How Long It Takes To Digest Food, From Beginning To End

From your first bite to the trip to the bathroom, we got to the bottom of everything you need to know (and likely more) about the inner workings of your digestive system.

"In addition to the macronutrient composition and diversity of your diet and supplements (think prebiotic fibers and targeted probiotics), there is also individual variety from person to person when it comes to GI motility and speed,"* mindbodygreen's Vice President of Scientific Affairs Ashley Jordan Ferira, Ph.D., RDN, explains.

What you eat also affects how quickly the digestion process happens. Here's what to know about how quickly different macronutrients travel through the body:

When you've eaten foods like simple carbohydrates (think sugar or white bread), your body can digest them much more quickly, which is why they do not satiate you as well as more nutrient-dense foods that keep your digestive system busy for longer. "In fact digestion of simple or fast carbs starts straight away in your mouth, whereas fiber and other macronutrients remain intact," Ferira explains.

Fats and proteins move through your body at a slower rate, increasing the amount of time you feel full. "This is because proteins and fats are complex compounds that require more steps to be broken down," notes Burgess. "Fats, in particular, take longer to digest because they don't dissolve in water, which means an additional substance, bile, is needed for their digestion," she adds.

"The fiber content1 of a food impacts how quickly it's digested," explains Burgess. "Foods higher in soluble fiber form a gel-like substance in the stomach, which slows down the digestive process. In contrast, foods high in insoluble fiber speed up the digestive process because they quickly pass unabsorbed into the large intestine, where they add bulk to stool." Both types of fiber are important to consume regularly, explains Ferira.

Here's a peek at the role that different parts of the body play in the digestion process:

Many factors can affect the speed of digestion outside of the foods you're putting into your body, from physical activity to stress. Some of these include:

There are plenty of ways to help keep your digestion ticking along smoothly. Here are a few strategies to start with:

Ferira agrees, adding that, "consuming prebiotic fiber regularly directly fuels postbiotic abundance via fermentation processes in the gut. Not to mention the health benefits the wide array of phytonutrients in fruits and vegetables also deliver."

What's more, they are "antioxidant and anti-inflammatory powerhouse fats, especially the marine-derived EPA and DHA varieties," Ferira explains.

Regular movement and physical activity are great for a number of areas of the body, and digestion just so happens to be one of them. This is because exercise can promote motility in the gut, effectively cutting down on the time it takes for food to move through the body. "Studies show that exercise may improve gut health in many ways," says Burgess.

If your digestion needs a boost of daily support, adding a targeted gut health supplement like mbg's advanced probiotic+ with bloat support can be a smart strategy to help ease bloat, promote regularity, and even aid in making the digestion process that much smoother.*

For this reason, it's important to eat slowly and savor your food so it can move smoothly through your gastrointestinal (GI) tract.

Seeing as digestion is a natural process that everybody completes, it can be useful to understand the ins and outs of what gets things move more smoothly. To aid digestion, focusing on eating a nutrient-dense diet with plenty of fiber. Taking an effective targeted probiotic can also help to move things along, bulk up stool, and support your overall health.*