Weight loss is a prevalent goal, and many seek cost-effective alternatives like steam rooms and saunas. Both steam rooms and saunas have gained popularity for their potential health benefits, including weight loss. But what are the real benefits of steam rooms and saunas, and can they truly help you shed those extra pounds?
Understanding Steam Rooms and Saunas
Saunas have been around for centuries. Saunas are small rooms typically filled with dry heat. Steam rooms are different from saunas and use humidity.
Types of Saunas
Different types of saunas include:
- Wood-burning saunas: The most traditional type, using fire to heat the space with woods like birch, oak, or maple.
- Electric saunas: Produce heat with electricity, usually through heating elements that warm up rocks or panels.
- Infrared saunas: Utilize infrared light waves to warm the body directly without raising the temperature of the air around you. Temperatures in infrared saunas typically land between 110 F and 135 F (43.33 C and 57.22 C).
Steam Rooms
A steam room, also known as a steam bath, is an enclosed space outfitted with a steam generator. Because of the moisture content, steam rooms often have tile floors and either glass or tile walls to avoid the growth of bacteria in porous materials. Temperatures often range between 110°F and 114°F with 100% humidity.
The Claimed Weight Loss Benefits
One of the most touted benefits of saunas and steam rooms is their ability to promote weight loss. This claim stems from the heat these treatments produce for your body, similar to how active movements like cardio can encourage calorie burning.
Read also: Unveiling the Benefits of Steam Rooms
How Heat Exposure Works
Heat exposure in steam rooms and saunas activates thermoregulation. The body increases sweat gland activity to maintain core temperature. Mild, short-term increases in resting energy expenditure (REE) have been reported after sauna use. However, the effect is not sufficient for meaningful fat oxidation.
Calorie Expenditure
According to PubMed Central, heat sessions elevate heart rate and metabolism while promoting fluid loss-factors that contribute to calorie expenditure. The mechanism of calorie expenditure in both sauna and steam use involves heat-induced cardiovascular stimulation. A 30-minute session can burn up to 500 calories (according to research indexed in PubMed Central Technically).
The Reality: Water Loss vs. Fat Loss
Sweating results in acute fluid loss, not fat loss. Most weight change after a steam or sauna session reflects water expelled through eccrine glands. A 2019 review published in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health confirms: weight changes post-sauna are due to dehydration, not adipose reduction.
Sweating and Fat Loss
Sweating is not an indicator of fat loss. Sweating primarily results in water loss, not fat oxidation. The process of lipolysis-breaking down stored fat-does not involve sweat glands.
Temporary Weight Loss
Steam rooms temporarily help you lose weight by supporting water weight reduction. Their high humidity causes your body to sweat intensely, losing fluid. But remember, this type of weight loss isn't fat loss. You can quickly regain this loss by hydrating yourself.
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Are Steam Rooms or Saunas Better for Weight Loss?
Both steam rooms and saunas support weight loss through similar thermal mechanisms. Neither proves superior.
Additional Health Benefits of Sauna and Steam Rooms
While sauna and steam room sessions can support your weight loss journey, their benefits don't stop there.
Stress Reduction
There’s evidence around saunas being effective for those who have high stress work or personal situations. The sauna experience does seem to show improvement in anxiety. Research shows that a sauna can also help improve sleep. Giving yourself that kind of introspective time is extremely successful in helping to mitigate anxiety, depression and burnout. Sauna bathing is a regular part of Scandinavian culture as a way to destress and relax. According to 2024 research in Frontiers in Public Health, women who sat for sporadic 20-minute sessions in a sauna with a temperature of 80 degrees Celsius, or 176 degrees Fahrenheit, experienced less tension, depression, anger, and fatigue when it came to their mental health. If you can easily and frequently integrate sauna sessions into your schedule (bonus points if you can socialize while using it!), the sauna “likely will reduce your stress levels,” Dr. Millstine adds.
Cardiovascular Health
The heat from a sauna can boost your heart health and help maintain a healthy blood pressure. The heat causes an increase in heart rate and sweating. This results in a physiologic change that mimics exercise. This also causes the release of anti-inflammatory agents. Research shows that people who regularly use a sauna at least four times a week for 20 minutes have a significantly lower risk of heart attack, stroke, and dementia, notes Dr. Parikh. Sauna bathing may also help increase cardiovascular fitness, per 2022 research in the American Journal of Physiology. In those with no underlying cardiovascular disease, sauna bathing may be helpful to modulate the autonomic nervous system and reduce blood pressure. It may also be helpful to improve dilation of the smooth muscles and reduce arterial stiffness, he adds.
Pain Relief
If you have rheumatoid arthritis or ankylosing spondylitis, research shows that using a sauna may help improve pain and stiffness. Some small studies show an improvement in chronic pain. Particularly dry sauna and infrared sauna use are thought to increase blood flow to muscles and decrease muscle spasms, have been shown to improve chronic back pain. The heat can make your muscles more pliable and elastic, so it [can] probably help with workout recovery soreness,” says Dr. Millstine. Sauna use can also help with tension-type headaches, likely because it alleviates the muscle soreness that contributes to them, she adds.
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Lung Function
If you have asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), research shows that regular sauna use may help with your lung function. Wet sauna use likely hydrates the respiratory tract, improving the ability to move mucus from the respiratory tract more easily with coughing.
Skin Health
Using a sauna can benefit your overall skin health because it helps bring blood flow to the surface of your skin before you start sweating. Regular sauna use makes the skin more robust-meaning it sort of firms it up-and makes it more elastic, which is good for aesthetic reasons, but also because the skin acts like a general health barrier.
Immune System
Saunas may also help prevent the common cold and other viral infections, research shows.
Improved Circulation
Anything that raises your body temperature will increase your heart rate, which in turn increases your circulation, says Denise Millstine, MD, an internist at Mayo Clinic’s family medicine office in Scottsdale, Arizona. Sitting in a sauna is almost like walking on a treadmill at a regular pace, adds Purvi Parikh, MD, an internal medicine physician and clinical assistant professor at NYU Grossman School of Medicine. Because of the heat, your heart has to pump harder to circulate your blood, which means you’re getting some cardio benefits even though all you’re doing is sitting in the heat.
Mental Wellness
Heat-based treatments, including steam rooms, may support mental wellness by directing attention toward relaxation and away from anxiety-producing news and “doomscrolling.” One study suggested that engaging in heat treatment activities helps to create a state of mindfulness and a focus on the breath, both of which have many psychological benefits. These may include sleep improvement, stress reduction, and mood boosts from focusing on doing something positive for yourself. In one study involving Finnish men, sauna bathing was associated with lowered risks of dementia.
Workout Recovery
The pain you feel after working out is called delayed-onset muscle soreness (DOMS). Professional athletes have known for decades that heat therapy can help them recover from training workouts. Heat can penetrate deep into muscle tissue and help relieve DOMS.
Healthy Aging
One study concluded that regular sauna bathing has the potential to delay the effects of aging through heat therapy’s benefits on cardiovascular and cognitive health, physical fitness, and muscle maintenance. Emerging evidence shows that the health benefits of saunas are often dose-related, especially for inflammation and cardiovascular benefits. This means that regular repeated sauna use has more benefits than infrequent use.
Risks and Precautions
One of the biggest risks with sauna use is dehydration. Dehydration can cause thirst, headaches, muscle cramps and confusion. So, you want to make sure you drink water before and after a sauna session. The biggest risks are dehydration and dizziness from the heat, says Dr. Parikh. So always make sure you're well-hydrated before and after your sauna sesh. Staying in a steam room for more than 15 minutes can dehydrate you. Experts recommend drinking water while you’re in the sauna and directly afterward. Steam rooms are usually lined with tile, glass, or plastic, making them airtight to retain moisture. They are heated to between 114°F and 120°F (45°C and 48°C). Although temperatures vary, steam rooms are typically kept somewhere around 110°F (43°C). Steam rooms can also host other people’s germs. The steam isn’t hot enough to kill some types of bacteria, and the warmth may even increase the number of bacteria. The heat in steam rooms can also encourage further growth of viruses. If you’re ill, it’s recommended that you do not use the steam room to reduce the risk of transmitting your illness to others. Other potential risks of a steam room, especially with prolonged exposure, include: burns, cramps, heatstroke, heat exhaustion, dizziness and fainting.
When to Avoid Saunas and Steam Rooms
And while it’s generally safe to use a sauna, Dr. Zack advises avoiding using one in the following situations:
- If you’ve had a recent heart attack or stroke.
- If you’ve been drinking alcohol.
- If you are pregnant
- If you are immunocompromised
- If you are recovering from surgery
Consult Your Healthcare Provider
You should check with your healthcare provider before use:
- If you’re older than 65.
- If you’re under 16.
- If you’re trying to get pregnant.
- If you have certain heart conditions, like heart disease, severe aortic stenosis, heart failure, or high or low blood pressure.
- If you have certain neurologic conditions such as epilepsy.
- If you’re taking medication.
- If you’re concerned about male infertility.
Tips for Safe Sauna and Steam Room Use
Are you ready to give a sauna a try? Dr. Zack offers these tips to make sure you stay safe.
- Listen to your body: If you’re feeling unwell, feeling dizzy, feeling weak, feeling like it’s hard to breathe or uncomfortable, you should exit the sauna and seek medical help.
- Keep it short: Try to keep it around 15 to 20 minutes. And if you’re new to saunas, you may need to start out with five minutes and add more time each session.
- Stay hydrated: Make sure you drink plenty of water or even electrolyte drinks to help refuel.
- Sauna use should feel like a supportive ritual, not a challenge to power through: "The key is to listen to your body-it should feel nourishing, not punishing."