Can you drink diet soda while cutting? The purpose of a cut is to consume a calorie deficit on a daily basis and therefore to get to a stage of truly ‘shredded’ and lean you need a daily calorie deficit. You can therefore drink diet soda on a cut as long as you stay in an overall calorie deficit.
For most people training specifically for physique development their diet will always be a top priority, the saying goes that you can’t out train a bad diet!
Therefore if you are reading this and already an active gym goer and someone that looks after their physique then chances are your diet will mostly be made up of nutrient dense, whole food sources with minimal artificial sugars or sweeteners.
Having said that everyone has a certain food or drink that they just can do without, maybe some sugar in your coffee, a chocolate bar or packet of crisps with your lunch or more commonly a habit of drinking soda.
Drinking soda isn’t the end of the world for physique development and I’m not going to lecture you on giving it up completely but people often wonder if you can cut the full fat option for a diet soda when they are cutting to save the calories.
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Can You Drink Diet Soda While Cutting
This would not be my advice but just to answer the question as clearly as possible, when you are on a cut as long as you are consuming a caloric deficit each day and keeping energy expenditure high then there is not a food group that you need to omit and this includes diet soda.
You can definitely consume a diet soda or two when cutting and still drop body fat as long as you are in a caloric deficit each day.
Personally I had a lot of soda when I was a child and in my early teen years however one day, and I can’t remember quite why I made this decision, but I just made the switch from soda of any kind to water almost completely.
There are the odd occasions where I will have a soda but for the most part I’ll consume up to 1 gallon of water per day on average. Therefore my blunt response would be for anyone to give up soda whether you are bulking or cutting.
Water has an unbelievable number of benefits and you will notice a difference in your day to day life but I can appreciate that is a lot easier said than done.
Therefore if you either want to switch from a full fat version to a diet coke or whether you just want to continue drinking diet coke on a cut then you absolutely can as long as all other aspects of your diet, training and recovery are in place.
They key thing when cutting is to track your calories and energy expenditure in order to ensure a steady rate of fat loss, around 90% of your diet should come from nutrient dense, wholefood sources but as long as you follow the guidelines above for cutting then the additional 10% can certainly be used for diet coke.
Will You Lose Weight If You Stop Drinking Diet Soda
If you are currently drinking diet soda while on a cut then something you might be wondering is will you lose weight if you stop drinking diet soda.
That’s a fair point to consider however the purpose of diet soda is to be zero to low calories meaning that in terms of a calorie deficit there will be very minimal if any change to your weight as a result.
The changing variable is far too low to impact weight loss. If you were drinking two litres of a full fat soda daily and decided to cut that out then you would likely see a huge decrease in overall calorie intake from sugar and carbohydrates.
Per 1 Liter Coca Cola
Calories – 420kcal
Carbohydrate – 10.6g
Total Sugar – 10.6g
Per 1 Liter Diet Coke
Calories – 4kcal
Carbohydrate – 0g
Total Sugar – 0g
As you can see removing the original soda from your diet would see a daily calorie decrease of 420kcal, for a steady cut I’d recommend a deficit of between 300kcal – 500kcal so simply removing this drink and keeping all other factors the same you should theoretically see weight loss if energy expenditure is high enough to instigate this.
In comparison, cutting the diet soda from your diet would only see a calorie decrease of 4kcal which is not enough to lose weight.
What I will say however is that water is a more optimal choice in terms of movement of blood, uptake of nutrients and supporting other bodily functions. With this in mind switching from a diet soda to water should make your body run more optimally which in turn should translate to weight loss.
What Should You Drink When Cutting
I’ve just touched on this however when cutting you should at a minimum be drinking 8 x 200ml glasses of water per day and my personal opinion is that you should up that further if you are engaging in weight lifting and cardio on a daily basis.
Water makes up up to 60% of the human body, it is vital for nutrient transportation, blood flow and organ health and up to 79% of your muscles are made up of water.
For anyone looking to improve their physique you should be looking to up your water intake daily, especially on a cut when you are looking to flush your toxin buildup in the muscles for weight training and cardio when on a calorie deficit.
I can’t say what you shouldn’t drink when cutting because as I’ve already mentioned everyone is entitled to consume something that isn’t completely nutrient dense. For maintenance of a physique I’d recommend 80% nutrient dense foods making up the majority of your diet with 20% ‘treat’ meals covering the rest.
When cutting however you need to be a bit smarter and deliberate with your food choices and look at more of a 90% – 10% split. Therefore what you consume with that 10% buffer is entirely up to you but what you do need to do is make sure you are consuming plenty of water when cutting.
Should You Stop Drinking Diet Coke on a Cut
For fear of repeating myself, It is definitely ok to consume diet coke when cutting, provided you are still in a fat burning state of a caloric deficit and energy expenditure is high.
Whether you should stop drinking diet coke on a cut is an entirely different situation and the answer really is that it depends.
If you absolutely want optimal progress on a cut then you need to consume the most optimal food sources (I know we are discussing liquids), that means that you really should be consuming water as your primary source of hydration.
If you really want to continue to consume diet coke on a cut and are looking for a justification or validation to carry on consuming it then you are entirely fine without it significantly impacting your progress.
In general though try to reduce your consumption of diet coke and increase your consumption of water and your body will thank you for it in the long run.
Cutting should not be about removing all the foods you enjoy, if you need some help evaluating when you should start a cut then check out my article below, from there you can see if you have room in your diet to continue consuming diet coke.
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