10 Worst Testosterone Killers (Avoid at All Costs!)

Here’s the truth. You could be doing everything right in the gym and not see results. Literally.  You could be following the perfect program and hitting all of your numbers. At the same time, you’re nailing all of your macros and calories on a daily basis as well as taking the right supplements.

However, even if you’re doing this, you could still have issues with seeing results. This could include slow progress, small levels of growth or even no results at all! What could this possibly be? Low testosterone! And this video is going to go over 10 major testosterone killers that you need to avoid.

But stick around as we’re also going to give you tips on what you need to do to maximize your testosterone levels! Testosterone is the male’s primary sex hormone and is an extremely powerful compound.

As such,  your levels can have a massive effect on your ability to put on mass and increase strength. Unfortunately, low testosterone has become more common in society and its effects reach much farther than mitigating muscle growth and strength. In fact, even though most people associate testosterone with muscle growth, low testosterone can even cause an increase in body fat!

Depression, sleep, fatigue and  sexual performance are just a few of the other areas of a man’s life which could take a hit! Now men’s testosterone levels can vary quite a bit naturally. This simply means that every guy isn’t going to similar levels. For reference, men’s natural testosterone levels range from 300-1000 ng/ml. This range can vary depending on who you ask but that’s average.

Now within this range, 450-600 ng/ml is considered normal with anything higher being “high” normal  while anything lower is “low” normal. However, regardless of your personal range,  it’s always in your best interest to try and maximize and maintain your levels.

With that said, there are quite a few behaviors that are relatively common which may be decreasing your levels; these are 10 things that you can control and can change.  Therefore, if you want to maximize your natural testosterone levels, you got to knock these out! This should come as no surprise but drinking alcohol doesn’t really do you any favors in terms  of your health.

It adds empty calories and may result in a hangover and is number 1 on our list! At the same time, it can also unfortunately decrease your testosterone levels. It appears to occur as alcohol as a toxin to your Leydig cells; these are the cells responsible for producing testosterone.

As your Leydig cells are damaged, testosterone levels drop. One study found that healthy men drinking a pint of whiskey a day caused their testosterone levels to drop to that of alcoholics in just 30 days.

This suggests it takes 30 days of drinking a pint per day to have your levels significantly affected by alcohol equalling low-normal or low levels. Now having just, a couple drinks once in a while probably isn’t going to cause any massive detrimental effects.

However,  it’s not going to do you any good either. Unfortunately, it’s difficult to say exactly how  much you can have and not experience a negative effect but moderation is always your best bet. If all this wasn’t enough, alcohol can disrupt your sleep.

And it just so happens that lack of sleep is the number 2 testosterone killer! Sleep may be the number one variable in health and training that negatively impacts a person’s health, body composition or performance. If you get enough sleep, you’ll optimize all of those variables. On the other hand, if you cut your sleep short, you can negatively impact all of them. As you could probably guess, this relationship also applies to your testosterone levels.

One of the more notable studies was performed in 2011. Researchers wanted to examine the effect of sleep restriction on young men. For 8 consecutive nights, the participants’ sleep was reduced to only 5 hours a night. At the conclusion of the study, these men saw a 15% reduction in their testosterone levels.

What strikes us is that this occurred relatively quickly, especially considering that 5 hours of  sleep isn’t that low relative to what many people get these days.

Now we should note that not all studies have come to this conclusion. So, while researchers still aren’t 100% on the relationship that exists between sleep and testosterone level, the research definitely leans towards lack of sleep causing a lack of testosterone.

For example, one other study from 2014, examined the effects of long-term sleep deprivation in professional drivers. This group was chosen due to their long hours which usually results in lack of sleep. As you could guess, these drivers tested for low levels of testosterone.

In the control group, men had testosterone levels of 650 ng/ml while the drivers had testosterone levels equal to just 63% of that at 410 ng/ml. That is not anabolic! However, this study also examined one other variable in men with low testosterone.

This  variable also happens to be our next testosterone killer, number 3 is lack of exercise! Well actually, not even specifically exercise but simply lack of physical  activity.

Due to the way life has evolved, a surprising amount of  individuals live a sedentary life and it does nothing good for you. Living a sedentary life and lack of physical activity is the easiest,  modifiable factor that affects our health including testosterone levels.  As we just saw in the study with drivers, the result is not good. Unfortunately for those who aren’t too keen on the gym or getting their sweat on, there are plenty of other studies that show this. In addition, men’s testosterone to cortisol ratio is greater when they are regularly active rather than non-active.

Cortisol is the opposing hormone to testosterone and is catabolic in nature giving it the ability to break down muscle. Therefore  you want this level to be low as well to create an anabolic environment. This means that theoretically, if you had high testosterone levels but really high cortisol levels, the catabolic effects could still overpower the anabolic effect.

The exact  mechanism is much more complicated than that but you get the point;  you want high testosterone levels and low cortisol levels. In fact, in 2016, a study examined the effect of several different variables and its effect on the testosterone levels of obese men.

The study found that regular exercise did more to increase testosterone levels than even losing weight! With that said, your weight can also be a detrimental variable to  your testosterone levels. Next on our list of testosterone levels is obesity at number 4! Obesity has been running rampant all across the USA for quite a while now. Currently, 42% of adults are obese and 73.6% are overweight! This by itself brings a host of medical issues including increased risk of cancer, heart disease, diabetes and mortality! It also brings the risk of lowering your testosterone. It’s been estimated that obese men have testosterone levels that are 30% lower  than men at a normal weight. What’s even more is there seems to be a direct relationship with BMI  and testosterone levels; specifically, every 1 point higher in BMI equals a 2% decrease.

Now we know that BMI has its flaws and all, especially when evaluating athletes. Their higher  levels of muscle mass can skew BMI readings, making them appear overweight or even obese.  However, that’s not the only measurement that has been found to correlate with testosterone levels;  we’re talking about your waistline! A 2008 study of 1,862 men aged 30 or  older found that a four-inch increase in waist size increased a man’s odds of having a low  testosterone level by 75%! For comparison, aging 10 years was only associated with a 36% increase!

However, even if you’re of a normal weight, your diet can still have a  significant effect on your diet. Number 5 is a poor and restrictive diet. Now there are quite a few different compounds and specific foods that can affect your testosterone levels. We can’t think of a better study that illustrates this other than a 2021 study on whole eggs and egg whites! Yep, it’s that simple!

So these researchers wanted to examine how removing the yolk out of an egg could  affect men on a resistance training program.

They took two groups of men and had them perform the  same exact training program. In addition, their diet was tracked with one difference; the eggs. One group ate whole eggs post workout while the other group consumed only egg whites post workout; protein and total calories were equated for and equal. After 12 weeks of training, the group that consumed whole eggs had greater loss in body fat and body fat percentage.

At the same time, they also had greater strength gains. However, what we’re concerned about is their testosterone levels which increased as well! Why would this be? Well, testosterone is a cholesterol-based hormone and as the yolk in an egg is full of cholesterol, it causes an increase! In fact, similar mechanisms have been suggested to occur with men who follow the  keto diet or other diet high-fat diets.

As these men consume more cholesterol, it’s suggested to be one of the mechanisms which results in higher testosterone levels. Now that’s just one food that can make a difference but there are many others. For example, soy protein. A study from 2007 investigated what would happen if healthy, 30-year-old men began to swap some of their daily protein intake with a typical soy protein powder; specifically, 56 grams.

After 2 weeks, testosterone levels dropped by 19%!

What’s really interesting is that 2 weeks after cessation of supplementation, their testosterone levels returned to baseline! Similar claims have  been made towards veganism as a whole, however, studies aren’t as conclusive as some may have  you believe. At the same time, a vegan diet is most likely not better for your hormone levels. Another major group of foods is simply processed and fried foods  such as junk food. None of this is good for your testosterone levels.

But still, putting the food aside, there’s another issue you need to be  concerned with when looking at your diet; your calories! We’ll explore that next at number 6. Cutting your calories is a must for anyone looking to cut some weight. However,  cutting too much for too long can also cut your testosterone levels. For example, one research study followed a group of young men performing a long march  for 14 days.

Due to the marching, their caloric need was around 6,670 calories yet they were only  consuming 3,600 calories. As a result, they saw a significant decrease in their testosterone levels. Now remember earlier in the video where we talked about cortisol levels. Well, significant calorie restriction can also increase your cortisol levels which further magnifies the response.

However, there are some studies that suggest this may primarily happen in men with normal or healthy weight.

There was a large review released in 2022 that examined how calorie restriction affects the testosterone levels of men. They found that calorie restriction did affect testosterone levels of the men. However, the effect depends on if the men were overweight or of normal weight. If the men  were of normal weight, the testosterone levels did drop. However, if the men were overweight,  the testosterone levels actually saw an increase!

In fact, this relationship has been seen in other studies. For example,  a study was using a keto-based low caloric diet in obese men and again, their testosterone increased. This seems to suggest that a drop in weight is a more powerful influence on testosterone levels than low calories.

Therefore, you should first worry about dropping weight. However,  once you drop enough weight, or if you’re already at a healthy weight, you should still be careful with too extreme of a calorie restriction.

One other thing calorie restriction causes is an increase in stress! At number 7,  high stress can be an instant testosterone killer! In fact, stress’s detrimental effect on testosterone has been known for decades;  for example, this study drew a relationship all the way back in 1972! Most of the negative effects on testosterone seem to occur by way of its effects on cortisol. For example, one mechanism suggested is cortisol’s interaction with the glucocorticoid receptor.

When cortisol is increased, the glucocorticoid receptor can join other hormones including androgens such as testosterone which inhibits its effects and decreases testosterone level.

Regardless, there seems to be pretty clear evidence of this relationship whatever the mechanism. For example, a study tested the testosterone levels of 52 skydivers during  a 5-day intensive training program. Who knew? Jumping out of an airplane over and over and over can be stressful!

In fact, the hormonal changes were substantial including the decrease of testosterone levels by 46%, IGF-1 by 28%, and SHBG by 25%! We’ve already spoken about how low calories can decrease your testosterone levels as well as being overweight.

However, we should also add that number 8 on our list of testosterone killers is being too lean! Yes,  having too low of body fat can also cause your testosterone levels to plummet! Being too lean can dramatically increase cortisol levels due to the added stress  as well having lower levels of body fat.

The easiest way to see these phenomena play out is within the world of natural bodybuilding; emphasis on “natural”. When bodybuilders are preparing for a competition, they place their body under tremendous stress by training and eating low-calorie diets to reach a very low body fat.

There was a case study that followed a natural bodybuilder through his preparation for a contest. By the time he had reached the day for his meet after six months of prep, his testosterone levels dropped 75%! We should note that this is an extreme example and there’s a lot going on, but you need to understand that fat plays It’s important to note that after his competition, he resumed a normal diet and training regime which was accompanied with his testosterone returning to his base levels.

This underscores the profound impact that such rigorous training and dieting  regimens can have on hormonal balance. It’s important for athletes to closely collaborate  with experienced professionals, including coaches and medical experts, to monitor  their health and make adjustments as necessary to mitigate potential negative consequences. Now assuming you’re of a healthy weight with a proper diet, you’re not out of the woods yet.  In fact, number 9 on our list is very common. While resistance training can be an awesome  testosterone booster, training too hard and too much can actually be a testosterone killer!

When we train, we are naturally stressing the body which causes an increase in cortisol.  There’s no way around this; it’s even true if you’re just lifting heavy weights.

However, when you are eating a proper number of calories and giving yourself enough recovery, production of testosterone and muscle protein synthesis ultimately outweighs any catabolic processes and keeps a proper testosterone to cortisol balance. The problem is when you train too hard and too often, you are causing your body to  be constantly stressed. As a result, your testosterone will drop and stay low while  your cortisol levels remain elevated.

While this can happen with any type of training,  it is especially common with endurance training such as long runs. This is brought on by the  excessive amount of exercise some serious endurance athletes perform. What’s ironic is that when speaking about serious runners, it’s been suggested that  this hormone imbalance can actually benefit them as it will break down unneeded muscle.  If some researchers are saying there’s actually a benefit from this for runners as it causes muscle breakdown, you can be sure it’s not good for anyone wanting to maintain muscle mass.

Now we are not hating on endurance training and cardio as you need it; it should just be kept in check.

At the same time, be sure to maintain proper rest and recovery with your weight training. And do not fall into the trap of thinking rest days aren’t needed!  If you train every day or too much, your testosterone levels will suffer! And number 10 on our list, various drugs, some legal and others illegal,  can ultimately result in a drop in testosterone.

There are quite a few and can include drugs for hypertension as well as beta-blockers, antidepressants and medications for anxiety. This is especially important for opioid users as opioid use and abuse is on the rise in the USA.  Now abuse of opioids presents a plethora of harmful and dangerous side effects.

In addition, long-term opioid abuse has been found to decrease testosterone by 50%. This  appears to be caused by numerous types of opioid and can affect those who are  prescribed as well as those taking recreationally. Now this can differ depending on the medicine and the individual.

For example,  a 2021 review on anti-depressants found a mixture of results. Therefore,  if low testosterone is a concern of yours, you should always check  on your specific medications and its possible effects before taking them. And so those are the top 10 ways you could be killing your testosterone. How many are you  guilty of? Well, the good thing is that while we know these can decrease your testosterone levels,  we can simply reverse them to increase your testosterone.

Most of these can be reversed simply by doing the opposite! The best way to increase your testosterone is to clean up your diet, don’t partake in restrictive diets, get plenty of sleep, follow a well-structured strength training program and get plenty of sleep. Keep your alcohol intake to a minimum and increase your daily activity. Do that and you’ll be able to maintain optimal levels!

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