Claiming to be “the last weight loss program you’ll ever need,” Noom has become a fitness buzzword in the world of health and weight loss, and for good reason.
This article will discuss what you can expect from Noom, its unique approach, the features on offer, and more.
What Does Noom Offer?
Unlike other weight loss apps that push you to do some calorie-burning workouts, Noom aims for a direct yet subtle approach, addressing the real culprits that hinder people’s weight loss efforts—their minds.
Here are all the greats things you get with Noom.
A Unique Approach
Noom is a psychologically-based and science-backed weight loss program. It uses cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) to improve your relationship with food, slowly change your mindset, and build healthier habits as you go through your personalized program.
As a Noom user, you will go through 10 mini short courses, which come in short yet entertaining articles complete with jokes, trivia, and multiple-choice questions in between. Noom slowly introduces new habits and breaks old mindsets as you go through each article.
The articles help you become more self-aware while providing you actionable advice and tools that you can use right after you exit the app.
A Personalized Approach
You can set your own pace by determining how much time you can devote to the app. The app will adjust the number of articles it will give you in a day based on this. However, if you exceed the time limit you placed, the app will still allow you to tackle more articles if you wish to.
To appreciate your journey, the app shows your progress with a Course Progress visual. It can also help you follow through with your goals by allowing the app to notify you to do things like logging your meals, drinking your water, and so on.
Accountability
You can get a one-to-one coaching experience with a Noom coach or be part of a group coaching with other users. Noom coaches undergo a four-week Noomversity program approved by The National Board for Health and Wellness Coaching (NBHWC). However, they do not have the same certification as dieticians.
How Noom Works
Noom will offer you a free 14-day trial to start, which will automatically continue unless canceled at least a day before the end of the trial period.
The app will ask you questions about your demographic profile, habits and behavior, and nutrition. It will also ask the weight you want to lose, your ideal pace, and how much time you can set aside for the program. Based on these, Noom will create a personalized program including a daily calorie budget that matches your goals.
Each day, Noom will give you a set of mini articles to read and introduce you to a new aspect of the program. This includes asking you to log your meals, track your steps and water intake, and weigh in daily, among other features.
Noom’s Features
To support the personalized program it creates for you, Noom is equipped with many other features that you can use to keep track of your health and fitness goals.
Detailed Noom Syllabus
Each mini course addresses a specific topic such as behavior chains, calorie density, and mindful eating. These are discussed using bite-sized information in the form of short articles.
Mini articles contain studies, multiple-choice questions, and explanations to help you remember important information. You can always go back to your favorite articles by bookmarking them and finding them in the article library.
The app will also quiz you every now and then as you go through the set of mini-articles available for you in a day.
You also have to take a final quiz at the end of each mini course. The quizzes help you consolidate the information you take in from the articles.
Calorie Tracker
In the app, foods are not branded as “good” or “bad.” Instead, they are categorized using a unique color system based on their calorie density. Below is a quick breakdown:
- Green: least calorie-dense; must be eaten in larger quantities
- Yellow: have more calories and are less healthy than green foods; must be eaten in moderation
- Red foods: have the most calories and least healthy nutrients
The app gives you a percentage of how much of each color you should eat in a day, which is 30% green, 45% yellow, and 25% red foods.
As you log your daily food intake, the app gives you the remaining percentage of food intake (per color) that you could eat to maintain your calorie budget.
Other Built-in Tools
The app comes with tools that can help you track your health and fitness goals better. You can also sync Noom with your phone’s health data for more comprehensive data tracking. Here are tools within Noom that you can use
- Weigh in: Noom will generate a Weight Graph based on your daily weigh-ins to help you visualize your progress.
- Log your meals: You can log your meals (from breakfast to dinner, including snacks in between) using over a million foods in Noom's database and using its barcode scanner. The log shows you the calorie count and the color of the food you consumed.
- Win with water: You can determine your water goal and log the number of glasses (about eight ounces per glass) that you drank for the day.
- Reach your step goal: The app syncs with your phone’s health app to keep track of your daily steps.
Recipes
The app gives you access to hundreds of recipes. Recipes are categorized according to meal type and tell you how many servings the recipe can make, how long it takes to cook, and how many calories there are per serving.
Each recipe contains detailed instructions covering the preparation and ingredients. It also gives a percentage of the contents of the food by “color.” You can also favorite the recipe.
Ready to Start Your Fitness Journey
Staying fit and maintaining a healthy weight is not as simple as cutting down your intake of certain foods. It is especially challenging if there are old mindsets and habits to break.
Noom takes a different and interesting approach toward fitness and health. Backed up by research and psychology, it would not be surprising if it does yield positive results.