Yo,
Greetings to the new faces, or welcome back to the regular faces. It’s good to have you here. Hopefully you’ve all been pushing yourselves and working to keep yourself healthy.
We turn our attention today to the time duration of protein powder. Specifically to the question, “how long does protein powder last?”. It’s a standard question, and therefore can be given a standard answer.
However, as with many things, there are a few things you’ve got to consider.
You may be asking this question because you’re a first time protein buyer.
Hey, you may even be asking this question out of pure curiosity.
Whatever it may be, we’ll explore the answer to this question.
Of course, if you want a very straightforward answer, I suggest checking alongside the bag or emailing wherever you purchased the protein powder from. Simply asking something along the lines of “when does this expire?” or “how long would this last for?” Should suffice.
If you want a straight answer, as in a literal time span, I’ll say this: I’ve found that a protein powder’s shelf life is around 1-2 years.
Your Usage
“It depends on your circumstances”
I bet you’re tired of hearing that answer to many of your questions. It can sound bland, but you know what…
It’s true.
It’s certainly true for protein powder. Think about it, if you use three serving of protein powder a week, and there are 33 servings in one size, then that equates to your protein powder lasting 11 weeks. This is just shy of three months.
You can apply some basic maths to figure it out (we’ll do this more later).
Furthermore, there may be days or other periods where your usage fluctuates. You may find yourself in situations where you require more protein powder than usual. This may be because you missed a meal earlier and need a quick top up. On top of this, you may be in a rush in the morning and decide to have a protein shake.
Differently though, you can also find yourself in situations where you need or choose to use less than usual. Maybe you’re sick and not feeling hungry at all. Your appetite may be completely gone.
Maybe you’re having breakfast at a cafe and downed a bunch of eggs benedict’s. It’s unlikely that you’d have access to protein powder and would even need it at that point (so many eggs).
Maybe you’ve gone on holiday and you’ve left your protein powder at home.
Whatever situation you find yourself in, life’s weird man, so your usage may change.
As I’m writing this, I’ve just thought of another reason as to why the amount of protein powder you use may change.
Recipes. There are many high protein powder recipes that you may come across. You may love them.
As a result of this, some of them may require a bit more protein powder than what you are used to and thus, affect how long it will last.
I hope our initial answer (that “it depends on your circumstances”) is starting to have some validity to you now.
If you’re using more than usual, then it’ll last for a shorter amount of time. If you’re using less, then it’ll last for a longer amount of time.
Just with a car and it’s tank of fuel.
Size
We’ll apply a bit of maths here.
Let’s say your protein powder is 2kg, or better yet for mathematical purposes, we’ll say it has 65 servings.
Let’s also say for example, that you use 5 servings a week. To figure out how long the protein powder will last (based off these factors) will be calculated by doing 65 divided by 5.
This comes down to 13. This means that at this rate, the protein powder will last you 13 weeks.
Let’s do another example. Imagine that you use 8 servings a week. To figure out how long the protein powder will last, the calculation will be 65 divided by 8.
This comes down to 8.125 weeks, so essentially 8 weeks.
Pretty simple, yeah?
The formula is simply: Serving amount per size divided by amount of servings that you consume in a week.
I would also like to address something. I wouldn’t be surprised if you’re wondering why we’re using servings per week instead of servings per day. Or maybe servings for month.
It’s not a complicated answer to be honest. I just decided on servings per week because it’s my preferred.
Of course, you could just do total serving amount per size divided by serving amount a day. That is simple too and it’s completely viable.
Just pick whichever you want. The purpose is to give you guidance on how you can mathematically calculate your estimated time span with protein powder.
So, the size certainly is very important. What size you choose to get, whether it is 1kg, 2kg, 2.5, and all the way up to 5kg, will impact how long it will last for.
My experience
Quite frankly, I’ve never finished a protein powder past it’s expiration date. I’ve always finished it within.
This is probably because I normally have one serving a day and buy sizes only up to 2.5kg.
It’s important to remember that the shelf life is around 1-2 years man. So I’ve never had the issue of consuming it past it’s expiration date.
Moreover, in terms of how long it actually stays on the shelf, it’s about 1-2 months. This is most likely due to the fact that I have one serving a day and recently, the sizes have been only 1kg.
What about for you?
For most people, including yourself reading, I believe that the protein would last around 1-4 months MAX. I doubt that most people’s protein powder would last beyond that time span.
Most people who buy it use it quite frequently and opt for around 1 to 2.5kg in size. Then again, if it lasts longer than what I am predicting, that’s not a problem at all. I’m just making a prediction from what I know and understand.
Finishing…
So today, you got a short answer and a longer answer.
If you made it to this point, that means you were interested in the long answer, and I’m appreciative of the fact you read on.
Truly, I hope this was of some use to you and gained something from it.
I hope to see you again my fellow student.
