There are countless different weight loss diets doing their rounds in the markets and in fitness circles. First I will list a few popular weight loss diets.

5 Factor Diet

This diet has been devised by Harvey Pasternak, a fitness instructor and is a new kid on the block.

South Beach Diet

This is one fad diet which keeps the nutritional factor in mind; based on the glycemic index, it is balanced and as far as its popularity is concerned, it boasts of millions of followers including the common mass as well as Hollywood celebrities and models.

Weight Watchers Diet

Not only is it popular, but it also ensures successful and effective weight loss.

Glycemic Index Diet

All over Europe GI diets are phenomenally popular, but they are making their presence felt in USA now and inching their way into obese individuals’ good books.

Sonoma Diet

It has been introduced to the health and fitness circles pretty recently which belies its popularity. It is based on a Mediterranean themed diet which will make you rediscover the joys of eating (healthy food though). The weight loss will take place gradually but not by starving.

NutriSystem Diet

This one also is characterized by pre packaged foods that are shipped.

Medifast Diet

Obese individuals will benefit a lot from this rapid weight loss diet. Its chief feature is pre packaged food items that are shipped to your place.

eDiets

This online diet has attained a lot of popularity in a short time.

Shangri La Diet

Even unusual would be an understatement to describe this diet. Sugar water and oil are used here as appetite suppressants.

Reverse diet

This diet teaches you to enjoy one big hearty meal everyday with smaller easy to digest meals during the rest of the day. That big hearty meal will be breakfast.

Protein Power diet

This diet limits the intake of carbohydrates and concentrates on increased consumption of protein.

Fad diets

The Zone, Atkins Diet, General Motors, Raw Food Diet, Detox Diet, 3 Day Diet, 5 Day Diet, 7 Day Diet, Cabbage Soup Diet, Hollywood 48 Hours Miracle Diet and other such countless gimmicky diets are best avoided because they trigger dramatic weight loss in a few days by starving the body of food.

It is impossible to thrive on these diets for more than 2 days. No human being can survive on a frugal meal of cabbage soups and lettuce and a piece of bread. These fad diets are endorsed by anorexic models and tinseltown celebrities who are ready to do anything to retain their good looks, short of murder.

Young impressionable girls and women – their silly heads filled with junk – blindly ape their screen idols and end up with anorexic bodies, fainting fits, swoons, fatigue, lethargy and in extreme cases even have to be hospitalized for they start suffering from malnutrition.

Low carb dieting is just what it sounds – a diet whose specialty is low carbohydrates content and it is also known by other names such as low glycemic diet or controlled carbohydrate diet or reduced carbohydrate diet.

Low carb dieting is a rather broad term that encompasses various kinds of flexible eating plans and formats as well as popular fad diets like Carbohydrate Addicts Diet, Sugar Busters Diet, Protein Power Diet, The Zone, South Beach Diet and Atkins diet.

The main thing that these diets preach is to restrict the consumption of carbohydrate laden food items or eliminate carbohydrates from your diet as much as possible.

A few of these diets will banish carbohydrates in all its various forms while some others will reduce or eliminate the intake of food groups which are high in carbs such as sugars and starch. Other low carb diets will concentrate on the glycemic content.

There is one low carb diet that has attained a lot of popularity nowadays which eliminates all kinds of white colored foods such as potatoes, white rice, white flour and sugars. It goes by the name of No White Foods diet.

Each and every of these low carb diets has an induction phase – a phase marked by very little or negligible consumption of carbohydrate. Most people who are up in arms against low carb diets and believe that they eliminate whole food groups together and lead to imbalance in the body and result in loss of nutrition and malnourishment, get confused between this low carb induction phase and a low carb diet.

To put your doubts to rest, though there is this induction period it lasts for a very short period and is followed by the intake of more carbohydrates later on.
A few of these low carb diets start off with comparatively high levels of carbs, but in spite of that cannot match up to the standard set down by USDA Food Pyramid.

Mainstream diets recommend an eating plan with the carb content pegged at 50% to 65%. Taking it to be the yardstick, a low carb diet may contain a carb count of 40% or even lesser. But this is not the official way to measure the carb count in diets.

Advantages of low carb dieting

Each and every individual won’t experience all of the many benefits of low carb dieting. The advantages and benefits experienced by individuals following this diet will vary from one person to another.

Some of the proven and widely demonstrated benefits of low carb dieting are reduced blood insulin level, decreased blood pressure, improved insulin sensitivity, an increase in good cholesterol or HDL, a reduction in blood glucose levels in pre diabetic and diabetic patients, improved levels of triglycerides and significant weight loss in spite of not limiting calories. Not much muscle mass loss is reported.

At times seizure disorders are treated through Ketogenic diets.