Does Rice Make You Fat?

The amount and type of rice you eat impacts potential weight gain.


There isn’t one simple answer to whether rice makes you fat. Rice can contribute to weight gain, but it all depends on how much you eat throughout the day. The potential impact of rice on your weight also varies according to the type of rice and its fiber content.

Calories and Weight

There’s no secret about how you lose or gain weight. When you eat more calories than you use through daily activities, you gain weight. Depending on activity level, women should get 1,800 to 2,400 calories daily and men should aim for 2,200 to 3,000, according to the USDA's Dietary Guidelines for Americans 2010. Don’t reduce your calories significantly lower than the amount that fits your lifestyle, because your body needs the fuel to operate at optimal capacity. To figure out whether rice might make you fat, its calories must be balanced within your total daily caloric intake.

Calories in Rice

The calories you’ll get from rice vary slightly between white and brown rice. One cup of cooked white rice has 205 calories, compared to 216 in brown rice. Rice illustrates the value of portion control because it’s easy to put more than 1 cup of rice on a plate, whether as the base for a stir-fry dish or as a side dish. From the perspective of calories alone, rice won’t make you fat as long as the total calories you gain from rice don’t put you over your daily calorie goals.

Fiber and Weight

The type of carbohydrate in your diet makes a difference when it comes to weight control. Research suggests that people who eat more fiber are less likely to gain weight. Refined grains, such as white rice, cause blood sugar and insulin to rapidly rise, which makes you feel hungry. In the long term, spikes in blood sugar may make you gain weight, according to the Harvard School of Public Health. Eating more fiber also lowers the risk of developing diabetes and cardiovascular disease.

Fiber in Rice

Brown rice is a whole-grain that still has all its natural fiber. When rice grains are processed to produce white rice, the bran and germ are removed, which means it’s no longer a whole grain. The bran and germ contain almost all of the fiber and many other nutrients. White rice can be enriched with minerals and vitamins, but the fiber can’t be added back. Both types have about 45 grams of total carbohydrates in 1 cup of cooked rice, but brown rice has 3.5 grams of fiber, which is six times more than the 0.6 grams in white rice.

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