Diet and weight-loss tips nutritionists all agree on

Harry Bullmore spends his days interviewing experts in the health and fitness space. Here are the most useful pieces of advice about weight loss that they have revealed this year

- Harry Bullmore

There is a lot of diet advice on the internet – some good, some not so good, some terrible. As The Independent’s senior fitness writer, I interview experts weekly in an attempt to cut through this noise and bring readers accessible, effective tips that benefit their health.

No matter which expert I’m speaking to, there are several underlying features of a nutritious adult diet that remain largely undisputed:

Eat a wide variety of plant-based foods, including plenty of vegetables

• Choose wholefoods where possible

• Focus on hitting fibre requirements - at least 30g per day

• Consume adequate protein from lean sources

• Stay hydrated

• Foods with excessive saturated fat and added sugar should form only a small portion of your diet

• Consume an appropriate number of calories for your build and activity levels

If you were to follow this advice consistently, chances are your health would be in a pretty positive place. Add regular exercise into the mix and you’re running in the right direction. However, there are other key tips that have stayed with me in 2025, which I’m sharing with you here.

Prioritise nutritious foods you can add to your diet

“Appetite is finite,” Everything Fat Loss author and experienced trainer Ben Carpenter tells me. “I like focusing on adding nutritious foods into your diet because they tend to displace other foods.”

For example, one study Carpenter cites found that children encouraged to eat more apples - a food rich in nutrients and high in fibre - actually lowered their daily caloric intake. The fruit had elbowed other, less nutritious, energy-dense foods out of the picture.

He says most people have a good idea what is meant by nutritious food, but adds that opting for items that “tend to be slightly less processed” is a good rule of thumb to follow.