98.6°F or 37°C, although there is some variance between individuals. there is also one other key piece of information that explains why colder water burns more calories: water you consume has to be warmed up to your normal body temperature before it can be utilized in your body.

In other words, if you drink cold water, your body must spend energy (burn calories) to warm it up to 37°Celsius, before it can be used. For example, say you drink 8.4 glasses of ice water (3.3°C) per day, which is just over the standard minimum recommendation of 8 glasses per day. From the definition of a calorie, we can figure out that the water has to be increased by 33.7°C (37°C - 3.3°C). This means your body will burn 33.7 calories for every 1000grams or 4.2 glasses of (3.3°C) water consumed.

In this example you are drinking 8.4 glasses of water per day, which is twice the volume used in the definition of a calorie. Therefore, the 33.7 calories burned to increase the temperature of 4.2 glasses would double to 67.4. To sum everything up, drinking 8.4 glasses of 3.3°C or 38°F water will burn 67.4 more calories than drinking identical amount of water at 37°C or 98.6°F (your body temperature).

Based on human physiology and the scientific definition of a calorie, we can see that without a doubt, drinking colder water does burn more calories. So now the important question is what does this mean for you and your ability to fail fat? The truth is this information is note worthy, but drinking colder water will not have anywhere near the impact as eating right and exercising, although it can cause a small increase in fat loss.

Before taking a closer check your potential fat loss, there is one important thing to point out with the above example. To find the volume of calories burned, I compared ice water to water that is the temperature of the human body (98.6°F). The problem is most men and women who don't drink ice water probably drink water that is room temperature instead of the temperature of your body. Room temperature water is generally around 60-75°F, so the extra calories burned by drinking cold water will not be as significant when compared to room temperature water.

However, there is still a tiny but significant difference in calorie burning between drinking ice water and water at room temperature. In the above example, the projected increase in calorie burning was 67.4 per day when drinking 8.4 glasses of ice water. Even when comparing ice water to room temperature water, there will still likely be at least 30 more calories burned by drinking ice water. 30 extra calories burned in a day may not seem like much, but it can add up over time.

If you compare 2 people who do everything identical (lifestyle, nutrition, exercise, etc.), except one person drinks ice water and the other person drinks room temperature water, the person drinking ice water should burn an extra 30 calories per day. Over the course of a year this adds up to 10,950 calories, which translates to just over 3 pounds of fat. Therefore, just by drinking ice water instead of room temperature water, one person could lose 3 more pounds over the course of a year.

Naturally, this is just theoretical, because you will never find 2 people who have identical lifestyle, behaviors, and physiology, but it does show that you can create a small increase in fat loss just by drinking cold water. I would never recommend designing a fat loss program based solely around drinking cold water, but considering that drinking water is something you have to do anyway, why not let the water add a little boost to your metabolism and help you burn a few extra calories.