The scale doesn’t have to be the only way of checking your health. Of course, weight isn’t the only indicator of your health, but it’s essential to maintain an ideal bodyweight. You must have asked yourself if you are too heavy for your height and age. Many teenagers are obsessed with their looks, so they constantly measure themselves to find out if they are skinny enough. Do you want to know if you at your ideal body weight, or are you overweight, obese, or underweight? The thing you need to do in order to find out this information is to calculate your BMI (Body Mass Index).

What is Body Mass Index (BMI)?

BMI (Body Mass Index) is a technique of measuring the nutritional status of an adult. Adolphe Quetelet developed it in the 19th century. He wanted to find out the risk of diseases considering the state of the human body.  BMI can be used for children as well.  

How to calculate BMI? 

You can calculate your BMI at home; you need to know your weight and height. It’s simple; you have to divide your kilograms by the square of your height in meters (kg/m2). You can google the BMI calculator, and you will get a more precise result. The result you get is sorting you in the following categories:

1. Underweight

When your BMI is below 18.5 you are probably underweight. Being underweight is as dangerous as being overweight, resulting from poor nutrition. If you are trying to be healthy, you have to eat wholesome food rich in nutrients to gain weight. Remember, don’t try to gain weight by eating just junk food. It can get you more damage than it can be helpful to your body.  

2. Normal weight

It will be ideal if your BMI is between 18.5 and 24.9, this weight is considered average weight or perfect weight. At this point, you need to maintain your weight. Live a healthy lifestyle, exercise, eat healthy to stay healthy.  

3. Overweight

If your Body Mass index is 25 to 29.9, you are overweight. It doesn’t necessarily mean you are unhealthy, but there is a risk of many conditions if you are overweight, so it would be helpful to your health to try losing some weigh to reach your ideal bodyweight. 

4. Obesity

When your BMI results are above 29.9, but at this point, having a higher BMI isn’t just an esthetic problem, now you are risking many diseases. But, when it comes to BMI, we can differentiate between the three stages of obesity, and every next stage brings more risk for your overall health. 

  • Class 1 obesity  (low risk), if BMI is between 30 and 34.9.
  • Class 2 obesity (moderate risk), if BMI is between 35 and 39.9.
  • Class 3 obesity (high risk) if BMI is above 40. 

Final thoughts

BMI isn’t a perfect way to measure your health, but still, many experts tend to use it. It isn’t ideal because it doesn’t consider the muscles. For example, the person who lifts weights will weigh more, but it doesn’t mean he is overweight or obese, but BMI will show so sometimes. Also, BMI doesn’t consider lifestyle, activity levels, genetics, and gender. Other measurements can indicate your health, such as waist circumference, and waist circumference will complement BMI calculations for determining your ideal bodyweight. But still, this sometimes won’t be enough to find out about your health. Then you can get in touch with a weight loss professionals, where you will be able to do many tests that will assure you about the state of your organism.