Water is an essential part of staying healthy. Over half the body consists of water. Being well hydrated helps concentration levels, sports performance and general wellbeing.
Total Body Water is the total amount of fluid in the body expressed as a percentage of total weight.
The average TBW% ranges for a healthy person are:
Female 45 to 60%
Male 50 to 65%
Here is how to calculate how much water you should drink a day for both health and weight loss benefits.
Your weight: The first step to knowing how much water to drink everyday is to know your weight. The amount of water a person should drink varies on their weight, which makes sense because the more someone weighs the more water they need to drink. A two hundred pound man and 100-pound woman require different amounts of water every day.
Multiply by 2/3: Next you want to multiple your weight by 2/3 (or 67%) to determine how much water to drink daily. For example, if you weighed 175 pounds you would multiple that by 2/3 and learn you should be drinking about 117 ounces of water every day.
Activity Level: Finally you will want to adjust that number based on how often you work out, since you are expelling water when you sweat. You should add 12 ounces of water to your daily total for every 30 minutes that you work out. So if you work out for 45 minutes daily, you would add 18 ounces of water to your daily intake.
To make it a littler easier to calculate how much water to drink everyday, here are the recommended amounts for a range of weights. Remember to adjust for your activity level.
| Weight | Ounces of Water Daily |
| 100 pounds | 67 ounces |
| 110 pounds | 74 ounces |
| 120 pounds | 80 ounces |
| 130 pounds | 87 ounces |
| 140 pounds | 94 ounces |
| 150 pounds | 100 ounces |
| 160 pounds | 107 ounces |
| 170 pounds | 114 ounces |
| 180 pounds | 121 ounces |
| 190 pounds | 127 ounces |
| 200 pounds | 134 ounces |
Tips for Reaching Your Daily Water Goals
Drinking over 100 ounces of water may seem impossible at first, but with these easy tips you can reach your goal in no time.
Drink 2 cups (16 oz.) of water before every meal: Science has proven that drinking 2 cups of water before every meal helps you to eat less during meal time and lose weight. If you do this three times daily – at breakfast, lunch, and dinner – you have already consumed 48 ounces of water.
Morning and Night: Get into the habit of drinking one glass (16 oz.) of water when you wake up and another 8 oz. glass before you go to sleep every night. This will add another 24 ounces of water to your daily intake. The easiest way to do this is to keep a glass or container of water at your bedside, that way as soon as you wake up and start your day, you can begin drinking water.
Keep Track By Your Container: One thing that has proven to help people consume enough water daily is to buy a special container for their water, like this one or this one, and set a goal of how many times they will fill an finish the container. For example, if you buy a 16 oz. container and need to drink 80 ounces of water a day, your goal would be to drink 5 of those daily. Need to drink more water? Try a larger container.
Bubbles: Consider carbonated and sparkling water in addition to regular water. Many people find that adding sparkling water and 0 calorie flavored water makes drinking water throughout the day more fun. Find yourself drinking lots of expensive sparkling water? Consider buying a soda stream and make your own delicious sparkling beverages at home.
Infuse Your Water With Flavor: Water doesn’t have to be boring and infusing your water with fruit, herbs, and other flavors can make it much easier to reach your daily goal. Try adding cucumber, strawberries, lemons, limes, and fresh herbs to create flavorful water. This fruit infusion water pitcher is a great way to always have great tasting water on hand or try Hint water available at MOXIE or try these recipes.
Strawberry Lemon Basil Water
Ingredients:
Directions:
Fill a pitcher to the top with ice and fruit.
Slightly scrunch up the basil and cover with cold filtered water.
Let the water infuse at least 1 hour in the refrigerator.
Ingredients:
Directions:
Add melon and mint to a pitcher and then fill with water.
Allow fruit to soak for 2-8 hours in the fridge.
Rosemary Grapefruit Water
Ingredients:
Directions:
Add ingredients to the bottom of a pitcher.
Cover with water.
Let sit over night and enjoy the next day.
Resources:
Slender Kitchen, Importance of Hydration and Total Body Water. 2017.
Connecting Families, Infused Water Recipes for Summer. 2016.
DISCLAIMER: The information on this site is not intended or implied to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. All content, including text, graphics, images and information, contained on or available through this web site is for general information purposes only.
