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Can Vaping Help You Lose Weight?

9th Feb 2022

Vaping Can Help You Lose Weight

We all want to know ‘how to lose weight quickly’ through various diets and fasting to remove those extra few pounds in belly fat. But is it also possible by vaping e-liquids or does the action instead lead to weight gain? The short answer: vaping does not help you lose weight as a diet trick, despite that being the reason why some pick up an e-cigarette.

Its sole purpose is to help people quit smoking by using a healthier alternative that follows a familiar pattern of holding something in the hand to inhale. What’s important to understand is that neither smoking or vaping is recommended for your wellbeing to lose weight but neither do they contribute to excess fat. Nicotine, the natural appetite suppressant, found in cigarettes and vaping, leads to weight loss but not in a natural way. Instead, nicotine reduces your appetite and speed up your metabolism, so your body burns calories at a faster rate.

Why Do People Gain Weight Fast After Quitting Smoking?

Although nicotine is the main substance in cigarettes that acts as an appetite suppressant leading to eventual weight loss, excessive amounts of tobacco can cause excess fat which largely forms at the belly, according to some medical studies. This could also be the link between cigarette smoking and a greater risk of diabetes. After a person quits smoking, this tends to lead to an increase in calorie intake, with research suggesting this happens as the metabolic rate decreases.

Because of lower energy due to a decrease in physical activity and high-fat diets, the weight gain can last several months or even years in some cases until nicotine levels even out, with a smoker gaining on average an additional 4.5kg between 6-12 months after quitting. Nevertheless, you have to outweigh the positives against the negatives. A bit of light exercise, a healthy diet and no cigarettes will not only help to shed the pounds that will inevitably happen initially but inevitably lead to a better life, free of combustible tobacco and reduce the level of tar and dangerous toxins in the body.

Is Vaping an Appetite Suppressant?

A not uncommon stereotype of a smoker who decides to quit is the return of hunger and the associated weight gain that may result, once you’ve stopped smoking. This is because your appetite hormone begins to return to normal. Saliva increases and the taste of food starts to improve, increasing a desire to eat more. Heavy smokers will often forgo food due to the quantity of nicotine suppressing their feelings of hunger and their desire to eat. Because the nicotine found in tobacco and cigarettes is a natural appetite suppressant, if you smoke because you think it helps with weight loss, there could be a better way to do so without inhaling all the carbon monoxide, carcinogenic materials and tar.

Vaping is quickly becoming a go-to replacement for thousands of smokers every year in their quest to become smoke-free. Up to 95% less harmful than smoking tobacco, health officials Public Health England published evidence to suggest vaping could help smokers become smoke-free. With an estimated 3.2 million UK vapers enjoying the benefits of a smoke-free life, The nicotine in the e-liquid will suppress the appetite in the same kind of way that a cigarette does, which means you can finally quit cigarettes and avoid the immediate need to eat all the sweets and cakes you can get your hands on. While we wouldn't recommend a non-smoker to start vaping, e-cigs are a far safer way for a smoker to get the fix of nicotine that the body is addicted to.

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How Many Calories Are There in Vape E-Liquids?

It shouldn’t be a major surprise to know that e-liquids contain barely any calories. This varies based on the ingredients and sweeteners used but each 10ml bottle for instance typically has roughly 50 calories, stemming mainly from the PG and VG bases used. Considering the amount that goes into sugary snacks from your local supermarket and it’s easy to spot the difference. It’s not a food alternative but helps to replace the nicotine cravings or withdrawal from not touching cigarettes anymore. With no carbohydrates or added sugars in a vape juice, rest assured it’s all about the puff with each inhale and getting the right nicotine hit, which can be adjusted, unlike cigarettes.

Does Vaping Help with Weight Loss?

There is no evidence to suggest that vaping can help with weight loss for non-smokers, however in the event of quitting smoking, it can help those smokers maintain their weight. After all, nicotine acts as a fat burner, increasing your calories used when resting between 7% up to 15%. So it’s useful with vaping that you can pick your nicotine level and reduce at the right pace for you.

Fork Wrapped With a Measuring Tape for Someone Thinking About Weight Loss

However, if a smoker was to go down the ill-advised route of going ‘cold turkey’ and completely cut out nicotine from their normal routine, then eating more food than normal may be helping to curb those cravings for cigarettes. Depending on how much food is consumed and how little exercise is undertaken a few unwanted extra pounds might be added to the scales over time. By vaping e-liquid, the nicotine continues to suppress the appetite and will keep the body in its current state, but in a far less harmful way.

The aim of the game is not to vape forever, but to help slowly remove the body’s addiction to both smoking and nicotine. Therefore, it’s important to take your time reducing nicotine, so that you don’t put your body under any undue stress.

E-liquid is available in varying strengths of nicotine which means vapers can slowly reduce nicotine levels, as well as letting the body’s hunger levels slowly adjust at the same time.

How You Can Speed Up Your Metabolism Naturally after Quitting Smoking

  1. Chew your food at a slower pace. Food is not just for fuel but also a pleasure, so take your time!
  2. Try and allow your food to digest for at least 20 minutes after finishing a meal to feel full. Eat smaller portions and try some snacks if you start getting peckish after to stabilise your metabolism.
  3. Exercise regularly to ensure a high metabolism which will be lower due to nicotine consumption.

Does Vaping or Smoking Break a Fast?

While fasting for religious reasons is very important to many, that’s not something we could comment on or claim to be experts, explaining whether you can vape at the same time as your religious fast. However, this isn’t the only purpose for fasting. In recent times we have seen the upward trend of intermittent fasting to lose weight in short sharp bursts and the vaping community holds a curiosity whether it’s possible to vape while fasting on alternate days or even ‘time-restricted eating’, where you only eat during the daytime window (8-12 hours) and fast the remaining part of the day. So, does smoking or vaping cause an increase in blood sugar or insulin levels that prevents fasting?

What we do know is whenever you reduce your blood sugar levels, this, in turn, helps to reduce insulin levels. Because vaping nicotine does not trigger an insulin response, similar to smoking, it will not break your fast. The number of calories you vape is very minimal and you don’t ingest them like a source of food, therefore you’re not consuming energy through carbohydrates that the body requires outside of fasting. Studies also suggest there may be other circumstances instead of nicotine that contribute to smokers suppressing their appetite when fasting.

Vaping Sweet and Fruity E-Liquid

The reason that smokers crave sweets and add on weight when they quit smoking is that tobacco and cigarettes contain up to a teaspoon of sugar per cigarette. This means that in addition to your body having an addiction to nicotine, it'll have somewhat of a sweet tooth too. By vaping a fruit or sweet flavoured e-liquid like grape or cola, you can satisfy both of your body’s cravings at the same time.

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