Sleep

Sleep a bit longer, eat noticeably less

If you're under about six and a half hours, this is a bigger lever than most diets.

What it’s worth

−270 calories a day, eaten without trying

Do this

→Aim to add an hour, not three. The trial that found this simply extended sleep opportunity.
→Anchor your wake time first, including weekends. Bedtime tends to follow on its own.
→Judge it on a fortnight, not a night.

Why it works

Short sleep pushes ghrelin up and leptin down, so hunger rises and fullness arrives later. Cravings skew toward fast carbohydrate specifically. It's a physiological pull, not a character flaw, which is why it responds to sleeping more rather than to trying harder.

The evidence

In a free-living trial where sleep was extended in adults habitually sleeping under 6.5 hours, measured intake fell by around 270 calories a day. Nobody was asked to eat less. That's the second of the three genuinely causal levers.

The honest bit

The effect is specific to people who are actually short on sleep. Extending from seven and a half to eight and a half hours doesn't do this, and lying in bed awake for an extra hour helps nothing.

Knowing it isn’t the hard part

You’ve just read the tactic. The difficult bit is the Tuesday in six weeks when you’re tired and it’s raining. Milo is a coach you text like a friend: it knows which of these you’re working on, notices when it slips, and brings it up once rather than nagging.

See how Milo works

Try next

Swap the sugary drinks — The single biggest win available to anyone who drinks their calories, and it costs almost nothing.
Eat the bulky thing first — A soup or salad before the main course quietly takes 100+ calories off the meal.
Decide the swap before you're in the moment — Deciding once beats deciding nightly on willpower.

General information, not medical advice. If you have a health condition, are pregnant, or are under 18, talk to a healthcare professional before changing how you eat or train.