How Many Protein Shakes a Day is Healthy?

How Many Protein Shakes Should You Be Drinking? 

Protein intake with food or in the form of supplements helps enhance athletic performance and build muscle. If you are working on upping your fitness levels, including protein shakes as part of your diet plan is a good idea. Protein intake also helps in increasing lean body mass and maximizes fat loss.

Protein shakes are popular since they are easy and convenient to take in protein. But is there a point when it becomes too much of a good thing? Would you be better off substituting your protein shakes with whole natural foods that are more filling and are a richer source of a variety of micronutrients?

Benefits

Protein shakes enhance muscle growth and assist weight loss, enabling you to maximize strength and elevate physical performance.

The protein shakes provide you with the benefit of protein intake that would otherwise be generally sourced from conventional food sources – be it plant-based or animal-based. Protein shakes are a convenient mode for adding dietary protein. The most significant advantage is that it is a method of supplementation that helps in reasonably accurate predictions of expected beneficial outcomes. Protein shakes can be customized with various tastes/flavours, making it easier to stick to a dietary plan than sourcing protein only through traditional protein-rich food. 

Drawbacks

In healthy individuals, consuming protein shakes to meet dietary protein requirements does not present any serious long term health risks. However, depending on the quality of and ingredients in the protein shakes, individuals experience cramping, digestive distress and flatulence. 

However, an abnormally high protein diet can have some uncomfortable side effects. Excessive protein intake could lead to impaired liver function and a heightened risk of heart disease. Doctors recommended a protein intake of 3.5 grams of protein per kilogram of body weight. 

Over-reliance on protein shakes for protein intake might cause you to overlook including whole foods and grains in your cooking. Besides providing protein, whole foods and grains provide essential micronutrients, fibre, vitamins, minerals etc. Therefore, variety in food intake is critical for overall health. 

There is no consensus on the correct number of protein shakes that one can drink daily. However, for most people, between one and three protein shakes per day should suffice to meet their nutritional needs. 

Moderation in anything, including in the consumption of protein shakes, provides optimal outcomes. So whether your goal is muscle gain, weight loss, maintaining lean mass, or improving athletic performance – protein intake in moderation will help you achieve your goals. Consuming more than three protein shakes per day will not harm you. But, as a general rule, relying on too many protein supplements and giving up on whole foods is not advised.