Does Infrared Sauna Burn Calories? Myth or Reality
You will enjoy an incredible calmness in your mind and improved mental health after attending an infrared sauna session. An infrared sauna relaxes your body, recovers your muscle memory, and detoxifies your body. Hence, users are still wondering, does infrared sauna burn calories?
Yes, infrared saunas promote calorie burn. Infrared saunas increase blood circulation throughout our bodies, causing sweat. Finally, you will experience 70-300 kcal of calorie burn by taking 10 minutes of 4 infrared sauna sessions.
This comprehensive guide explores a few study reports that prove that infrared sauna burns calories. Also, you will learn how the process works. At the end of the article, I shared what needs to be done to maximize the benefits of infrared sauna sessions to burn calories. Keep reading!
Does Infrared Sauna Burn Calories?
The straightforward answer is YES; infrared sauna burns calories. Hence, an infrared sauna helps you lose body weight.
When we spend minutes in an infrared sauna room, the sweat production of our body increases. At the same time, our body pumps blood around different parts, causing calorie burning.
In fact, the calorie-burning process is similar to how we burn energy from sweating when exercising. During physical exercise, our body heats up and sweats and increases heart rate, which triggers calorie burn.
Binghamton University researched this and found that participants who spent 45 minutes in an infrared sauna lost 4% of their body fat after 16 weeks. The participants attended the sauna session 3 times a week.
So, it is evident that an infrared sauna burns calories.
How Do You Burn Calories in Infrared Sauna?
You might still be wondering about the calorie-burning process with the infrared room sauna. Let me make you clear with the information below.
An infrared sauna supports weight loss in many ways. They are,
Increases Metabolic Rate
Your body's core temperature will increase when you spend 10-15 minutes in an infrared sauna room. Simultaneously, your heart rate and metabolic rate will increase. Your body temperature will take longer to cool down if you spend a longer period of the session. More importantly, cooling down will become harder for your body for longer sessions.
In that case, blood flow in different body parts will increase, and you will sweat a lot. An increase in the metabolic rate will work to burn calories.
Detoxification
You already learned that an infrared sauna lets you sweat a lot. Sweat helps you detoxify your body, hence causing calorie burn.
You might be thinking, how do toxins enter our body?
Well, toxins enter our bodies in different ways, i.e., through drinks, foods, skin care products, polluted environments, etc.
You may experience several health-related problems due to toxins like weight gain, blemished skin, poor immunity, and many more, so how do we get rid of these toxins that already enter our bodies?
The answer is simple – SWEATING!
An infrared sauna is one of the best ways to detoxify your body.
As explained, a 10-15 minute infrared sauna lets you sweat a lot; the process removes toxins from your body, too.
Chemical and other toxins will be removed from your body with an infrared sauna session while improving blood circulation.
In the end, the entire process contributes to weight loss.
Enhanced Cardiovascular Health
Many studies found that frequent infrared sauna sessions promote healthy blood pressure. When your blood pressure stays within the level, be sure that your body doesn’t have cholesterol.
Moreover, lowering cholesterol levels means a lower chance of chronic heart failure.
Maintaining good cardiovascular health is of utmost importance if you want to lose body weight. By attending infrared sauna sessions in Franklin, TN regularly, you will experience an improved metabolic rate. This enhanced cardiovascular health will help you burn calories.
How Many Calories Can You Burn in an Infrared Sauna?
This is another burning question!
Yes, many infrared sauna users want to know the amount of burnt calories through infrared sauna. In this case, let me share a few study results.
Study #01
A 2017 study showed that a person lost approximately 300 kcal by spending four sessions a day in an infrared sauna. The time for each session was 10 minutes. Also, the person took a 5-minute break between the sessions.
According to the study, the amount of burnt calories depends on a few factors, which are:
Body heat acclimation
Body surface area
Body mass
Also, be noted that the number may vary from person to person.
The study said that since our body works harder to pump blood throughout the body during an infrared sauna session, we lose weight during the process.
Study #02
Another study is done on men and women athletes. They attended 20-minute sauna sessions 3 times a day. The temperature of the infrared sauna was set to 70 degrees Celsius. The participants took a 5 minute break between the sessions.
Interestingly, the women lost 0.39 kg of body weight. On the other hand, the men lost 0.89 kg of body weight.
Based on the result, the researchers came to the conclusion that three sessions of 50 minutes in an infrared sauna will help you lose 450-1100 kcal.
It is a pretty nice number, isn't it?
Wrapping Up
Hopefully, your query “does infrared sauna burn calories?” is answered by the study results in this comprehensive guide.
Burning calories with the help of an infrared sauna is not a myth at all. Researchers on this topic conducted multiple studies, and each study gave positive feedback.
However, make sure to drink plenty of water and attend the sauna session after exercising. This way, you can enjoy the maximum benefit of an infrared sauna session. Otherwise, you may experience severe dehydration. At the same time, it is prohibited to drink alcohol during the process.