a man holding his tummy

3 Ways To Know If You Have Visceral Fat Or Not

Visceral fat is the fat deep inside your body that covers abdominal organs. One cannot always see it, even thin people can have visceral fat without them knowing it. The belly fat must not be confused with visceral fat, as body fat or subcutaneous fat is the layer of fat directly underneath the skin (if belly is poked the fat that feels soft is subcutaneous fat) while visceral fat lies deep inside and out of reach. In this article we try to cover 3 ways to know if you have visceral fat or not. But first let’s begin with knowing its dangers.

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Why Is Visceral Fat Dangerous?

Visceral fat is deep inside and covers the organs. Several research studies have shown that visceral fat is responsible for diseases like stroke, type-2 diabetes, and high cholesterol to name a few. In addition to these there are several other diseases for which visceral fat is responsible for:

  • Dementia
  • Cancer
  • Liver disease
  • Heart attack
  • Lower back pain

3 Ways To Know If you Have Visceral Fat

While there is no exact way to find out if you have visceral fat in the body except for imaging tests, which are expensive and the doctors might not do it just for scanning the visceral fat, we have compiled these 3 ways to know if you have visceral or not at home. These 3 ways will provide only rough estimates.

1. Body Shape

photo of a burn fat text on round blue plate
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Looking at your body and observing where the fat is concentrated may help identify visceral fat. It you observe an ‘apple’ shape, it is likely you have visceral fat. An apple shape, when elaborated, is the shape of thin arms and legs with aft concentrated in abdomen area.

2. Body Mass Index (BMI)

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Body Mass Index or BMI is ratio of height compared to weight. Generally a BMI of 30 or higher is considered overweight and a likely sign of presence of visceral fat. Use this BMI calculator to calculate your BMI by entering height and weight.

3. Measure Waist

a woman in a crop top measuring her waist
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Take a measuring tape to measure the waist. Generally in women, 35 inches or higher is a likely sign of visceral fat while in men it is 40 inches. Please keep in mind this is only a rough estimate, there are a lot of other parameters like height which need to be considered.

How To Get Rid Of Visceral Fat

Several steps can be taken to get rid of visceral fat. The first step of which is changing eating habits. No amount gym and workout will help if you do not take care of eating clean. Start with a change in diet and then introduce physical activity and make it a part of the routine.

Here are some examples to help reduce visceral fat:

  • Physical activity
  • Eating healthy
  • Good sleep
  • No alcohol
  • No smoking

Related: Read our list of Top 4 Easiest Breakfast Ideas Under 5 Mins.