Intermittent fasting helped people keep weight off for a year - ScienceDaily

What the report says

ScienceDaily reported on July 18, 2026, that a University of Granada-linked study found benefits from a 12-week intermittent fasting program were still detectable one year after the intervention ended. The research, published in Clinical Nutrition, involved 99 adults with overweight or obesity, about half of them women, and examined whether time-restricted eating could help maintain weight loss after structured support stopped.

Participants first received guidance on a Mediterranean diet and were assigned to different schedules. A control group continued eating over a usual daily span of 12 hours or more, while other groups limited eating to eight hours. The fasting schedules included an early window starting before 10 a.m., a late window starting after 1 p.m., and a self-selected eight-hour period.

According to the report, participants using the eight-hour windows maintained more of their weight loss after 12 months than those who kept longer eating schedules. The timing of the window did not appear to determine the overall weight-maintenance effect, although the early eating group showed a stronger preservation of fat-mass reduction. The study was part of a broader project whose earlier findings, published in Nature Medicine, indicated that time-restricted eating groups lost an average of 3 to 4 kilograms more than participants receiving nutritional guidance alone.

The findings matter because obesity treatment often focuses not only on initial weight loss but also on preventing regain. ScienceDaily said researchers involved institutions in Granada and Navarra, along with Spanish biomedical research networks, and suggested that flexible eating windows may make time-restricted eating easier for some patients to incorporate into daily routines.