The New Weight Watchers

Weight Watchers

The Promise

Pasta, steak, cheese, ice cream... You can eat what you want on Weight Watchers. While the popular weight-loss plan has been revamped, the basic principle of eating what you love remains -- though the program steers you toward healthier foods with its points system.

In its new program, called Beyond the Scale, fitness also takes a bigger role. You'll be encouraged to move more every day.

Weight Watchers isn’t so much a diet as a lifestyle change program. It can help you learn how to eat healthier and get more physical activity, so you lose the weight for good.

You can follow the plan online on your own. You'll track your food choices and exercise, chart progress, and find recipes and workouts. There’s a coaching option if you prefer one-on-one consultations by phone, email, and text. Or you can go to in-person group meetings, where you’ll weigh in.

A Consumer Reports survey found that people who went to meetings were more satisfied with the program and lost more weight than people who used only the online tools.

What You Can Eat and What You Can't

No food is forbidden when you follow this plan, which doesn’t make you buy any prepackaged meals.

Weight Watchers assigns different foods a SmartPoints value, which replaces its long-standing PointsPlus plan. The concept is the same, though. Nutritious foods that fill you up have fewer points than junk with empty calories. But the eating plan now factors sugar, fat, and protein into its points calculations to steer you toward fruits, veggies, and lean protein, and away from stuff that's high in sugar and saturated fat.

You’ll have a SmartPoints target that's set up based on your body and goals. As long as you stay within your daily target, you can spend those SmartPoints, however, you’d like, even on alcohol or dessert.

But healthier, lower-calorie foods cost fewer points.

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