Does Tanning Burn Calories? The Connection

There have been many misconceptions as well as several revelations by scientists and experts over the years about tanning, and a lot of questions like does tanning burn calories? How does tanning affect weight loss? amongst few have been pondered on.

Let’s leave the several other revelations for now and talk about the relationship between tanning and weight loss and if tanning does burn calories.

To properly understand, let’s first understand the meaning of each individual term; Tanning, Calories, Weight Loss.

What Are Calories?

First of all, calories are a unit that measures energy. When we eat food, it breaks down into that thing called calories and this is one way the body gets its energy. In addition to getting calories from food, your body also uses calories as fuel for basic functions like breathing.

In a situation where you eat or have more calories in your body than you need, your body automatically saves the excess calories as body fat and this is how you gain weight.

What is Tanning?

Tanning is an activity where the skin is exposed to ultraviolet rays from sun rays. This results in changing the skin color to somewhat brown or bronze. In addition, and there are several ways you can go about tanning the skin, either indoors using tanning beds and spray tans or outdoors using the sunlight, also known as sunbathing.

What is Weight Loss?

Weight loss is mainly losing excess body fat. In addition to that, weight loss can also refer to losing excess water or muscle mass from the body as well.

The process of weight loss begins in a situation where you’ve used up more calories than you have in your body which ultimately results in burning off some amount of stored fats. The more fat, muscle, and water you lose, the more bodyweight you shed.

Relationship between Tanning, Calories and Losing Weight

Now that we understand each term individually, let’s talk about their connection with each other: how does tanning affect weight loss?

It’s understandable that tanning sessions can make you sweat, which some believe to be proof of burning calories and ultimately lose weight! But that’s wrong because sweating is water loss from the body which leads to dehydration and it’s temporary. The lost water through sweat will be ultimately be put back on as soon as you drink another water.

So, Does Tanning Burn Calories?

Tanning actually has a very negligible effect on calories and weight loss. Lying down under the sun sunbathing will help you burn more calories, just as much as lying down on your bed and doing nothing will do.

The tanning process does not especially burn any significant number of calories and it certainly doesn’t cause weight loss. If you want to lose some pounds, tanning is definitely NOT the way to do so!

Takeaway: Tanning itself does not burn calories.

How Many Calories Does Tanning Burn?

Technically, tanning will burn calories but as said above that tanning will only burn as many calories, as just lying down on your bed doing nothing will do. So, do not expect a huge chop off from your body wait as tanning will not help you lose weight.

Having said that tanning through sunbathing does have some benefits as it can increase body vitamin D levels, which is important for bone health and immunity. This means tanning should be done in moderation but make sure to wear sunscreen while doing so!

So, if tanning sessions do not cause weight loss, then what can be done to lose some pounds? The best way to burn calories and losing the extra pounds is actually working out and going on a diet. Dieting means eating nutritious food that reduces calorie intake while still being delicious!

The bottom line: tanning will only give you tanned skin, not help you lose weight.

Does Tanning Burn Fat?

Yes, only if you are swimming or working out in the sun.

You can’t burn calories by sunbathing and lounging around a beach or pool while drinking beer. To burn fat while tanned, you must exercise your body through walking, running, jogging, strength training.

Of course, if you’re sun tanning and exercising at the same time, then yes — tanning will aid in burning belly fats amongst others and thus assist with weight loss (if that’s your goal). Sun tanning does not burn fat on its own; tanning must be paired with other exercises.

So if you aim to leverage tanning to burn belly fat and body fat in general, tanning activity must be paired with other exercises, like swimming, jogging, etc.

There are no shortcuts to this; there is nothing you can do that will burn fat without exercise and healthy eating habits (talk about a myth). So if the idea of sun tanning for “weight loss” appeals to you then also think about exercising more!

Does sweating burn calories?

No! not really. Sweat is not the determining factor of how many calories you’ve burned, it’s merely a sign that your body is hot and needs to cool down.

Sweating serves as the body’s natural method of keeping itself cool. It accomplishes this by releasing water and salt, which evaporates to assist to cool you off. Sweating alone doesn’t burn a significant amount of calories, but sweating out enough liquid will result in a loss of water weight. However, it is only a temporary reduction. Once you rehydrate by drinking water or eating food, any lost weight will be restored immediately.

The most significant reason we sweat during a workout is that the energy we’re expending generates internal body heat. As a result, if you’re sweating hard enough when you exercise, you’re definitely burning calories in the process.

Does tanning bed burn calories?

If you are wondering if lying in a tanning bed burn calories, then technically, Yes tanning in a tanning bed burn calories. But enough to lose weight? No! not really. You won’t burn off a substantial number of calories without physical activity if you lie on a tanning bed. Every hour, you shed about 53 calories just sitting on a tanning bed, the same as when you are relaxing.

To use a tanning bed, a user lays on it and exposes themselves to the ultraviolet light it emits which is not enough activity to get your body to burn weight loss worthy calories. Tanning beds use magnetic ballasts, which are not electronic like most other lights (e.g., an incandescent), and have been confirmed to cause Tanorexia; a tanning addiction, so tanning beds are not a particularly healthy tanning method.

So to say; tanning beds will not help you to burn calories and lose weight. If you are lying in a tanning bed to burn calories, you might be wasting your time. Yes, they might give you a tan faster and evenly than the sun, but that’s about it!