How Much Aerobic Exercise Is Enough to Lose Weight?

Aerobic exercise alone does not cause weight loss. Weight loss is caused by creating a prolonged calorie deficit. In supplying your body with fewer calories than it needs to fuel its energy demands you force your body to raid its fuel reserves of fat to compensate for the shortfall. Weight loss is the result. Daily aerobic exercise is recommended for overall fitness. As one part of a weight-loss strategy (combined with diet and strength training) aerobics has the added benefit of raising your calorie threshold, making achieving a calorie deficit easier.

Intensity and Duration of Aerobic Exercise

• Any activity which stimulates a heart rate that falls within 50 to 85 percent of your heart's maximum work capacity is considered aerobic. The 50 to 60 percent range is considered the heart health aerobic zone, the 60 to 70 percent range is considered the fat burning zone, the 70 to 80 percent range is considered the fitness aerobic zone and the remaining 80 to 85 percent range represents a transition from aerobic to anaerobic exercise.

  Your body will burn a greater percentage of fat when your workout intensity falls within the fat burning aerobic zone, but you will burn more calories overall if you train in the fitness aerobic zone. You can use the Mayo Clinic: Target Heart Rate Calculator to estimate the target aerobic heart rate range for your age.

  Use a heart monitor to gauge whether your workout intensity is at the right pace for your target range, or periodically pause during your aerobic workout to do a pulse count. But the easiest way to determine the appropriate aerobic pace for your fitness level is to perform the talk test. If you're able to talk casually during a workout, your pace is too slow. If you're too breathless to talk during your workout, your pace is too fast. During your aerobic workout you want to be able to talk but through short breaths.

  Thirty minutes of daily aerobic exercise is recommended for general fitness purposes. When exercising for the purpose of weight loss it's better to do more than 30 minutes. A daily aerobic workout of 45 minutes or longer is suggested by the American Council on Exercise for those working out to lose weight.

The Comprehensive Strategy

• Aerobic exercise alone sometimes will not yield weight loss results unless your diet keeps calories under control and you build your muscles through strength training. Use the Calorie Calculator to estimate your daily caloric needs. In setting your daily calorie allowance, deduct 500 from this estimate; this will create a calorie deficit. You can use aerobic exercise to then create in even larger deficit gap to accelerate weight loss.

  Incorporate strength (resistance) training into your workout routine, 20 minutes a day every other day, to build and tone your muscles. Just the presence of muscles consumes a lot of energy. Increasing your body's muscle mass is a great way to boost your metabolism and drive up your body's energy demands even when you're just lying around resting.