Can you actually lower your metabolic age? Yes. For the past three years I have been doing exactly that with clients through my Metabolic Age Reversal™ programme. When we successfully bring their visceral-fat reading down, their metabolic-age reading comes down with it. Every time.
I have spent more than 50,000 hours working with clients, so this is not based on one or two interesting results. The client’s own smart scale measures their body composition and calculates readings including visceral fat, skeletal muscle and metabolic age. I then use those readings to follow their progress through the programme, which means we can do this wherever they are in the world.
That matters because metabolic age gives us a very different way of thinking about getting older. We cannot change our actual age, but we can change an enormous amount about what is happening inside our body.
What is metabolic age?
Metabolic age is a calculation based on information about your metabolism and body composition, compared with reference values for different age groups. Smart body-composition scales use measurements and their own algorithms to produce the metabolic-age reading, so what interests me is following the same person’s readings consistently and watching how they change.
I have never been interested in weight on its own. Two people can weigh exactly the same and have completely different bodies. One may have more skeletal muscle and an excellent visceral-fat reading, while another may have less muscle and considerably more fat stored around their organs. The number telling us how heavy they are simply does not give us that information.
Body composition does, and visceral fat is one of the measurements I am particularly interested in. I explain this distinction in more detail in Weight Loss vs Body Composition: Why the Scales Don’t Tell the Full Story.
Why does visceral fat matter?
Visceral fat is the fat stored deeper within the abdomen around our internal organs. It is different from the subcutaneous fat sitting underneath the skin, and higher amounts of visceral fat are associated with increased cardiometabolic risk.
It is also something we can change. A major systematic review and meta-analysis published in 2026 examined 61 randomised controlled trials involving 4,136 people and found significant reductions in visceral fat across the different movement approaches studied, including sustained cardiovascular movement, resistance work and combinations of the two.
This is one reason I want clients looking beyond their weight. You cannot look at somebody and know what their visceral-fat reading is, and you certainly do not have to look overweight to be carrying more visceral fat than you ideally want. Recent 2026 research has also found that regular movement can reduce visceral fat in people of normal weight and those only slightly overweight.
If your stomach and body shape have changed during midlife, you may also find this helpful: Why Belly Fat Increases in Midlife and What Actually Helps.
What I have seen with Metabolic Age Reversal™
This is where the programme becomes particularly interesting. Over the past three years I have seen an extraordinarily consistent relationship between visceral fat and metabolic age on the smart-scale system my clients use.
Somebody might begin with a visceral-fat reading of 18 and a metabolic-age reading around 10 years older than their actual age. As we get their visceral fat down, their metabolic-age reading comes down too. I can sometimes see metabolic age beginning to fall when visceral fat reaches 12 or 13; by 11, it is consistently coming down, and it continues to drop year by year as we reduce visceral fat further.
When the visceral-fat reading reaches 6, the metabolic-age reading reaches the client’s actual age on the system we use. Below 6, I start seeing metabolic age become younger than actual age, and at a visceral-fat reading of 2, I see metabolic ages around five years younger. Different manufacturers use their own calculations, so these precise numbers relate to the system I use and the pattern I have observed through my own client work.
I happen to be a good example of where we are trying to get to. I am 60, my metabolic age is 54 and my visceral-fat reading is 2, which is an excellent result. The interesting part, however, is not having a flattering number on a scale. It is what we have changed inside the body to produce it.
How do I lower metabolic age?
My Metabolic Age Reversal™ programme concentrates on the things we can actually influence: reducing excess visceral fat, maintaining and developing skeletal muscle and improving overall body composition. Food matters, when we eat matters, alcohol matters, muscle matters and movement matters.
None of this means somebody suddenly has to become a fitness enthusiast. In fact, one of the most important things I advise clients to do is wonderfully ordinary: move for around 20 minutes before breakfast.
You have eaten dinner the evening before, slept and woken up the following morning. There has simply been a natural pause between dinner and breakfast. I use part of that time to get the body moving before we eat again.
A purposeful 20-minute walk is excellent. It could also be cycling, 20 minutes on a Peloton or exercise bike at home, swimming, a gentle jog or even putting some music on and dancing around the house. It needs to fit naturally into somebody’s life because there is very little point devising something theoretically wonderful that nobody wants to do.
The level I am looking for is easy to recognise: you can talk, but you probably couldn’t sing. Your heart rate has risen, you are breathing more deeply and your body is working, but you are not pushing yourself into an exhausting, breathless level. For some clients that may be somewhere around 120–130 beats per minute, although the appropriate heart rate is individual.
At this moderate, sustained level, the body uses a mixture of fuels, including fat and carbohydrate. Research into maximal fat oxidation also shows that the precise intensity at which somebody uses the greatest amount of fat varies considerably between individuals, which is another reason I prefer giving clients a simple, practical way of recognising an appropriate level rather than pretending there is one magic heart-rate number for everybody.
Why move before breakfast?
There is some interesting physiology behind something that feels completely natural. After the overnight pause between dinner and breakfast, you have not just eaten a meal and supplied the body with a fresh source of energy. During movement, stored fatty acids can contribute to the body’s fuel supply and be oxidised to produce energy.
Research comparing movement before and after eating supports a difference in the fuel being used during the activity. A systematic review and meta-analysis of 27 studies involving 273 adults found greater fat oxidation during activity performed before eating than when the same sort of activity was performed after eating.
That does not mean the timing alone magically removes visceral fat. The much stronger evidence is that regular movement reduces visceral fat, which is why the 20 minutes before breakfast sits within the wider Metabolic Age Reversal™ programme rather than being treated as a trick in isolation.
I often explain the principle to clients using animals in the wild. They do not wake up with breakfast conveniently waiting beside them; they wake up and move to find food. Humans also spent most of our history with movement woven naturally into obtaining food and beginning the day, whereas modern life makes it perfectly possible to wake up, eat immediately and then barely move.
We have made movement sound terribly complicated. Get up, move your body for 20 minutes and then have breakfast. It is natural, it is achievable and, most importantly, people actually do it.
Why skeletal muscle matters as we get older
Reducing excess visceral fat is only part of changing body composition. I am equally interested in skeletal muscle, particularly as we get older, because I do not want somebody simply becoming smaller. I want them to retain and develop the tissue that helps keep them strong and capable.
Skeletal muscle also plays an important metabolic role, including in glucose metabolism, which is why resistance work forms another part of my approach. This does not have to mean complicated equipment or turning your life upside down. Resistance bands, simple hand weights and your own body weight can all provide resistance at home.
The evidence supports this broader approach. The latest 2026 analysis found that resistance work, sustained cardiovascular movement and combining the two all reduced visceral fat, which is why I am interested in both sides of body composition: bringing excess visceral fat down while protecting and developing skeletal muscle.
For more on the relationship between muscle, shape and long-term metabolic health, read How to Look Lean and Toned After Losing Weight.
Can you reverse your metabolic age?
After three years of running Metabolic Age Reversal™, I find the answer extraordinarily exciting. I have watched clients bring a metabolic-age reading that was older than their actual age down to their actual age and then, as their body composition continues to improve, below it.
The number itself is satisfying, but the real achievement is underneath it. We have reduced excess visceral fat, worked on skeletal muscle and changed the everyday behaviours influencing body composition. That is considerably more useful to me than simply celebrating because somebody weighs less.
I am 60 and I have no interest in trying to recreate my 30-year-old body. I want the best 60-year-old body I can have: strong, healthy and capable, with good skeletal muscle, excellent visceral fat and a body composition that allows me to continue doing everything I want to do.
Your actual age will continue to go up every year. But your metabolic-age reading does not necessarily have to go with it, and that is precisely why I created Metabolic Age Reversal™.
If you would like to find out about my Metabolic Age Reversal™ programme and how I work with clients to improve visceral fat, skeletal muscle and body composition, please contact The Weight Loss Guru Ltd™ and my team will send you the information.
