You may hear that being fat or having much fat in your body will make you get into serious problem. It is true because body has limit space for storing fat and if fat is too much in your body composition, your shape will change. To avoid the change or your shape or to shape your body, you should know how much body fat should I have.
Normally, woman should have 12% essential fat and men should have 3% of total body weight. Essential fat is fat that store in your body to support health function. Then, storage fat is fat that saved in your body as stock of energy. It means body has two kind of fat and it has different function. Talking about essential fat, between men and women has the different amount. It is because women have different physical and physiological development; women need more fat to support reproductive function.
Here is the range of body fat percentage that you should have;
|Classification||Women (% Fat)||Men (% Fat)|
|Obese||32% +||25% +|
The table gives you information about how much should your body essential fat. The table based on American Council of Exercise. Then, for women at 20-25, they should have 21-32% body fat. When they get older, the amount will change or increase. The amount should be 23-33% for women between 40-59 and 24-35% for women over 60.
Next, the body fat percentage for men is different. 8-19% for men between 18-39 and 11-21% is for men at 40-59. The amount of body fat will increase for men over 60; 13-24%. Some experts say that there is no accurate standard of body fat percentage and there is a way to know your body fat amount by feeling your body. For example women, if you do not get normal menstruation, it means your body fat percentage is not in normal amount. Then, if you have less energy and get tired easily, you may also have less body fat percentage. Since there is no accurate amount of body fat percentage, you should listen and feel to your body to know the question how much body fat should I have.