Have you ever wondered if you’re not losing weight because you’re actually gaining muscle mass while losing fat? The only way to know is by using a body composition scale or analyzer.
Bodyweight alone can be misleading. It doesn’t give an accurate picture of body composition or overall health because it’s easily affected by small changes like water retention. Or, if your diet is too low in calories, you could be losing muscle when you think you’re losing fat.
You can know what’s truly happening in your body when you understand the full picture of body fat, lean muscle mass, body water, and bone mass. A body composition scale can provide the full picture.Â
In this blog we’ll specifically look at the Hume Health Body Pod Scale, an accurate and affordable tool for tracking your body composition progress at home.
Plus, get 20% off your Body Pod with discount code RENEWAL15 !
Benefits of a Body Composition Scale for Home
One of the most common ways to have your body fat tested is at a local gym via calipers or an Omron handheld body fat analyzer. Neither are the most accurate or detailed, but are still better than weight alone.
Best case scenario, your gym or local nutrition shop will have an InBody machine that can give you a full analysis of your body composition beyond just fat and muscle, and with far greater accuracy than calipers or Omron.
However, many places charge money to have these measurements done. And the biggest benefit comes from being able to re-measure data frequently to see what progress is being made. Costs can add up if you have to pay frequently for these measurements and taking them too infrequently may not give you a fully accurate picture.
Consistency is key when it comes to accurate body measurements. It should be done at the same time, in the same clothes, before a workout, and with a similar amount of water consumption. All of that is hard to achieve if you have to drive to a gym every time you want a new measurement.
The Hume Health Body Pod machine eliminates these problems. It works just like an InBody scan, with the same accuracy, but in the comfort of your home, anytime you want! Taking more frequent measurements can help you learn more about your body and fluctuations that may occur due to water retention, heavy meals, workouts, etc.
Body Pod Features
The Body Pod is the world’s first portable body analyzer. It uses 8 frequency sensors to deliver precise weight, full body composition, and other health data, to help you understand how your body reacts to food, sleep, stress and other factors so you can make informed health choices.
Here are some of the features that set it apart from similar body analyzers or body composition scales like Omron, Withings, and InBody:
- It comes with a free app that allows users to set goals and track their progress over time.
- It measures 54 different health metrics including weight, body fat percent, muscle mass, amount of muscle mass in each limb, bone mineral content, basal metabolic rate, subcutaneous fat, body water, metabolic age and more. Plus, it provides explanations for these numbers so you know what they mean, and actionable insights for which areas to work on.
- Body Pod records your heart rate, which may help to understand if you’re overtaxing yourself with workouts or stress.
- As you weigh in consistently over time, the Hume App will have better understanding and be able to accurately detect if potential changes are from true progress or other variables that may impact a reading, like extreme dehydration or sensor noise.
- It uses a visual of a human body that shows muscle mass in each arm, leg and trunk, so you can work on building a balanced body to prevent injuries. Descriptions provide context for whether the amount of muscle is high, low or standard relative to other similar Body Pod users.
- It tells you bone mineral content, which can help you know if you should add more weight-bearing exercise, or increase certain vitamins and minerals in your diet that help build and maintain bone.
- Body Pod can sync with Fitbit, Samsung Health, Apple Watch and more. This allows the app to become an all-in-one solution to track your nutrition, sleep & activity on top of the health metrics. All of this data can be very motivating for some people and make it easier to stay on track with your goals.
- It uses AI to study patterns and connects them with your body data to give you personalized feedback so you can easily understand which areas to work on!
- It’s more accurate than similar smart body composition scales. A traditional body impedance scale provides a good baseline to measure body composition, but it measures only the lower half of your body, then uses an equation to calculate your full body composition. The Body Pod has advanced sensors embedded in the handles to scan your torso, arms, legs and even heart.
- It measures your FULL body composition and claims to have an accuracy of 98% compared to the DEXA scan – the medical grade gold standard of body composition analyzers.
- Body Pod is on par with InBody machines that cost $20k at the gym. Now, anyone can have this technology at home, which is pretty amazing! Plus, use discount code RENEWAL15 for an extra 20% off your purchase!
Other Things to Know & Downsides of the BodyPod Body Composition Scale
Of course, no machine is perfect, so let’s cover a few more pieces of information:
- It’s important to know that the Body Pod utilizes the first 5 weigh-ins as a calibration period to get a better understanding of your unique body composition. So, keep in mind that your first few results will be the least accurate and may vary. Plan to weigh in daily if possible when you get the machine to start getting more accurate results as soon as possible.
- Do not weigh on carpet or a soft surface, especially on your first weigh-in, as this can affect the calibration of the scale and accuracy of the results. I accidentally did this when I received it, and ended up having to work with support via email for a few days to figure out the problem and get it working again.
- The app has a free and paid version. In order to get all of the insights, nutrition programming, and workout programs, you need the paid version which is $14.99/month or $100 per year as of this blog date. If you simply want the necessary data, the free app works perfectly fine.
- It won’t allow you to change your weight goal unless it’s 5 lbs. different from your current weight. And it can’t be set it for small goals like 2-3 lbs. You can’t set body fat % goals, either.
- While the app and scale worked well on my iPhone, my husband’s Samsung would not read his weigh-ins and we couldn’t get it working on his phone for a long time, which was quite frustrating.
- The app can create a nutrition plan, and you can log your food intake within the app. While convenient, the goal nutrients provided can be way off. For instance, it doesn’t know if your weekly activity is weights, walking, running, etc or your goal body fat %. When I set a 5 lb. weight gain goal, it set my protein at a crazy high number that would be better suited for a professional athlete. I would never give that protein goal to myself or a client.
- The nutrition recommendations shouldn’t be something you blindly follow, assuming the app knows best. As a registered dietitian, I must note that if you want help with your nutrition to reach your body composition goal, you should always consult with a health professional. A machine or app that doesn’t know your health history, lifestyle, and unique goals cannot provide the best and safest goals for you.
If you need specific nutrition guidance, you can reach out to me at [email protected] for a free consult.
Body Pod Body Composition Scale Review in Summary
You should now have a better understanding of the benefits of a body composition scale. The unique features of the Body Pod set it apart from similar and less accurate machines. While it’s not a perfect machine, it definitely beats your average body composition scale or body fat analyzer due to its comprehensive measurements and accuracy. The BodyPod is as close as you can get to an expensive machine like InBody, but at a far more affordable price, smaller size, and greater ease of use.
You can purchase yours here and use discount code RENEWAL15 for 20% off!
