The beginning of the year is often a time during which people try new things. Diets and fitness tend to be prevalent at the start of each year. Not all diets are the same; there are different types and many of them are vastly different in their results.

Change can often be daunting, especially when it comes to cutting off foods that have become part of one’s daily life. One way to make this task seem less challenging is by beginning with a commercial diet plan. There are many different options, each with their own variety of foods and systems to help with losing weight.

One popular example is Weight Watchers, which allows its users to manage their food via a point system. Weight Watchers is often used as a way to get acclimated to dieting because it allows people to eat whatever they like with only one criterion: they must stay within their daily limit of points.

“It really allowed me to look at what I was eating and portion sizes,” physical education teacher Julia Weida said. “I think that what made it work was the fact that I didn’t feel like I was dieting. I wasn’t limited to anything, it just opened my eyes to what I put into my body.”

While Weight Watchers is one popular commercial diet, there are many others. Most use their own styles and ideologies to promote weight loss; while Weight Watchers uses a point system, some companies such as Nutrisystem have a specific food regimen to follow. Nutrisystem allows its users to choose from a variety of foods that they then send to the users in order to promote efficient portion control.

Both of these diets use different methods in order to help people reach their health and weight loss goals.

No diet will have a large impact on one’s health unless it is paired with physical fitness. Fitness may look different for each individual depending on what their goals are, but finding a well-balanced nutrition plan is essential to achieving one’s goals.

“They definitely go hand in hand,” Weida said.  “You can’t necessarily just exercise or just diet, you have to have both of them.”

Another diet that has recently been growing in popularity is the ketogenic diet. US News explains that this diet works by allowing your body to enter a state of ketosis. Ketosis is when the body begins to break down stored body fat in order to produce ketones. Ketones are the main source of energy for the body. This diet allows the body to rely on fat for energy instead of sugar. On the ketogenic diet, people drastically reduce the amount of carbohydrates they consume in order to enter ketosis.

“Keto doesn’t focus so much on proportion because you’re eating so much fat and protein,” owner of Punch Fit Gym John Hunter said. “What ends up happening is you feel fuller longer, so you don’t necessarily have to track what you’re doing.”

One diet that has begun to spread across the globe is the Mediterranian diet. US News rated it as the best diet overall, the easiest diet to follow and the best diet for healthy eating. It is characterized by a high consumption of vegetables, fruits, nuts, grains, seafood, and olive oil, as well as a moderate consumption of eggs, poultry, cheese and yogurt. One thing people find appealing about this diet is that it is not heavily structured; the Mediterranean diet is a simple eating pattern. Much like Weight Watchers, it allows people to choose their own foods and determine what will be best for them. This looser structure may be beneficial for those who are not looking for a dramatic change and wish to have large control over the kinds of foods they consume.

Even though people just think of eating healthy when they think of dieting, in reality diets come in many different forms. There are varied results for different diets. When trying to get healthy, it’s important for a person to choose the diet that works best for them individually.