How much protein to build muscle? See why pushing intake too high can backfire — and what to prioritize instead.

Do you expect your muscles to grow bigger and bigger by shoveling “high protein” into your body?

But what if eating more protein isn’t just unnecessary — but actually makes it harder to grow?

Today, I’ll walk you through the new research that challenges everything we thought we knew about how much protein to build muscle, exposes the protein hype, and reveals the 2 things that actually build more muscle than protein. 

But how did protein become known as “the most important” nutrient in the first place?

What Does Protein Do?

When you lift weights, you trigger muscle protein synthesis — a molecular message to your muscles that says, “Build.”

But building muscle is like building a brick house: without bricks, nothing gets built. Protein is those bricks. Eat enough of it, and you’ve got the raw materials to actually turn that growth signal into new muscle.

But when gym bros learned this, they didn’t just want to build houses; they wanted mansions. 

To quote Arnold:

"... and, I would eat up to 3-400 grams of protein a day."

Back in the golden era, it wasn’t uncommon for bodybuilders to eat over 300 grams of protein per day. A dozen eggs in one sitting and pounds of chicken breast.

Fast forward to today, and you’ll find lifters chasing 200+ grams of protein or following the “1 gram per pound of bodyweight” rule like it’s gospel. I know I did. I used to believe that if I didn’t hit my daily protein target, I was leaving tons of gains on the table.

But it wasn’t just bodybuilders. The food industry realized they could cash in on this obsession. 

Suddenly, you’ve got protein cereal, protein chips, protein cookies, and even Starbucks lattes with “extra protein.” Most of it is just cheap protein sprinkled in, but because they can slap “high protein” on the label, they charge you 20% more — and people happily pay for it.

Labels scream ‘high protein,’ but none of that tells you how much protein to build muscle versus what just empties your wallet.

How Much Protein To Build Muscle: More = Better?

Here’s where things get interesting: recently, a group of top protein researchers was skeptical about just how important protein is for building muscle.

This is the most comprehensive look yet at how much protein to build muscle during real training blocks; not just short lab trials.

They gathered every long-term growth study they could find relevant to the question of how much protein to build muscle (62 in total), where participants lifted weights but consumed different amounts of protein.

Then, they plotted all those results on a graph, with protein intake on the bottom and muscle growth on the side.

The results for how much protein to build muscle were not what they had expected. 

In one study, participants ate what most lifters would call “low protein” — 0.45 grams per pound of bodyweight. For someone who weighs 180 pounds, that’s just 82 grams of protein a day, basically two chicken breasts. 

The mark on the Y-axis represents the amount of growth they achieved. 

Now, what happens if you took a group of lifters and fed them double that (164g protein/day)? 4 chicken breasts per day. 

Using gym bro math for how much protein to build muscle, that should mean at least double the gains, right?

Surprisingly, the growth was pretty much identical.

Ok, but now let’s really push it. 270 grams per day. Six chicken breasts.

Well, despite participants in this study eating 3x more protein, they actually gained less muscle.

But I know what you’re thinking: you can’t just cherry-pick studies to answer how much protein to build muscle and call it a day. And you’re right. So let’s widen the lens a bit.

After looking at all the studies in the analysis that examined moderate to high protein intakes, if eating more protein really has a powerful effect on growth, you’d expect these dots to climb up and to the right. But ...

"The trend is basically flat. And so what that means is the anticipated benefit of pushing your protein even higher is very, very small, and frankly, so small that many researchers aren't even confident that a benefit exists at all. In other words, if you’re asking how much protein to add muscle, the data suggest ‘more’ isn’t automatically ‘better.’"

Why Is More Protein Not Always Better?

That’s Dr. Eric Trexler, a published researcher at Duke who’s spent his career studying muscle growth.

"If you're building a house and you have more bricks than the blueprint calls for, that doesn't mean you end up with a bigger house.

Essentially, you end up with a pile of leftover bricks, and eventually, you'll have to haul them away from the construction site. So, when you're building a house, that's tedious; it's a waste of time."

But graphs are one thing. 

What About Protein Type?

Let’s say you somehow managed to convince a pro bodybuilder to not just cut his protein intake in half, but to stop eating meat, eggs, and fish. That means he'll get all his protein from only plant-based sources.

Surely he’d shrivel up and lose all his muscles, right?

Well, that’s exactly what natural Pro Bodybuilder and well-known YouTuber Alex Leonidas did 2.5 years ago.

Alex used to consume 200 grams of protein daily. Now, he eats as low as 90 grams per day, all from plant-based sources.

"I've noticed absolutely nothing, Jeremy.

Recovery is exactly the same. Progressive overload remains the same as it has been for many years. I would consider myself an elite natural lifter.

I've been documenting all my training since 2020, I have SD cards filled to the max, and my gains have not been affected whatsoever. I've tried up to 220 grams, including being a single-digit body fat.

Comparing that to 120, which is 100 grams less. I'm just as strong as I've ever been. 405 bench at 181."

So if you’re wondering how far a person can possibly get with a low-protein diet, Alex is living proof that the answer is “pretty far.”

Alex:

"Now, I just feel like people need to focus more on their health instead of just one sole macronutrient, protein.

And that's been surprising to me too, because now I'm saving money and I don't have to stress about it as much.

And I'm not the first person to report this. If you've looked at Brian Bornstein and a couple of other guys, it's a common thing that they're now dropping their levels to around the zone that I'm talking about."

So, as we can see from Alex, his results challenge the idea that how much protein to build muscle must always mean pushing intake sky-high.

Doing This Matters More Than Protein

But now you’re probably wondering… If the question really isn't how much protein to build muscle, and protein doesn’t matter as much as we thought, then what does?

Well, let’s look at a few clues.

In one study, researchers had one group of people double their protein intake to approximately 140 grams per day, while another group remained at 70 grams. The catch? Neither group trained. And after eight weeks, guess what happened.

Nothing. No muscle, no strength, no gains — just more expensive pee.

On the flip side, another study looked at patients with kidney issues who were forced onto extremely low protein diets: less than 50 grams a day.

You’d think that would completely shut down muscle growth. But when half of them started lifting weights, even on that tiny amount of protein, their muscles still got over 20% bigger and 30% stronger. 

Then, There's Also Calorie Intake

But what about your diet? 

What if I told you that eating this bowl of rice could give you the same muscle growth as eating all this extra protein? 

In one experiment, researchers divided lifters into three groups. All of them followed the same lifting program.

• Group A got nothing extra, just their normal diet.
• Group B added a 2,000-calorie shake made entirely of carbs.
• Group C added a similar 2,000-calorie shake, but with 82 grams of protein mixed into it.

After eight weeks, both shake groups gained significantly more weight and muscle than the control group, which didn’t get extra calories. But here’s the kicker: the carb-only group experienced similar gains as the extra protein group. Suggesting it was the extra calories, not protein, driving the gains.

We see the same thing in the opposite direction, too.

In fat loss studies, people who train hard and eat plenty of protein can still build muscle if they’re at maintenance calories or in just a small deficit. But once that deficit gets too steep — around 500 to 700 calories per day — muscle loss becomes inevitable, even with a high-protein diet.

So, when you calculate how much protein to build muscle, remember that total calories often move the needle more.

Bottom line? Put these studies together, and the most important drivers of growth become quite obvious: number one, hard training. Number two, eating enough calories to fuel your training and recovery.

And unless you’re severely restricting protein, it comes in for support at #3. 

Protein Can Actually Hurt Your Growth

In fact, there are some cases where protein can actually hinder your growth rather than help it. 

For one, protein is arguably the most filling food you can eat, and it also burns the most calories to digest. If you struggle to gain weight, it can make it harder to eat enough to support growth.

Not to mention the GI discomfort and flatulence that can come from higher protein diets — you won’t like it, and neither will the people around you. 

Second, it’s expensive. 

Let’s say your body only needs about 100 grams of protein a day, but you push it up to 200. That extra 100 grams isn’t giving you any additional muscle — your body just burns it for energy.

Now, if that extra protein is coming from chicken, that’s about five dollars added to your grocery bill every single day. But if you replaced those calories with carbs, like potatoes, you’d get the same amount of energy for less than a dollar. That’s a difference of around $120 a month, or nearly $1,500 a year.

By the way, I share how you can get your protein for cheap (or rather, cheaper) here.

And third, when protein consumes too many of your calories, it displaces carbs and fats. Too low fat can mess with your hormones. Whereas too low carbs drain your glycogen, tanking your workout performance. 

But Protein Does Have Its Benefits

Now, I’ll share exactly how much protein to build muscle I’m currently eating, and the ranges I’d recommend at the end of this article. But just because protein is overhyped doesn’t mean it’s useless.

There are actually three situations where protein has major benefits.

Situation 1: From Low To Moderate Intake

First, although you can still build muscle without consuming a lot of protein, the analysis I showed you earlier suggests a meaningful increase in gains when you transition from very low intakes to moderate ones. 

In fact, Alex mentioned that once he starts consuming less than 90 grams of protein per day, his muscle recovery becomes noticeably slower.

This “threshold” is right around 0.55 g per lb of bodyweight, which aligns perfectly with what the analysis shows.

So if you take the number of grams of protein you eat in a day, and divide it by your bodyweight in pounds, and the number you get is below 0.55, you’ll almost certainly see more growth by eating more protein. 

Situation 2: Dieting

Cutting? Your answer to how much protein to build muscle while staying lean may shift upward to manage hunger and protect muscle.

Eric:

"Being able to attenuate hunger and increase fullness on a high-protein diet becomes really helpful when we're trying to lose weight and restrict calories. 

Now, if you're over 15% body fat, you know you've got plenty of stored energy, so you don't have to worry too much about cutting into muscle as you're losing weight.

However, once you drop below 15% body fat, protein becomes even more important.

We recently published a meta-analysis specifically on lean-dieting people, and found that their protein needs tend to be a lot higher than we would typically see in people who are either not dieting or not quite as lean."

Situation 3: Adherence

And the third scenario is adherence. Some people just enjoy eating protein.

I’m Filipino, and for me, rice without some kind of protein on the plate just feels incomplete. That’s also why I still use protein powder. I even sell my own brand, and although this article may not be the best marketing for it, I still use it almost every day.

Not because it’s magic, but because it’s a quick, tasty, and versatile way for me to get 30 grams of protein in a single scoop. 

So How Much Protein To Build Muscle?

But let’s get to what you’re waiting for — how much protein to build muscle? Or, in other words, how much protein should you actually eat?

For the majority of lifters, consuming 0.55 to 0.63 grams of protein per pound of body weight will already be close to maximizing their gains. For a 160 lb person, that would be around 88 to 100 grams of protein per day.

And remember, protein sneaks into your diet in more ways than just shakes and chicken breasts.

Bread, beans, peanut butter — it all adds up. I even scanned this simple meal with my app — just a protein shake and two slices of peanut butter toast — and that’s already 50 grams of protein.

So, hitting your protein target could be as simple as adding one protein shake to your day.

Now, if you do want a little extra “insurance,” you can go slightly higher, to about 0.64 to 0.72 grams per pound. Think of this as your “very likely maximizing gains” zone.

And lastly, if you’re dieting and below 15% body fat, OR you’re just someone who wants the reassurance that you’re definitely maximizing your gains, you can bump it up to 0.73 to 1 gram per pound of bodyweight. 

TL;DR

• If you’re asking how much protein to build muscle, the big picture says: once you hit a sensible moderate target, more adds little.
• Training > protein. Without hard, progressive lifting, extra protein does nothing; with proper training, even modest intakes work, so train first, then fine-tune how much protein to build muscle.
• Calories matter right after training quality: in surplus, carbs can rival protein for gains; in steep deficits you’ll lose muscle regardless of protein intake. Fuel first, then decide how much protein to build muscle.
• Too much protein can backfire — too filling, pricey, GI issues, and it crowds out carbs/fats. Smarter to balance than to max out how much protein to build muscle.
• Practical playbook: hit a sensible, moderate protein target, go higher only when cutting/very lean, or if it helps adherence. Most progress still comes from training and calories, not from obsessing over how much protein to build muscle.

As for what I’m currently doing, I used to sit at well over 1 gram per pound because I thought it was necessary. These days, I’m closer to 0.73 — right at the lower end of this “maximized” range — and I’ve noticed no difference in my gains. If anything, shifting some of those calories back into carbs has made my training, as well as my digestion, feel a whole lot better.

Plus, I used to panic about protein when travelling.

Now, I know that even just 1 protein shake and a high-protein dinner is pretty much covering my bases. 

So next time, before you buy those overpriced protein snacks, maybe buy a calculator to figure out how much protein you actually need first. Just kidding.

You can just use my Built With Science+ app. It shows you exactly how much protein to build muscle you need and the right workouts to combine with it, PLUS it adjusts your plan based on how your body’s actually responding.

Click the button below to try the BWS+ app for 2 weeks, for free, no strings attached:

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And since your training is what really drives growth, check out this article where I break down the only 2 exercises you need for a wider back.

Thanks for sticking to the end, and I’ll see ya next time!

By the way, here’s the article summed up into a YouTube video: