To lower your body fat percentage, you first need to know how it is calculated so you understand the effect of different choices on the percentage. It is a measurement of the weight of your body fat divided by your total body weight. An average percentage for women will be 15 to 30 percent while men should be lower, in the 10 to 20 percent range.

Two Ways To Lower

There are two ways you can get your body fat percentage lower. The first is to actually lose body fat. If you use this method, you will also lose body weight. The second method is to increase your lean body mass. You will actually gain weight following this method, but you will be dividing the same amount of body fat by a higher body weight. This will result in a lower percentage.

Cut Calories

When you consume more calories than you burn in a day, the excess calories are stored as body fat. On the other hand, if you consume fewer calories than you burn in a day, your body will burn body fat to make up the difference. So eat fewer calories. Cutting your daily intake of calories by 500 calories a day will result in you losing a pound a week.

Exercise

Burn more calories by exercising. Aerobic exercise like running and biking is particularly useful in burning calories. If you can burn 500 more calories a day and don't change your diet, you can still lose a pound a week, because you are using more calories in a day than you take in.

Morning Workouts

Do your exercise when you first get up in the morning and you can burn three times as much fat than if you did it at other times during the day. This is because the first fuel the body uses for a workout are carbohydrates, but if you workout first thing in the morning, you've been fasting for 12 hours or so. Your body won't have carbohydrates to burn, so it will see the secondary fuel source which is body fat.

Lift Weights

Resistance exercise like powerlifting and weightlifting build muscle tissue. Not only does this add lean mass to your body, which will lower your body fat percentage, but a heavier body will need more calories to sustain the weight. This will help you burn more of your body fat.

Source:

Weight Loss Resources

eHow.com

Bodybuilding for You.com