Before you begin

A few quick notes will make these guides easier to use.

• Use a desktop or laptop when possible: These guides often link out to calculators and supporting references. A larger screen makes it much easier to move between tabs and compare information.
• Use the linked tools instead of doing manual math: Interactive calculators are linked wherever they can save time. The equations are sometimes shown for reference, but you usually do not need to calculate them yourself.
• Treat the guide as a framework, not a rulebook: Use the guidance as a strong starting point, then adjust based on your body, recovery, and training response instead of following it rigidly.

1. Introduction to Cutting

Whether you’re aiming for a lean, athletic physique or the sheer size of a pro bodybuilder, your success ultimately hinges on a few fundamental principles. Mastering them is the difference between feeling lost and making consistent, tangible progress. It ensures every ounce of effort you pour into your training actually yields the results you’re after.

It all boils down to deliberately managing three key factors: the fuel you consume (calories and macros), your overall mass (body weight), and what that mass is made of (body fat percentage).

What the Scale Doesn't Tell You

It’s easy to get fixated on the number on the scale, but that figure doesn't tell the whole story. Your body isn't one solid mass; it’s a composition of fat mass and lean mass. Fat mass is exactly what it sounds like, while lean mass is everything else—muscle, bones, water, and organs. Knowing both your body weight and your body fat percentage allows you to understand this ratio, giving you a crystal-clear picture of your starting point and the quality of the progress you're making.

What's the Goal?

Your objective will dictate your entire approach, so it’s crucial to know exactly what you’re aiming for.

• Cutting is all about lowering your body fat while fighting to preserve as much hard-earned muscle as possible.
• Body Recomposition is the process of building muscle and losing fat at the same time.
• A Lean Bulk focuses on maximizing muscle gain while accepting a minimal, controlled increase in body fat.
• An Underweight Bulk is a more aggressive approach for those who need to gain weight to reach a healthy range.

The Problem with Most Body Fat Measurements

Since your body fat percentage is such a critical metric, you need an accurate way to measure it. The truth is, most methods are wildly inconsistent.

First, you need an accurate body fat measurement.

The easiest way is to find a place with a Multi Segment Body Composition Analysis machine, like an InBody 970, 700,580, 380s, 270 or 260. It's accessible, cheaper than a DEXA scan, and accurate enough for tracking.

Don't worry it doesn't cost much (few dollars), many gyms offer it for free. Make sure it's a professional grade inbody machine, not consumer grade BCA anaylzers which tend to be highly inaccurate. (unfortunately some gyms install them)

A word of warning: don't trust consumer grade smartwatches and scales. While they're convenient, their body fat estimations are often unreliable and can lead you to make the wrong decisions. The professional equipment costs thousands of dollars for a reason that's a level of technology you simply won't find in a sub $1000 gadget. Finding a place for a real scan is easier than you think; a quick Google search for "body composition analysis near me" will likely point you to a local gym or clinic that offers InBody scans for a small fee.

For body fat % measurement, in terms of accuracy: MRI > DEXA > Hydrostatic Weighing > Bod Pod > InBody Multi Freq Device (specially the ones which also use Mhz freq, eg, InBody 970, 700) > InBody Multi Freq Device (no Mhz freq, eg, InBody 260,270, 280) > Other Multi-Frequency BIA Devices> Calipers (Skinfold, highly depends on operator skill) > Ultrasound > US Navy Formula > Single-Frequency BIA Devices.

Visual estimates, even by professionals, are significantly less accurate than DEXA scans, no matter what some forum discussions might claim. That said, for contest or photoshoot preparation, visual assessments for conditioning are a practical method. In such cases, it's beneficial to seek guidance from a coach's trained eye for a more reliable evaluation.

For most people, not pro bodybuilders/atheletes, even inbody 260,270,280 are decent place to start and widely available but yes if you've access to a better device use that.

Fueling the Machine: Calories and Macros

Your body's transformation is fueled by what you eat. Calories are simply energy—eat more than you burn, and you’ll gain weight; eat less, and you’ll lose it. But the type of calories you eat determines the quality of that change. These are your macros:

• Protein is the brick and mortar for building muscle. Without enough of it, your body simply can't repair and grow, no matter how hard you train.
• Fats are non-negotiable. Healthy fats are essential for regulating the hormones that drive muscle growth and recovery, not to mention keeping your joints healthy. Skimping on them will sabotage your progress.
• Carbohydrates are your body's go-to energy source, especially for powering you through high-intensity workouts.

What Is Cutting?

A cut is a fat loss phase where your goal is to reduce body fat while maintaining lean muscle mass. Unlike bulking, cutting is about eating fewer calories than you burn (caloric deficit).

Who Should Cut?

Before starting a cutting phase (reducing body fat), it's essential to determine if it's actually the right move for you. Cutting at the wrong time can hinder progress or lead to unnecessary frustration.

Use this tool to assess whether you should cut:

Should You Cut? Fitness Strategy Planner

Important: Do not start a cut until you've gone through this tool and confirmed that cutting aligns with your current physique, training history, and goals.

2. Calculating Caloric Deficit

Step 1: Calculating TDEE

Your BMR (Basal Metabolic Rate) is the amount of energy your body burns just to stay alive at rest. Your TDEE (Total Daily Energy Expenditure) includes your BMR plus all the calories you burn from daily life and exercise. While most online calculators give you an estimate, the only way to find your true TDEE is by tracking your food intake against your weight changes over a few weeks. For a deeper dive, see this accurate TDEE calculator.

After step2, your TDEE will be dead on center, not adjustment needed

TDEE is the maintenance calories, if you eat at matenance your weight will not change if you average it over 3 weeks which should take out water weight fluctations.

If you eat more than maintenance, you gain weight

if you eat less than maintenance, you lose weight.

Weight gain or lost will be some part fat, some muscle, depending on training/diet

Just use this calculator (it's the most accurate): TDEE Calculator

It will give you your Total Daily Energy Expenditure (TDEE).

Step 2: Select a deficit

Let the Energy Macro Planner do the heavy lifting. Simply choose the right deficit from the table, plug it into the planner, and you'll get the exact amount of protein, fat, and carbs you need—no manual math required. Want to see the details behind the calculation? They're listed below for reference. Otherwise, feel free to skip to the next step, as the planner has already taken care of it for you.

Male – Recommended Calorie Deficit by Body Fat %

Female – Recommended Calorie Deficit by Body Fat %

Notes:

• Deficits are relative to TDEE (maintenance calories).
• The leaner you are, the smaller the deficit should be to preserve muscle and maintain performance
• Add diet breaks or refeeds every 4-6 weeks in lean phases to improve adherence and hormonal balance.

Based On:

• Helms et al., JISSN 2014 – Nutritional strategies for natural bodybuilding
• The Muscle and Strength Pyramid (Nutrition) – Helms, Morgan, Valdez
• Lyle McDonald – Rapid Fat Loss Handbook
• 3DMJ (3D Muscle Journey) contest prep materials

Caution:

As you progress through your cut and your body fat percentage decreases, you'll need to periodically adjust your calorie deficit and total intake to stay on track.

There are two common strategies in the Natural Bodybuilding world:

1. Start at Target Deficit and Taper Down

   • What it is: Begin your cut at the full target deficit based on your current body fat % (e.g., 20% if you're at 20% body fat).
   • Why: You can afford a higher deficit when body fat is high without risking muscle loss.
   • How: As your body fat decreases, reduce the deficit accordingly using the same body fat to deficit table.
   • When to use:
     • You're starting with relatively high body fat (15–20%+).
     • You want to maximize early fat loss.
     • You're working with a limited prep timeline.

2. Ramp Up to Target Deficit, Then Taper Down

   • What it is: Start with a smaller deficit than your target (e.g., 10% even if your target is 20%), and gradually increase to the target.
   • Why: A slower ramp-up improves adherence, minimizes fatigue, and helps preserve performance early in the cut.
   • How: Once your current deficit matches the target for your body fat %, follow the same taper-down approach as you get leaner.
   • When to use:
     • You're already moderately lean (~12–15% body fat).
     • You have a long prep window (20–30 weeks).
     • You want to prioritize training quality and minimize early fatigue.

Select the appropriate strategy based on your goal.

3. Macronutrient Recommendations

Let the Energy Macro Planner do the heavy lifting. Simply choose the right deficit from the table, plug it into the planner, and you'll get the exact amount of protein, fat, and carbs you need—no manual math required. Want to see the details behind the calculation? They're listed below for reference. Otherwise, feel free to skip to the next step, as the planner has already taken care of it for you.

Protein

• 2.3-3.1 g/kg of Lean Body Mass (LBM) per day
• Essential to preserve muscle mass during a deficit
• Supported by: Helms et al., 2014 (J Int Soc Sports Nutr) - Higher protein (e.g., 2.3-3.1 g/kg LBM) is essential to preserve muscle mass during calorie deficit. Even distribution (~0.4 g/kg LBM per meal, 4-6 meals/day) may enhance MPS (Morton et al., 2018; Schoenfeld & Aragon, 2018). Barakat et al., 2022 (Nutrients) - Reaffirms the 2.3-3.1 g/kg LBM range for aggressive cuts, but notes that benefits plateau beyond ~2.6 g/kg LBM, with higher intakes potentially reducing dietary flexibility.

Note: While total daily protein is most critical, even distribution of protein intake (~0.4 g/kg LBM per meal, 4-6 meals/day) may enhance muscle protein synthesis during a cut. (Morton et al., 2018; Schoenfeld & Aragon, 2018)

Fat

• 0.8-1.5 g/kg body weight
• This range helps maintain hormone levels, essential fatty acid intake, and supports fat soluble vitamin absorption
• Supported by: Helms et al. (2014 & 2019): These papers established a minimum fat intake of around 0.5 g/kg of total body weight, or 15-25% of total calories (with evidence range between 0.5-1.5g/kg Body Weight), as crucial for preventing essential fatty acid deficiencies and supporting basic hormonal function during calorie restriction. They acknowledge that fat is often minimized in contest prep to prioritize calories for protein and carbohydrates, both vital for muscle retention and training performance. This 0.5 g/kg minimum has become a widely accepted floor in physique prep to avoid critical deficiencies, rather than an optimal target. Jäger et al. (2017): This broader sports nutrition review, while not exclusively focused on physique athletes in extreme cuts, suggests a slightly higher range of 0.6-0.8 g/kg fat for overall athlete health. This range is proposed to better support hormonal health, satiety, and psychological well being, building on general sports nutrition research. Barakat et al. (2022): This more recent, physique specific review reaffirms Helms' ≥0.5 g/kg minimum. However, it further suggests that intakes of ≥0.7 g/kg may offer better support for endocrine health and psychological well being during the demanding contest preparation period, highlighting the importance of balancing leanness goals with overall athlete health.

Carbohydrates

• Fill the rest of your calories with carbs
• Helps fuel workouts and recovery

4. Meal Plan Generation

Once you’ve got your calories and macros from the Energy Macro Planner, use the Meal Plan Planner to generate your personalized 7-day meal plan.

5. Training Guidelines During a Cut

Before you start any program

Hypertrophy just means muscle growth. You'll find plenty of programs but first you must learn what really matters in a program. Read Hypertrophy Blueprint, it contains all the knowledge you need to grow muscles. After reading this, you'll be able to make changes to any program.

Are you a beginner?

When you're new to fitness, the best thing you can do is follow a program built by an experienced coach. It's tempting to try and design your own routine, but you're unlikely to come up with something more effective. A solid plan is much more than just a list of exercises; it’s a careful balance of volume, intensity, and smart progression that takes expertise to get right.

If you’re working out from home or have limited equipment, this free beginner program list is an excellent place to start. It’s flexible and offers options based on the gear you have, including a full bodyweight program if you have no equipment at all.

So, what kind of schedule works best for beginners? A full-body routine three times a week or an upper/lower split four times a week are your best bets. As a novice, you get better results by training each muscle group at least twice a week, which helps maximize your body's muscle-building response. This is supported by the study "Effects of resistance training frequency on measures of muscle hypertrophy, a systematic review and meta analysis" by Schoenfeld et al., published in Sports Medicine, 2019. This approach also lets you practice the main lifts more often to build a solid foundation. If you can train four days a week, an upper/lower split is a fantastic choice because it hits every muscle twice while giving you plenty of time to recover and grow.

Ready to hit a fully-equipped gym? Here are a few great starting points:

Beginner Optimal Hypetrophy Program

If you're a late beginner or intermediate, proceed to Intermediate Programs

Strength Training

When you're in a cutting phase, it's common to dial back your training volume slightly while keeping the intensity just as high, if not higher. This isn't a hard-and-fast rule, though. If you can handle your usual workload without feeling wrecked, then by all means, there's no need to change a thing. So why do most experienced lifters cut back? Because once you have a couple of years of consistent training under your belt, building any significant muscle in a calorie deficit is next to impossible. At that point, the focus shifts. Many bodybuilders drop down to what’s called Maintenance Volume (MV)—just enough training to preserve muscle without piling on unnecessary fatigue. The goal isn't to grow; it's simply to hold on to the strength and muscle you've already built. This is exactly why cutting programs lean so heavily on big, heavy compound lifts to maintain your gains.

Cardio

• Low to moderate intensity, 2-4 sessions/week if needed
• Use cardio as a tool to increase energy expenditure, not to replace a calorie controlled diet
• High intensity cardio can interfere with strength training recovery

Note: Cardio increases your Total Daily Energy Expenditure (TDEE), thereby increasing your calorie deficit and accelerating fat loss.

It also helps break plateaus by maintaining high energy demands, forcing the body to tap into fat reserves to meet those needs.

For best results, focus on Zone 2 cardio, which primarily uses fat for fuel—effectively burning fat while minimizing muscle loss.

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6. How to Track Progress

General fat % for abs + lean face:

Men: Abs show at ~10-15%, crisp at 6-9%. Face leans out at ~13-14%.

Women: Abs show at ~16-20%. Face leans out at ~18-22%.

See: Progress Tracking

7. Supplements

• Caffeine: Appetite suppression, increased energy
• Creatine: Helps retain strength and muscle mass
• Protein powders: Help hit protein targets
• Multivitamin: Covers micronutrient gaps from reduced food intake
• omega-3 fatty acids during calorie deficits for their anti inflammatory properties and potential to help preserve muscle mass during cutting. Though evidence is mixed, it’s a low risk addition. (Rodrigues et al., 2020; Krzywicka et al., 2018)

8. Refeeds and Diet Breaks

Refeeds During a Cut

Refeeds are 1-2 days per week (or every 2 weeks) at maintenance calories, higher in carbs. Some coaches use them to support performance, mood, and possibly help preserve muscle or metabolic rate.

When to Consider:

• Cutting for 8+ weeks
• Low body fat (men ~12%, women ~20%)
• Fatigue, poor recovery, or diet burnout

Evidence Summary:

• Campbell et al., 2020: Moderate quality RCT in lean lifters, 2 day refeeds helped preserve fat free mass and RMR.
• Dirlewanger et al., 2000: Overfeeding increased leptin, potentially offsetting adaptation (short term).
• Other evidence: Mostly mechanistic or based on hormonal response and glycogen replenishment.

Evidence quality: Moderate to low. May help psychologically and in late stage cuts, but not essential for results.

Diet Breaks During a Cut

Diet breaks are 1-2 week periods at maintenance calories, often used during long cuts to ease fatigue, improve mood, and support training.

When to Consider:

• Cutting for 8+ weeks
• Experiencing fatigue, plateaus, or low adherence
• Body fat getting quite low (men ~12%, women ~20%)

Evidence Summary:

• MATADOR Study (Byrne et al., 2018): Moderate quality RCT in obese men showed better fat loss with intermittent 2 week breaks.
• Peos et al. (2021-22): Moderate quality trials in lean resistance trained athletes found no major physiological benefit, but improved psychological outcomes like diet satisfaction.

Evidence quality: Moderate. Useful for mental relief; not essential for muscle or fat loss in lean lifters.

9. Duration, Stopping, Transitioning, and References

How Long to Cut and When to Stop

Cut Duration

• Most cuts last 8-16 weeks, depending on fat loss goals
• Take diet breaks (1-2 weeks at maintenance) if cutting for more than 12 weeks to manage fatigue and adherence

When to Stop Cutting

• You should stop cutting when you reach your target body fat percentage or the lower end of the healthy range:

  • ~10% for men
  • ~18% for women

• If you're preparing for a physique competition or photo shoot and aiming for temporary ultra-lean levels, it's acceptable to cut further but only under controlled conditions.

  • In such cases, dropping below the standard healthy range is fine for the short term, as long as it’s followed by a well-planned recovery phase.

For natural bodybuilding stage ready, 5-8% (men) and 13-16% (women) is target body % range.

For modeling, 8-12% (men) and 16-20% (female)

Transitioning After a Cut

Options:

• Reverse Diet (Gradual Increase): Slowly increase calories by 100-150 kcal/week toward TDEE
• Jump to Maintenance: Start eating at TDEE immediately to stabilize weight
• Lean Bulk: If you’re lean enough and want to build muscle again

Use this tool to assess whether you should Lean bulk or Maintain:

Should You Lean Bulk Or Body Recomposition? Fitness Strategy Planner

Want to prepare for Natural Bodybuilding show or Photoshoot?

Follow our Peak Week Guide

References:

• Helms ER, Aragon AA, Fitschen PJ. Evidence-based recommendations for natural bodybuilding contest preparation: nutrition and supplementation. J Int Soc Sports Nutr. 2014;11(1):20.
• Morton RW, Murphy KT, et al. A systematic review, meta-analysis, and meta-regression of protein supplementation on resistance training-induced gains. Br J Sports Med. 2018;52(6):376-384.
• Lunn J, Theobald HE. The health effects of dietary unsaturated fatty acids. Nutr Res Rev. 2006;19(1):61–72.
• Trexler ET, Smith-Ryan AE, Norton LE. Metabolic adaptation to weight loss: implications for the athlete. J Int Soc Sports Nutr. 2014;11(1):7.
• Resistance Training Volume Enhances Muscle Hypertrophy but Not Strength in Trained Men Brad Schoenfeld, James Krieger, Dan Ogborn, Jozo Grgic, Alan A. Aragon, Bret Contreras Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research, 2019