Here is the real percentage of fats in America According to the CDC, the breakdown of Americans in 2014 looked like this when using BMI: As many opponents of BMI point out, it does not take into account people where BMI overestimates their fatness, such as bodybuilders.  According to one study, approximately 5% of individuals classified as overweight and 0.2% of those classified as obese by BMI actually had low levels of fat.  So let's do a little math: 33.1 * 0.05 = 1.655% 36.4 * 0.002 = 0.0728% When we adjust the metrics to take into account bodybuilders, the statistics become: These are the real numbers, according to those who criticize BMI for overestimating fatness. The problem with these numbers is that they are fatlogic. While these people take into consideration the fact that BMI overestimates fatness for some people, they fail to include the fact that it also underestimates fatness for others.  According to the same study, 29% of subjects classified as lean and 80% of individuals classified as overweight according to BMI had a BF% within the obesity range. Let's do some more math: 30.5% * 0.29 = 8.845% 33.1% * 0.8 =  26.48% That means in 2014, about 76.7% of Americans were fat according to bodyfat percentage, a whopping 7.2% a higher than what the BMI claims.  And the numbers are even higher now because the data is 2 years old. Disgusting!