It’s something that most of us want to know, can you eat bananas on keto?
I’m sure you’re aware that you’ll need to limit your carbs on keto.
However, most fruits are typically viewed as healthy food choices.
With that being said, many fruits generally have a high carb content, so you’ll need to be wary of which ones you eat.
This begs the question of whether you can eat bananas while on a keto diet.
Allow me to explain everything you need to know about bananas, keto, and eating fruit.
Bananas aren’t considered keto friendly. On average, a medium-sized banana contains 27g of carbs, the vast majority of which is sugar. Most keto diets call for less than 50g of carbs a day, and some even go as low as 15-30g of carbs. With that being said, if you are especially active and exercise regularly, you can typically consume slightly more carbs without kicking yourself out of ketosis. However, when you consider that many vegetables contain carbs, you’ll need to be wary of your overall carb intake.
1. Why Aren’t Bananas Keto Friendly?
Unfortunately, bananas can’t be considered keto friendly.
The energy provided by bananas mainly comes from carbohydrates, and most of this is sugar.
The keto diet involves dramatically cutting back on carbs, which allows your body to use fat, as opposed to carbs/sugar, as its primary source of energy.
This is known as ketosis.
However, to ensure you stay in ketosis, thus allowing your body to use fat as energy, you will need to limit your carb intake.
The vast majority of keto diets require you to consume less than 50g of carbs a day.
But, depending on your starting point, such as if you are currently extremely overweight or obese, then this could be as low as 15-30g of carbs a day.
Therefore, in some cases, simply eating one banana a day could actually take you over your carbohydrate limit.
This would mean that you may potentially not be able to consume any carbs for the rest of the day.
So, in effect, you wouldn’t be able to eat many vegetables, and your food for the day would need to consist of just protein and fats.
Now, while this may be possible in some cases, you’ll just be making a restrictive diet even more restrictive.
In other words, so you don’t fall foul of excessive carbs and accidentally kick yourself out of ketosis, bananas are best avoided.
2. How Active Are You?
Banana consumption and the keto diet aren’t actually completely cut and dried.
I’ve mentioned that most keto diets call for less than 50g of carbs a day.
However, this does very much depend on your starting point, as well as how active an individual you are.
Let’s say that you regularly exercise for at least 4-5 days a week, and you like to keep yourself active the rest of the time too.
Furthermore, the calories you require to maintain your current weight are fairly high due to your size and activity levels.
In most cases, you would need to keep your daily carb intake to 5-10% of your overall daily calories while on keto.
So, as an active person, your daily maintenance calorie intake could be as high as 3,000 calories, e.g., a 6-foot male who weighs around 180 lbs.
This would mean that up to 300 of your calories could come from carbs.
There are four calories per gram of carbs, so this would mean that you consume 75g of carbs a day.
Therefore, when you consider that a medium-sized banana (approximately 7 inches long) contains 27g of carbs, this would actually fit in quite nicely with your overall carb consumption.
So, I will say that your activity levels (and your overall size) will play a role in whether you can eat bananas on keto.
3. What Fruits Can You Eat on Keto?
When it comes to the keto diet and fruits, you are generally told that it’s best to avoid most of them.
Unfortunately, much like bananas, most fruits are high in carb content, and most of this is sugar.
And as the whole point of ketosis is for your body to burn fat for energy rather than sugar, high-sugar foods are best avoided.
However, this doesn’t mean that you have to completely cut all fruits out of your diet.
The best fruits to eat on keto include raspberries, strawberries, blackberries, and blueberries.
These are all much lower in carb content than bananas.
Plus, the fruit (and yes, it’s a fruit) that is most commonly associated with the keto diet is avocado.
The keto diet calls for 70-80% of your diet to come from healthy fats, and avocados are a fantastic source of healthy unsaturated fats.
I think it’s important to state that bananas in themselves aren’t unhealthy.
However, as the keto diet requires you to limit your carb intake, you’re probably best off avoiding bananas altogether.
Nine Fruits You Can Actually Eat on the Keto Diet
Final Thoughts
So, as you can see, bananas are best avoided on keto.
Bananas aren’t actually unhealthy, but due to their high carb content, they may potentially knock you out of ketosis.
When you consider that a medium-sized banana contains 27g of carbs and some keto diets require you to consume a maximum of 15-30g of carbs a day, it’s easy to see why.
With that being said, your overall size and activity levels may allow you to consume slightly more carbs.
But in truth, if you wish to eat fruits on the keto diet, then it’s best to stick to various berries and avocados.
If you are on a diet, you probably have an exercise regime too, so here’s some helpful advice on eating bananas before running.