The short version: almost everything widely reported about how Adele lost weight was wrong, and she said so herself. She did not follow the Sirtfood diet. She did not do intermittent fasting. She has said she ate more than before, not less. The change happened over roughly two years, not overnight, and by her own account it was never about losing weight in the first place.
This article separates what Adele has actually said in on-record interviews from what was attributed to her by tabloids and by people she says she has never met. If you came here looking for her diet plan, the honest answer is that there isn’t one.
What Adele Actually Said
In her November 2021 British Vogue cover interview and in her televised conversation with Oprah Winfrey the same month, Adele gave a consistent account: the training started as a response to anxiety following her divorce, not as a weight-loss project.
She described severe anxiety attacks during that period, and said that exercise was the thing that reliably interrupted them. Her framing to Vogue was blunt — “It was because of my anxiety” — and she has repeatedly said the weight change was a side effect of the training rather than its purpose.
Her trainer, Gregg Miele, gave Vogue the same account: the programme was built around strength, not fat loss. Adele has described progressing from deadlifting around 10 pounds to roughly 170, and training two or three times a day during the most intense period.
The Sirtfood Diet Claim Was Never True
This is the most persistent piece of misinformation attached to her name, and it is worth tracing because it shows how celebrity diet stories actually get made.
In early 2020, a Los Angeles trainer told a UK tabloid that Adele had slimmed down using the Sirtfood diet, and estimated that around 90% of the change came from dieting. That single interview was syndicated worldwide. Sirtfood book sales rose. The claim became “fact” through repetition alone.
Adele addressed it directly to British Vogue in November 2021 and rejected it outright, along with intermittent fasting, adding that she eats more than she used to because of how hard she trains. She was notably sharp about the people publicly claiming to have trained her, saying she had never met them.
She has mentioned reducing sugar and giving up smoking, but has never published a meal plan, endorsed a diet brand, or partnered with a weight-loss company — which is unusual, and worth noting when you see her name attached to a product.
The Timeline Everyone Got Wrong
The change looked sudden because of a single Instagram photo in May 2020. It wasn’t. Adele has said the process ran across roughly two years, and she believes the perceived abruptness is exactly why the reaction was so extreme.
Two years is a genuinely slow rate of change. Spread across that period, it is far less dramatic than the before-and-after framing suggests — and far more consistent with what the research says actually holds. Rapid loss has poor long-term retention; gradual change built on a habit you would keep doing anyway performs considerably better. See sustainable weight loss and why rapid approaches rebound.
The Part She Was Honest About, and Most Coverage Left Out
Adele has openly acknowledged that her circumstances made this possible in a way they are not for most people. She was not working during that period. She had money, time, and daily access to a personal trainer. Training two or three times a day is not a schedule available to someone working full-time with children.
That acknowledgement is the most useful thing in the entire story, and it is the part that almost never survives into the “how she did it” articles. Any celebrity transformation you read about comes with an invisible support structure attached: chefs, trainers, flexible schedules, and sometimes medical supervision. Comparing your progress to theirs without accounting for that is comparing two different experiments.
Does Exercise Actually Help Anxiety?
This is the genuinely evidence-backed part of the story, and it is the part worth taking seriously.
Exercise has consistent trial support as a treatment for mild-to-moderate anxiety and depression. Proposed mechanisms include improved regulation of the HPA axis (the system governing cortisol), increased brain-derived neurotrophic factor, better sleep quality, and the behavioural effect of having a predictable structure to the day — which is close to what Adele described when she talked about workouts giving her a sense of purpose during an unstructured period.
Two caveats matter. For moderate-to-severe anxiety or depression, exercise is an adjunct, not a replacement for therapy or medication. And the effective dose is much lower than two or three sessions a day — consistency beats volume, and moderate activity most days outperforms occasional extremes.
More on this in our Mental Health Guide and the effects of regular exercise on mental health.
The Backlash, and What It Revealed
A significant portion of the response to Adele’s changed appearance was not celebration but anger — from people who felt she had abandoned a body-positive position by changing her body at all.
Her answer was that she was body-positive before and remains so, that her body has been publicly scrutinised for her entire career in both directions, and that validating other people’s feelings about their own bodies was not a job she could take on.
The episode is a reasonable illustration of something clinically relevant: public commentary about body weight, particularly aimed at women, has measurable effects on body image and disordered eating risk in the people reading it — not only in the person being discussed.
What Actually Transfers
Not the schedule, and not a meal plan that never existed. What genuinely generalises from this story is narrower and more useful:
- Train for something that isn’t weight. Adele’s stated goal was managing anxiety and getting strong. Goals tied to capability rather than the scale tend to survive longer, because progress is visible even in weeks when weight doesn’t move.
- Strength training counts. Her programme was resistance-based, not endless cardio.
- Slow is the feature, not the failure. Two years is the realistic timescale. Anything marketed as dramatically faster is usually either temporary or something else entirely.
- Be sceptical of any diet attached to a famous name. The Sirtfood story ran globally for over a year on the word of one person the subject says she never met.
If you are considering changing your own eating or training, a clinician or registered dietitian who knows your history is a better starting point than any celebrity account, including this one.
Frequently Asked Questions
Did Adele use the Sirtfood diet?
No. She denied it directly to British Vogue in 2021, along with intermittent fasting, and said she has not followed any diet.
How much weight did Adele lose?
Around 100 pounds is the figure widely reported in the press. Adele has not built her own account around a number, and has consistently said the weight was not the point.
How long did it take?
Roughly two years. It appeared sudden only because the public saw a single photo in May 2020 rather than the process.
What did her workouts involve?
Primarily weightlifting and circuit training with trainer Gregg Miele, plus hiking, at up to two or three sessions a day during the most intense phase. That volume reflects her circumstances at the time and is not a general recommendation.
Sources
- British Vogue, November 2021 cover interview
- Adele One Night Only, CBS interview with Oprah Winfrey, November 2021
- National Institute of Mental Health — Anxiety Disorders
- National Institute of Mental Health — Eating Disorders
Reviewed by: the HealthCoachJP Editorial Team | Last updated: July 2026 | Related: Mental Health Guide | Weight Loss Guide
Note: this article reports publicly available statements and is not a diet or training plan. It is for general information only and is not medical advice. If you are struggling with food, exercise or body image, the National Alliance for Eating Disorders helpline is staffed by licensed clinicians: 1-866-662-1235.
