It is no surprise that fitness professionals and consumers alike want to know how much body fat they should expect to lose considering the increasing ease of measuring body composition and the benefits of decreasing body fat percentage. In contrast to the well-researched and accepted guideline that an individual should not lose more than 1-2 pounds per week, body fat percentage loss is not as well researched, and no official guidelines exist.
However, most experts agree that a 1% loss per month is generally safe and achievable. However, it is important to remember that most methods of measuring body fat (such as calipers or bioelectrical impedance analysis) are highly inaccurate.
The measurement of body fat percentage is prone to error, so any small change in body fat percentage could be from measurement error rather than an actual change in body fat. Therefore, you should wait a couple of months to reassess your body composition to see whether you‘ve made progress.
