ENहिन्दी soon
Home/India/Answers/What is a healthy BMI for Indians?
INIndia Food and daily life

What is a healthy BMI for Indians?

GLP Guidebook teamUpdated 5 Oct 20268 sourcesWritten from published sources
The short answer

For Indian adults, 18.0 to 22.9 is the normal BMI range set by India's 2009 expert consensus. It counts 23 to 24.9 as overweight and 25 or more as obesity. The WHO's global normal range, 18.5 to 24.9, is higher, because Indians tend to carry more body fat at lower BMIs.

What are the Indian BMI ranges, and how do they differ from WHO's?

India's 2009 expert consensus puts normal BMI at 18.0 to 22.9, overweight at 23.0 to 24.9, and obesity at 25 or more.1

CategoryIndia (2009 consensus)WHO (global)
Normal18.0 to 22.9118.5 to 24.92
Overweight23.0 to 24.9125.0 to 29.92,3
Obesity25 or more130 or more3

BMI in kg/m². Sources: Misra 2009, page 165; WHO. Checked 5 Oct 2026.

BMI (body mass index) is your weight in kilograms divided by your height in metres, squared.8 Take someone 1.65 m tall who weighs 65 kg. Their BMI is 23.9, which is overweight on the Indian ranges and normal on WHO's.

WHO starts the normal range at 18.5, and so does the 2025 Indian proposal below.2,6 The 2009 consensus text says 18.0.1

Why are the cut-offs lower for Indians?

At the same or lower BMI, Asian Indians tend to carry more body fat and more belly fat than white people, the 2009 consensus says.1

In most of the Indian studies it reviewed, high body fat matched a BMI of 21.5 to 24 in men and 19 to 24 in women.1 A 2021 study followed about 1.5 million adults in England. South Asians at BMI 23.9 had the same diabetes risk as white adults at BMI 30.5

A 2004 WHO expert group found risk starts at a BMI of 22 to 25, depending on the Asian population.4 It kept the global cut-offs, but suggested extra action points, starting at 23.4 India's ESI 2025 obesity guideline says South Asians get weight-related diseases at a lower BMI. It calls the pattern "thin-fat".7 Our post on "thin-fat" Indians goes deeper.

Check your BMI and waist on Indian cut-offs

Takes a minute. Free, no sign-up.

Check BMI and waist

Is the obesity cut-off moving to 23?

Not officially, since the 2025 paper that would count any BMI above 23 as obesity is an expert group's proposal, not a government rule.6

The group is the India Obesity Commission, and it proposes two stages.6 Stage 1 means extra body fat with no effect on the organs or daily life.6 Stage 2 needs a BMI above 23, a high waist or waist-to-height ratio, and a related symptom or disease.6 Examples include breathlessness or leg-joint pain during daily tasks, type 2 diabetes and fatty liver.6

The experts reached it through 5 rounds of an online survey (a Delphi process).6 We found no government notice adopting it, so this site and our BMI tool still use the 2009 ranges above.

Is BMI enough to judge your health?

No. BMI is a quick, cheap screening measure, but it cannot tell fat from muscle or show where on your body the fat sits.8

India's 2009 consensus says BMI and waist size should be used together, with equal importance.1 It advises seeking medical help above a waist of 90 cm (35.4 inches) for men or 80 cm (31.5 inches) for women.1

A BMI range is not a medicine decision. India's ESI 2025 guideline says a doctor may consider medicines above BMI 27. With a related condition, such as high blood pressure, the figure is above 25.7 It also says the threshold for diagnosis or treatment is "not based on BMI alone".7 Guide 1: Weight and health for Indians covers waist, stages and linked conditions in full.

Read the full picture

Related questions

What waist size is too high for Indian men and women? What is a normal HbA1c? Can you take Ozempic if you don't have diabetes? How often should you weigh yourself on Ozempic or Mounjaro?
Did this answer your question?

Sources

  1. Misra A et al. Consensus statement for diagnosis of obesity, abdominal obesity and the metabolic syndrome for Asian Indians and recommendations for physical activity, medical and surgical management. J Assoc Physicians India 2009;57:163-70. Full text read, pages 164-166. PMID 19582986
  2. WHO Regional Office for Europe. Nutrition for a healthy life (fact sheet), BMI table for adults over 20. who.int
  3. WHO. Obesity and overweight (fact sheet), 8 Dec 2025. who.int
  4. WHO Expert Consultation. Appropriate body-mass index for Asian populations and its implications for policy and intervention strategies. Lancet 2004;363:157-63. Abstract. doi:10.1016/S0140-6736(03)15268-3 · PMID 14726171
  5. Caleyachetty R et al. Ethnicity-specific BMI cutoffs for obesity based on type 2 diabetes risk in England: a population-based cohort study. Lancet Diabetes Endocrinol 2021;9:419-26. Abstract. doi:10.1016/S2213-8587(21)00088-7 · PMID 33989535
  6. Misra A, Vikram NK, Ghosh A, Ranjan P, Gulati S; India Obesity Commission Members. Revised definition of obesity in Asian Indians living in India. Diabetes Metab Syndr 2025;19:102989. Full text read, sections 6-7. Declared interests: the lead author reports grants, lecture fees and travel from companies including Eli Lilly and Novo Nordisk (paper's own declaration). doi:10.1016/j.dsx.2024.102989 · PMID 39814628
  7. Madhu SV, Kapoor N, Das S, Raizada N, Kalra S. ESI clinical practice guidelines for the evaluation and management of obesity in India: an update (2025). Indian J Endocrinol Metab 2025;29(4):355-65. "Not based on BMI alone" is from its "Concordance with the Lancet Commission" section. doi:10.4103/ijem.ijem_680_25 · PMC12410957
  8. US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. About body mass index (BMI), 16 Dec 2025. cdc.gov

Last checked 5 Oct 2026 · Next review due 5 Oct 2027 · Report an error

How this answer was made. Written by the GLP Guidebook team from the sources above. It's general information, not medical advice. Talk to a qualified doctor before starting, stopping or changing any medicine. How we write