Noom Diet Review: Everything you need to know about the weight loss app

• relatively expensive
• focuses mostly on weight loss rather than whole body health
• offers only virtual coaching
• requires smartphone or tablet
• categorizes several nutrient-dense foods as “red” foods
• recommends low amount of calories, which may not be suitable for everyone
• can be tedious and time consuming to log foods

Who tried it

In addition to being a registered dietitian and health writer, I also have a master’s degree in clinical nutrition, which qualifies me to introduce myself as jack.

In addition to my decade-long vegetarianism, I don’t strictly adhere to any other dietary regimen or restrict my intake of any other foods.

I had never used any other applications to help me lose weight until I tried Noom. In contrast, I’m well-versed in Noom’s calorie counting and meal monitoring features.

There are other applications that help me evaluate the nutritional worth of certain meals, foods, or diet regimens that I’ve previously used.

In contrast, I had no prior experience with Noom’s other features, such as the daily classes and group coaching.

How to get started

Noom’s onboarding process begins with a short questionnaire, which you can complete either online or inside the app.

Your age, weight, health, and exercise objectives are all asked for in this test. This questionnaire also inquires about your current eating habits, physical activity level, and any other practises or habits that could have an impact on your health.

To give you a taste of the questions, here are a few:

• What feelings are you hoping to achieve during your journey with Noom?
• Which best describes the area you live in?
• How long has it been since you were at your ideal weight?
• Have any life events led to weight gain in the last few years?

Use this information to generate a personalised strategy and schedule to help you achieve your objectives.

The programme recalculated my weight loss timeframe depending on my responses as I completed the survey.

Users are just need to spend a few minutes a day on the Noom app, which includes a daily educational article, advice and tasks that you can go through at your own speed.

Log your food consumption, exercise and weigh-ins as well as message your health coach and other members of the group for additional encouragement.You may also set your daily Noom lesson timer to a specified range, such as one of the following:

• 1–4 minutes
• 5–8 minutes
• 9–12 minutes

In general, I had little trouble getting started with the Noom app and navigating about once I was up and running.

How does Noom work?

As with other commercial diet regimens, Noom tries to help you lose weight by reducing your caloric intake.

When your daily calorie intake falls short of your daily calorie expenditure, you’re in a calorie deficit.
As a result of your responses to a series of questions about your daily activities and general health, Noom calculates how many calories you should consume each day.

Noom employs an algorithm to determine how many calories you should consume each day based on your ideal weight and time period. It’s called a calorie allotment.

To give you an idea, I set my daily calorie allotment at 1,320 calories. For those who want more control over their diet, you may set a daily caloric allowance and manually alter it. The software does not provide a daily calorie budget for women of less than 1,200 calories or for males of less than 1,400 calories for safety and nutrition concerns. When it comes to weight reduction and long-term weight management, two self-monitoring habits that Noom promotes are food journaling and weekly weigh-ins.
Noom also lets you see a breakdown of your food intake over the course of the day. Here you can see how many calories you ingested during the day, which items were red, yellow, or green, as well as how many calories you consumed in total throughout the day.

By establishing daily step targets and offering a training plan, Noom encourages regular exercise.

The software allows users to keep track of their physical activity and offers a wide variety of activities to pick from. Noom instantly synchronised with my Health app to reveal my total daily steps since I have an iPhone.

Additionally, Noom allows users to keep track of water consumption, blood pressure, and blood sugar levels, among other things.

Meal reminders may also be set up at particular times of the day, if desired.

How much does Noom cost?

Noom offers the following subscription plans:

• Monthly auto-recurring plan: $59
• 2-month auto-recurring plan: $150
• 3-month auto-recurring plan: $180
• 4-month auto-recurring plan: $240
• 5-month auto-recurring plan: $300
• 6-month auto-recurring plan: $360
• 7-month auto-recurring plan: $420
• 8-month auto-recurring plan: $480
• Annual auto-recurring plan: $199

A yearlong subscription to Noom, which costs $199, is the greatest deal if you know you’ll use it for more than a few months.

Also, bear in mind that the firm provides various discounts all year round.

Consult your firm’s human resources department if you’re employed by a company that provides a health and wellness programme for its employees. Noom, a health initiative, offers monetary rewards to participants.

Noom’s recurring plans start at $59 per month, which may be more than you’re able or willing to pay.

Are Noom’s add-ons worth it?

For an extra fee, Noom provides three optional add-ons to further tailor your experience.

These add-ons include:

• personalised meal plans
• personalised exercise programmes
• a DNA testing kit

Emailed to you in PDF format, the food and training plans may either be printed out or accessed on a mobile device.

As a result, several reviews complain that the tutorials don’t seem individualised, despite the label “customised.” For those who must follow a special diet, such as gluten-free or vegan, the meal plans are very helpful.

DNA testing kits for Noom subscribers have just been teamed with a Boston-based firm named Orig3n.

If you want to learn more about how your genetics affect your health, this testing kit is for you!

To yet, no studies have shown the potential health advantages of genetic testing in terms of motivating people to make lifestyle changes or predicting which diet and exercise regimens would work best.

What can you eat on Noom?

Noom categorises meals into green, yellow, and red depending on their calorie and nutritional content. The app suggests ingesting 30 percent green, 45 percent yellow, and 25 percent red meals each day.

Additionally, users are allowed a certain amount of calories per category in addition to a daily calorie allowance.

For instance, the following is how I allocated my daily calorie allowance of 1,350 to the following categories:

• Green foods: 405 calories
• Yellow foods: 608 calories
• Red foods: 337 calories

Green

• There are a wide variety of fruits to choose from.
• vegetables such as: romain lettuce and arugula, carrots, celery and onions, and spinach
• Sweet potatoes, parsnips, beets, and squash are all examples of starchy vegetables.
• Nonfat yoghurt, nonfat Greek yoghurt, and nonfat cheese sticks are all included in this week’s grocery list.
• Unsweetened almond, cashew, or soy milk are all acceptable dairy substitutes.
• There are a variety of whole-grain foods that include oats and brown rice as well as whole grain bread, pita, pasta and tortillas.
• A variety of sauces, including tomato-based, light mayonnaise and spicy salsa.
• Tea and coffee without sugar

Yellow

• Grilled poultry, turkey, and lean cuts of beef, hog, and lamb are all examples of lean meats.
  a variety of fish and shellfish
• Low-fat milk, low-fat cheeses, low-fat cottage cheese, and Greek yoghurt are all examples of dairy products.
• Lentils, pinto beans, chickpeas, peas, quinoa, black beans, and soybeans are all legumes and seeds.
  couscous, white rice, white bread, and white pasta are examples of grains and grain products.
• Diet Coke and beer are two of the many available libations.

Red

• Ham, red meats, fried meats, bacon, sausage, hot dogs, and hamburgers are all examples of meats that may be served.
• Nuts and nut butters: peanut butter, almond butter, almonds, walnuts
• Cake, chocolate, cookies, candies, and other sweets are all examples of desserts.
• For a quick bite: fries or potato chips or an energy bar or two.
• Butter, mayonnaise, and ranch dressing are examples of condiments.
• Wine and juices like orange juice are examples of beverages.

Keep in mind that not all foods fall neatly into one of the following categories.

There were certain sorts of sweet potatoes that were classed as green foods, while others were classified as yellow foods. For example, while I was recording my sweet potatoes, I discovered that some types of sweet potatoes were classified as green, while others were labelled as yellow.

My experience with Noom

In terms of both design and use, the Noom application is an excellent choice.

In addition to generating a personalised diet plan, the online questionnaire helped me identify the habits, behaviour patterns, and environmental variables that may be influencing my eating habits.

Although the daily courses were plain and instructive, I also found them to be easy to follow.

It’s also a boon for individuals who just have a few minutes a day to devote to the app but still want to get the most out of it by learning something new.

For those who struggle with motivation, the personal coaches were an invaluable source of information, suggestions, and encouragement throughout the program’s duration.

Group coaches used prompts and questions to encourage participation and build a feeling of community.

However, I found that the app does not combine users with comparable activity levels or health objectives, which may discourage some people.

In terms of recording my daily food intake, I found the meal tracker to be clumsy and unclear. There were a few instances when certain items were labelled as green in one record but yellow or red in another.

Many meals that were low in calories and rich in fibre or protein were labelled red or yellow, which made me wonder about the criteria for these categories.

As an example, the USDA designated a 20-calorie portion of fibre crispbread, which contains 4 grammes of fibre per serving, as a red food. When it came to my go-to spinach tortilla wraps (which have 50 calories and 11 grammes of fibre), they were yellow.

The quantity of calories in my daily budget seemed low, particularly when compared to what I consume on a regular basis to maintain my weight. Even yet, the flexibility to change the aim to something more attainable and long-term was very appealing to me.

Can Noom help you lose weight?