Losing weight is hard work. No matter which diet or fitness routine you decide to implement, you need the right advice from trusted sources and the sheer will to stick to your plans. These sites and apps provide the knowledge and motivation to lose weight and keep it off.

1. Fat2Lose (Web): Reliable Guide of Essential Information Towards Weight Loss

Fat2Lose is a free collection of reliable and actionable tips about weight loss, based on studies, experts, and one person's weight loss journey

The internet overwhelms you with different websites, articles, and tips on how to lose weight quickly. Still, you have to wonder how reliable and effective these are. You aren't the first to struggle with which resource to trust. Another such netizen got tired of sifting through all the unreliable data to find "actionable, no-bullshit tips" and put them all on one free website.

At Fat2Lose, the idea is to focus on those two key principles of weight loss: motivation and knowledge. It's broadly divided into sections for a weight loss checklist, turning bad habits into good ones, understanding how your body works, books to read for weight loss, fitness apps to burn fat, different types of diets, supplements to enhance your health, exercises that are sustainable, and smart devices to track your weight loss.

Each section has reliable data personally curated by the author based on studies, books, people's experiences, and the author's journey in losing 45 lbs of weight. None of the advice here is revolutionary. But the aim isn't to tell you something you didn't know before; it's to tell you that this is all that matters, and you can ignore the fad diets and trendy short-term advice you often read on blogs.

2. Psychology of Eating (Ebook): 4-Part Ebook Series to Understand Why and How You Eat

The Institute of Psychology of Eating's 4-part ebook series explains how and why you eat, as well as your relationship with food

Your weight is directly related to how you consume food. And we all have a unique relationship with food, which has formed over years of subconscious behavior. The Institute of Psychology of Eating wants to help you understand why and how you eat, to break away from unhealthy patterns and habits.

To get you started, founder Marc David, along with other food psychology experts, has put together a 4-part ebook series along with complementary videos. It's completely free with each part sent in an installment after you finish the previous one.

The first book tackles seven principles of food psychology and how body image and metabolism affect you. The second book dives into the science behind why you need to pay more attention to how you eat. The third book offers practical advice to implement what you've learned into making behavioral changes. The fourth book is more of a sales pitch to join the organization; you can ignore it if you want to.

3. Libra (Android) and Happy Scale (iOS): Track Weight in Wholesome, Non-Guilt Ways

Your weight loss journey needs regular weigh-ins to check your progress. But the thing is, our weight fluctuates because of several normal day-to-day factors. It can be disheartening to see the scale tick up even when you've been on your best behavior for two days. In such cases, it's easy to lose track of the actual progress you've made so far. That's the fallacy these two apps are trying to fix.

Both Libra and Happy Scale show your weight trend, rather than jotting the exact number on a daily graph. Their algorithms want to motivate you rather than dishearten or alarm you. For example, if your scale is high today, the app will use a point in the past to compare it with, so you get a realistic and happier judgment of your progress. Unlike many other apps, they also avoid judgmental words to spur you on, as well-intentioned as they might be. In a nutshell, it's weight tracking for those who want good data without feeling guilty.

You can also set long-term and short-term weight goals to track your progress and count milestones. Happy Scale also includes a "Prediction" meter to show when you're likely to meet your goals based on your current trends or if your weight loss trend were to change slightly. They're truly among the best weight loss apps you should install.

Download: Libra for Android (Free)

Download: Happy Scale for iOS (Free)

4. Snapsie (iOS) and Body Tracker (Android): Selfie Progress Pictures to See Weight Loss

On those days when your scale is showing a higher weight, and you aren't happy with the image in the mirror, you need that extra bit of motivation to keep going. But do you remember what the image in the mirror was when you started your weight loss journey? Snapsie and Body Tracker remember.

These apps encourage you to take regular selfies to track how your body has changed. You must have seen these progress pics posted online before, but if you're not confident in your body, you might hesitate to click selfies. Both Snapsie and Body Tracker are no-judgment, private spaces — you don't have to share it with anyone if you don't want to. And yes, they offer password protection so someone else won't accidentally see them.

Body Tracker's best feature is to track different parts of your body. You don't have to take a single selfie, you can take multiple photos of different parts like your belly, arms, hips, etc.

In Snapsie, you can choose to take a photo with an overlay of your previous picture. That way, you compare selfies a lot better since they're the same dimensions.

Download: Body Tracker for Android (Free)

Download: Snapsie for iOS (Free)

5. Weighlos (Android, iOS): Motivate Friends to Meet Weight Goals Together

Studies have shown that you are more likely to meet your goals and stay on track with good habits if you do it as a group. Weighlos is one of the best social fitness apps to set weight loss targets with friends and motivate each other to achieve them as a group.

The group creator can set a weekly goal, in kilograms/pounds or percentages. The percentage-based idea is pretty cool, letting users keep their weights private and protected while still sharing their progress with the group. But it's not necessarily always the fairest approach, so you should talk with your group and decide the best type of goal for you all as a collective.

Speaking of talking with the group, Weighlos has an integrated chat app to message each other. And you'll also see your individual and group statistics and trends. You can also join multiple groups.

Weighlos is privacy-friendly and doesn't sell your data to third parties. In fact, it's also completely ad-free even in the free version.

Download: Weighlos for Android | iOS (Free)

Diet Beats Exercise for Weight Loss

This combination of knowledge and motivation, available in various ways through these sites and apps, is essential to sustain your weight loss journey. You probably know that weight loss is a function of consuming fewer calories than you expend. But so you might be tempted to burn extra calories through exercise.

But multiple studies and meta-analyses of studies have shown that diet matters more than exercise when it comes to weight loss. Now, there isn't a single diet that is better than others, and it'll be up to the individual. What matters is choosing one that you stick to. As nutritional biochemist, Shawn H. Talbott says, "You can't out-exercise a bad diet."