Measuring Body Composition – Circumference

Circumference Measurement 

Photo by Siora Photography on Unsplash

It has been a few days, but in the last post I discussed BMI — in today’s post we will go over another form of body composition measuring; called circumference. 

When using this term, it means to measure the body’s “girth” using a tape measure. There are many sites that can be measured on the body using a tape measure, but typically you will see the thighs, waist, arms, chest and possibly the hips as well. pending what is important to you at the time, you may decide to measure all of the above or one particular part of the body. 

Measuring girth / circumference can have its advantages and disadvantages; personally I find that it is easy to use and inexpensive and now a days, you can purchase measuring tape specifically for body fat measuring on Amazon, and they aren’t much more than the original. 

Some disadvantages you will run into with using a a tape measure is, pending the type of clothing you are wearing, what you have recently digested, how tightly you hold the tape around you, and the placement of the tape around the specific body part will determine how accurate your number will be & it is highly recommended you have someone else measure you to make sure you get the best results. Keep in mind that knowing your circumference doesn’t mean you will know your body fat % necessarily but it can tell you if you have gained or lost inches, or perhaps it can be used when wanting to fit into something specific — such as knee sleeves ( I would know because I need knee sleeves for a competition in powerlifting and all of the websites recommended I measure my thighs in order to have the best fit). 

Utilizing this type of body composition tool can be helpful for starters but eventually you will want something more accurate depending on how serious you want to be about reaching your goals and how serious you are about wanting to know where your body fat and weight is compared to where it was. Learn this type of body measuring to use as a reference in the future, but again don’t rely on it heavily because it definitely has its disadvantages.