Does saunas burn calories? If so, how much?

Ok so we all know how to log in our calorie in take and our exercises calories... i wanted to know if saunas burn any calories? of course this is the only form of exercise i do but I'm just curious because i always pop into the sauna after swimming and wanted to know if i should log that in and if so, how much calories? Any ideas? Thanks!

Totally negligible.

Burns pretty much the same number as you would sitting around anywhere else.

I have read different answers on the subject. I've have found some good websites on the subject if you want to do the research yourself. Maybe make your own decision. Too much contridiction on it. There are some sites that say no and some sites that say yes.... Sorry, I know that wasn't much help but here are the sites if you wanna read some of them.

http://www.saunaaa.com/sauna-burns-calories.p hp

http://www.cankar.org/sauna/health/health.htm l

http://www.articlesbase.com/health-articles/d oes-a-sauna-really-help-you-burn-calories-or- is-it-a-myth-306611.html

But this excerpt from one of the articles puts it into the best summary if you don't want to go article reading or if you already have.

"Many sauna companies boldly state that just twenty or thirty minutes inside of their sauna will burn anywhere from three hundred to one thousand calories. This is simply not possible. People are always looking for an easier way to burn calories than exercise, but exercise is the only efficient way to really get rid of calories. Sitting in a sauna for thirty minutes may burn up to three hundred calories, but this type of calorie burn will not have the same effect on your body as the calories burned during exercise.

Calories burnt off while sitting in a sauna are just calories burnt. There is no muscle building, no fat shedding, no after burn (VERY important!) and no muscle strengthening or toning. When you choose to burn calories through exercise, you not only burn more calories, but you also build and tone your muscle, and you get rid of the excess fat on your body. If you choose the right kinds of aerobics exercises, you will also get the added benefit of after burn. After burn is what the body does after you have finished exercising. After burn can burn calories up to fourteen hours after you have stopped exercising."

chocolo..........WOW

Makes you lose some water weight by sweating and opening up the skins pours, plus it good for relaxing and relieving stress and small pains.

thank you so much for that article, I mean i KNEW it wont build muscles and stuff you know, duh hahah but i used to work at this place called bella forme and we had inferred saunas there and they would say it burns 400 calories because it speeds up your heart rate and i always wondered if that was true. but i do agree with how it just relaxes you and gets rid of water weight which is good, thanks hun!

Hey! Okay so most people will tell you that a sauna only makes you sweat and that you lose water weight. However, I have a sauna in like every single one of my houses and I am OBSESSED with them! In the summer, I get really lazy and don't exercise (I know I should) but I just do a 30 minute sauna and work up a nice sweat (make sure that you are sweating intensely) and they keep me skinny...the only muscle being workout on is the heart but keep doing saunas !

Of course saunas burn calories. 

Even when you are sitting at your desk or couch you are burning calories, when you eat you burn calories, and, yes, when you exercise you burn many more calories than when at rest.

A sauna does not burn calories in the same way as exercise because you are not expending energy to move your mass over a distance, like when you go on a run. Nor is it like building muscle, which will increase your metabolism and burn more calories over the long haul.

However, two things do happen when you spend enough time in sauna with X degrees of heat.

First, your heart rate increases in a sauna. If you don't think that you expend more energy with an elevated heart rate then I don't know what to tell you. Take a heart rate monitor into a sauna, check it out for your self.

Second, I have to assume, but I have not verified, that at some point your core body temperature rises. A higher core body temperature increases the rate of moisture evaporation and burns more calories. Same thing happens when we run on a hot humid day. I suppose you can check this with a thermometer.

So if you put all the variables together I suppose you could find out how many calories you actually burn. I have no interest in doing that, but there is no doubt that the energy expenditure is much higher than at rest.