Most Popular Diets for 2020

There seem to be as many diets as there are leaves in the trees and they also seem to come and go just as seasonally and perennially as leaves do. Most people out there are looking for ways to lose weight, feel happier, and enjoy better nutrition and energy levels. In this post, you will find the most popular diets which you can follow to stay healthy.

Different diets grow in popularity in different years and 2020 has seen the persistence of a few classics, as well as some relatively new faces in the diet ecosystem.

Paleo Diet

Sometimes called the Caveman Diet, the Paleo diet is based on eating foods that would have been common to prehistoric humans during the Paleolithic era, which was approximately 2.5 million to 10,000 years ago. Most people think of this diet as being all-meat but it actually includes fruits, vegetables, nuts, and seeds, too – basically, anything that would have been consumed during the early hunting and gathering era of human history.

The diet eschews foods that originated from the advent of farming, such as dairy, legumes, grains, potatoes, refined sugar, and pretty much any processed food. However, the popularity of the Paleo diet has helped spawn a variety of convenient options, including Paleo pancake mix and even Paleo flour. 

Advocates of the Paleo diet believe in the discordance hypothesis, which posits that the human body has not adapted to our modern diet and this mismatch is responsible for our current epidemic of obesity, diabetes, and heart disease. 

Volumetric Diet

The volumetric diet, designed by Barbara Rolls, a nutrition professor, is based on extracting the most nutrition from the fewest number of calories. This is one of the most popular diets group foods into four different categories based on their energy-density with the goal being to eat primarily from the first two categories, avoiding high-calorie foods like cookies, chocolate, and butter. 

This diet is viewed as a long-term lifestyle commitment. It’s not going to deliver immediate results and requires you to also adhere to a daily exercise regimen. The diet is popular among people who like to eat a lot and are looking for ways to maximize the nutrition and energy they get from their meals. Over time, the volumetric diet is a smart way to strategically wean yourself off unhealthy foods while still allowing you an indulgence here and there.

Keto Diet

Keto is one of the most popular diets in recent years. The ketogenic diet is based on consuming large amounts of fat and low amounts of carbohydrates with the objective of triggering ketosis in your body. Ketosis is a process whereby fat is converted into energy. Keto enthusiasts subscribe to the belief that by converting fat to ketones in the liver that you enhance cognition and brain health. 

The most common ketogenic foods are seafood (particularly shellfish, salmon, and any fatty high-omega-3 fish), low-carb vegetables, cheese, avocados, meat, eggs, coconut oil, yogurt, olive oil, nuts and seeds, shirataki, noodles, and cream/butter. 

While the Keto diet is great for people with epilepsy or access to a ketogenic dietitian, it’s one of the trickier diets to pull off and considered a difficult pathway for the average person looking to lose weight. 

Flexitarian Diet

The Flexitarian diets are the most popular diets right now as a way to embrace vegan and vegetarian eating habits and principles without being imprisoned by your own diet. Basically, the diet involves eating meals that are mostly full of veggies, whole grains, fruit, and plant-based proteins. Such a diet reduces your calorie intake and BMI.

Flexitarians permit themselves to eat meat, cheese, or dairy from time to time (and self-regulating this consumption is what makes this diet hard for somost popular dietsme people) but do not regularly consume them. 

The diet is a hit right now among Millenials and Zoomers who agree with the ethical and environmental tenets of vegetarianism and vegan lifestyles but still want to eat sushi or grilled chicken on special occasions – or every weekend (depending on how disciplined they are).

These are only a few of the popular diets out there in 2020, but their names regularly pop up in online diet searches and each of them has scores of followers. Ultimately, for any diet to work, you have to be disciplined, consistent, and smart with how you eat. Additionally, and this is something that has always been true and will always remain true, for any diet to truly be successful, you have to get plenty of exercise. There’s no shortcuts for living a healthy life.