In this article we look at whether meal timing can play a role in long-term weight management.
Obesity is a multifactorial and highly heritable condition, which is influenced by the interaction between genetic predisposition and modifiable lifestyle behaviours.
While the contribution of diet composition and physical activity to energy balance is well established, increasing evidence highlights the role of circadian rhythms, particularly meal timing, in regulating metabolic health, something that we delve into in "Do late night meals make you fat?".
Disturbances in the synchrony between endogenous biological rhythms and external behavioural stimuli, such as the timing of food intake, have been associated with an increased risk of obesity, insulin resistance and related cardiometabolic disorders.
However, the mechanisms and the extent to which timing of food intake interacts with genetic predisposition to influence obesity-related outcomes are not yet fully clear.
A recent study conducted in the Obesity, Nutrigenetics, Timing, and Mediterranean (ONTIME) cohort, examined the independent and interactive effects of meal timing and polygenic risk for body mass index (BMI/BMI) on weight-related outcomes.
The authors included 1195 adults with overweight or obesity who participated in a standardized, multimodal weight loss intervention in Spain. The intervention included nutritional counselling, physical activity and behavioural therapy, but did not provide advice on meal timing, thus allowing for natural variation in time-eating behaviour.
Delayed meal times were associated with higher body mass index at the start of the study, slower weight loss during the intervention and worse weight maintenance in the long term.
It is worth noting that the authors observed a significant interaction between meal timing and genetic risk for obesity. Individuals with a greater genetic predisposition to obesity who ate late had a higher body mass index compared to individuals who ate early, suggesting that an earlier meal time may reduce the high polygenic risk of obesity.
In conclusion, these results suggest that earlier meal intake may help maintain weight loss in the long term, especially when there is an increased risk of obesity due to genotype.
-Suprastratum: The authority on health, fitness and nutrition
Sources/bibliography/more reading:
- De la Peña-Armada R, Rodríguez-Martín M, Dashti HS, Cascales AI, Scheer FAJL, Saxena R, Garaulet M. Early meal timing attenuates high polygenic risk of obesity. Obesity (Silver Spring). 2025 Aug;33(8):1555-1566. doi: 10.1002/oby.24319. epub 2025 Jul 20. PMID: 40685562; PMCID: PMC12304843.
- Joshi D, Pigeyre M. Timing Matters: Early Eating Mitigates Genetic Susceptibility for Obesity. Obesity (Silver Spring). 2025 Aug;33(8):1414-1415. doi: 10.1002/oby.24350. epub 2025 Jul 24. PMID: 40708232; PMCID: PMC12304795.
