How much should newborns gain

Your Newborn's Growth (for Parents)

From your baby's first day, doctors will keep track of weight, length, and head size. Growth is a good indicator of general health. Babies who are growing well are generally healthy, while poor growth can be a sign of a problem.

How Big Are Newborns?

Newborns come in a range of healthy sizes. Most babies born between 37 and 40 weeks weigh somewhere between 5 pounds, 8 ounces (2,500 grams) and 8 pounds, 13 ounces (4,000 grams).

Newborns who are lighter or heavier than the average baby are usually fine. But they might get extra attention from the doctors and nurses after delivery to make sure there are no problems.

Different things can affect a baby's size at birth. The length of the pregnancy is important. Babies born around their due date or later tend to be larger than those born earlier.

Other factors include:

• Size of parents. Big and tall parents may have larger-than-average newborns; short and petite parents may have smaller-than-average newborns.
• Multiple births. If you have twins, triplets, or more, you can count on your babies being a bit small. Multiples have to share their growing space in the uterus, and they're often born early, which leads to small size at birth.
• Birth order. First babies are sometimes smaller than brothers or sisters born later.
• Gender. Girls tend to be smaller, boys larger, but the differences are slight at birth.
• Mom's health during pregnancy. Things that can lead to a lower birth weight include a mother with high blood pressure or heart problems; or one who used cigarettes, alcohol, or illegal drugs during the pregnancy. If the mother has diabetes or is obese, the baby may have a higher birth weight.
• Nutrition during pregnancy. Good nutrition is vital for a baby's growth — before and after birth. A poor diet during pregnancy can affect how much a newborn weighs and how the infant grows. Gaining a lot of weight can make a baby more likely to be born bigger than average.
• Baby's health. Medical problems, including some birth defects and some infections during the pregnancy, can affect a child's birth weight and later growth.

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What About Preemies?

Premature babies generally are smaller and weigh less than other newborns. A preemie's weight will largely depend on how early he or she was born. The time an infant missed being in the womb was growing time, so the baby has to do that growing after birth.

Many pre-term babies are classified as having "low birth weight" or "very low birth weight." In medical terms:

• Low birth weight means a baby weighs less than 5 pounds, 8 ounces (2,500 grams) at birth. That's the case for about 1 in every 12 babies in the United States, so it's quite common.
• Very low birth weight means a baby weighs less than 3 pounds, 5 ounces (1,500 grams).

Most babies with low birth weight or very low birth weight were born prematurely.

Premature babies get special medical attention right away after they're born. A specialist called a neonatologist may help care for them. Many preemies spend time in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) while they get medical care.

Is Bigger Better?

A baby with chubby cheeks and dimpled thighs once was many people's picture of a healthy newborn. But a baby born much larger than average may have special medical problems that need attention.

Some very large babies — especially those born to mothers with diabetes, including gestational diabetes — may have problems for a few days keeping blood sugar levels up. They might need extra feedings or even IV (given into a vein) 

glucoseto keep those levels from falling too low.

Will My Baby Lose Weight?

Yes, at first. Babies are born with some extra fluid, so it's normal for them to drop a few ounces when they lose that fluid in the first few days of life. A healthy newborn is expected to lose 7% to 10% of the birth weight, but should regain that weight within the first 2 weeks or so after birth.

During their first month, most newborns gain weight at a rate of about 1 ounce (30 grams) per day. They generally grow in height about 1 to 1½ inches (2.54 to 3.81 centimeters) during the first month. Many newborns go through a period of rapid growth when they are 7 to 10 days old and again at 3 and 6 weeks.

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Should I Be Concerned?

Newborns are so small, and it can be hard to know if your baby is gaining weight the way he or she should. You may worry that your baby has lost too much weight in the first few days or isn't taking enough breast milk or formula. If so, talk to your doctor, who may ask you about:

• How many feedings a day your baby gets. A breastfed baby may feed about 8 or more times in a 24-hour period; formula-fed babies usually eat less often, perhaps every 3 to 4 hours. A lactation (breastfeeding) counselor can make suggestions to increase comfort and improve technique, if a mom needs extra help.
• How much your baby eats at each feeding. A baby generally nurses for at least 10 minutes, should be heard to swallow after 3 or 4 sucks, and should seem satisfied when done. At this age, formula-fed babies may drink up to 3 to 4 ounces (90 to 120 milliliters) at a time.
• How often your baby pees. A breastfed baby may have only 1 or 2 wet diapers a day until the mother's milk comes in. Expect about 6 wet diapers by 3 to 5 days of age for all babies. After that, babies should have at least 6 to 8 wet diapers a day.
• How many bowel movements your baby has each day, and what they're like. Newborns may have only one poopy diaper a day at first. Poop is dark and tarry the first few days, then becomes soft or loose and greenish-yellow by about 3 to 4 days. Newborns usually have several poopy diapers a day if breastfed and fewer if formula-fed.

What Else Should I Know?

Being small or large at birth doesn't mean a baby will be small or large later in childhood or as an adult. Plenty of tall teens began life as small babies, and the biggest baby in the family can grow up to be a petite adult.

By the time they're adults, kids tend to resemble their parents in size. Genetics, as well as good nutrition and your attention, will play a large part in how your baby grows in the years to come.

Whether your baby starts out large, small, or average, in the next few months you can expect your little one to keep growing fast.

Reviewed by: Madhu Desiraju, MD

Date reviewed: October 2018

Averages for Breastfed & Formula-Fed Kids

Congratulations, you have a new little bean in your household! If your tiny one seems ravenous all the time, it’s because they are. Babies have a lot of growing and developing to do!

In the first 5 months of life, your baby will about double their birth weight. By the time they’re 1 year old, most babies triple their birth weight. But just like adults, babies come in all sizes and body types.

Some babies gain a lot of weight quickly. According to the World Health Organization’s (WHO) child growth standards, overall, boys gain weight faster than girls.

Squishiness and “rolls” can be normal and healthy for babies. Other babies might have leaner body types and appear thinner. This may also be completely normal.

Your pediatrician will weigh your baby regularly during well visits to make sure they’re within the range of normal weight gain for their length and age. It’s OK if your baby is off the charts sometimes — every baby is a little bit different and each gain weight at their own speed.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), breastfed babies have a tiny head start in weight gain shortly after birth, but their overall weight gain in the first year is typically slower than formula-fed babies.

Still, up until age 2, physicians use the WHO growth charts as the standard growth curve for both breastfed and formula-fed babies.

In general, here’s what you can expect for your baby’s weight gain by week:

Breastfed babies

Generally, breastfed newborns gain weight faster than formula-fed babies for the first 3 months of life.

One likely reason for this is that breast milk is a dynamic and ever-changing food, composed of the exact nutrition a baby needs at that stage. On the other hand, formula is a static composition of ingredients.

For the same reason, the amount of pumped breast milk a baby receives in a bottle will sometimes differ than the amount of formula a baby of the same age receives.

When formula-fed babies need more calories, they must drink more at each feeding. Breast milk, however, will change in its composition and caloric content depending on the baby’s needs.

On average, breastfed babies drink around 800 milliliters (27 ounces) of milk per day in the first 6 months of life. As a rule of thumb, feed your breastfed baby on demand so they receive all the calories and nutrients they need.

How much breast milk should I put in a bottle?

A lot of breastfeeding parents returning to work want to know how much milk they should leave for their babies while they’re gone. If you’re planning to bottle-feed expressed milk, expect to give your baby about an ounce of milk per hour.

So, if you’re working an 8-hour day, for example, your baby might consume two 4-ounce bottles or three 3-ounce bottles during the time you’re gone.

Of course, this may depend on your baby’s age and how much they typically drink in a feeding. But in general, this will give you a baseline from which you can adjust to suit your baby’s needs.

If you’re breastfeeding exclusively, you may need to track your baby’s weight a bit more carefully in the early weeks.

Weight gain is one way to determine how well breastfeeding is going — it’s not only a sign of how much milk you’re producing, but how well your baby is extracting the milk from the breast.

Formula-fed babies

Babies who are formula fed generally gain weight faster than breastfed babies after the first 3 months of life.

With formula feeding, it’s easier to know how much milk your baby is getting. You can tell how many ounces of formula your baby has finished by looking at their bottle.

But it’s also easier to accidentally overfeed your baby at times. This is because you’re more likely to keep feeding until the bottle is empty, even if your baby is already full. Sometimes momma’s eyes are bigger than baby’s stomach!

In fact, a 2016 study found that using a bigger bottle to feed formula to your baby can lead to faster weight gain in babies under 6 months old.

The researchers checked the weight of 386 two-month old babies. They found that babies who were fed with bottles 6 ounces or bigger were about 0.21 kilograms heavier than babies fed with smaller bottles.

This is kind of like adults eating from a smaller plate to feel fuller faster and avoid overeating!

Almost all babies lose some weight in the first week after birth. Don’t worry, though. As long as they’re feeding appropriately, they will quickly make up for it in coming weeks.

Most babies lose an average of 7 to 10 percent of their birth weight in the first few days. Ideally, they should be back to their birth weight by 10–14 days after birth. If not, be sure to speak with your pediatrician and possibly a lactation consultant to see if there are underlying problems with feeding.

If you experience breastfeeding challenges in the first few days after birth, you’re completely normal! Breastfeeding is often more complex than new parents expect.

Seek the help of a lactation consultant if you’re experiencing any of the following:

• your baby doesn’t latch on deep enough, or it’s painful for mama
• suckling seems weak during breastfeeding
• baby’s urine is dark yellow
• there’s red-brown “dust” in your baby’s diaper
• you hear clicking or gagging when baby is drinking
• your baby doesn’t have at least 2 to 4 poopy diapers a day
• your baby is extra sleepy at the breast or has low energy
• baby has a weak cry
• your baby looks a bit yellow or has other signs of jaundice
• there are other signs of dehydration in your baby

Weighing your baby regularly — at home or at your doctor’s office — is important because any amount of healthy weight gain is a sign that your baby is feeding well.

If your newborn hasn’t gained back their birth weight by day 10 to 14, has lost too much weight, or growth is too slow, your pediatrician, often along with a lactation consultant, can help.

And, if you find you need to supplement with formula, don’t stress! You’re not alone.

Breastfeeding offers numerous benefits, and your baby will still take advantage of them no matter how much breast milk they receive.

Babies gain weight and grow quickly in their first year. But weight gain can happen at different speeds and ranges for each little one.

Your baby’s weight gain depends on a lot of things, including genetics, how active they are, and whether you’re breastfeeding, formula feeding, or both.

Use the right growth chart and weighing methods to track your baby’s growth.

Don’t worry if your baby’s growth curve looks a little different than average. Talk to your doctor if you’re concerned, but as long as your baby is consistently gaining weight at their own pace, they’re doing just fine.

Height and weight gain for children of the first year of life. Tables

Dear parents, your baby is growing and you are worried about whether he is gaining enough weight and height. For control, there are centile tables for assessing the physical development of children, weight and height indicators. At the same time, you must remember that each baby is individual, he cannot grow according to the textbook. These weight and height recommendations are based on an average number of children and 10% deviation is normal. In addition, the centile corridor from 25% to 75% is an average physical indicator. That is why they say: Physical development is mesosomatic, macrosomatic, microsomatic.

It is important that the weight and height indicators are in the same centile corridor, but no more than two adjacent ones. Then we can talk about harmonious development. If the gap is more than two centile corridors, the development is disharmonious. Then we can think either about an unbalanced diet or about a pathology associated with obesity (paratrophy), or protein-energy deficiency (hypotrophy). In addition, one should not forget about the constitutional characteristics of the child, about genetic predisposition. Therefore, in no case should you compare your child with a neighbor's. To talk about the health of a child, we evaluate his condition according to many criteria. This is neuropsychic development, laboratory examination data, anamnesis, heredity. How many times in my practice have I met children who gained 400-450 g in weight every month, by the year they barely gained 7.8-8 kg. But at the same time, children already at 10 months began to walk, pronounce syllables, and follow complex instructions.

We'll talk about weight and height gain for term babies. In preterm infants, rates of weight gain and height differ according to the degree of prematurity. In addition, children can be born with intrauterine malnutrition.

The tables for girls and boys are different in terms of numerical indicators, but at 1 year of age, these differences are quite minimal.

Centile tables for assessing the physical development of girls from 0 to 12 months.

At the same time, until the age of three months, the child adds 20-30 grams per day daily, respectively, from 140 to 200 per week. If we talk about the average weight gain by months, then it is only 600 g per month, since the child after birth has physiological weight loss (with urine, feces, transition from intrauterine feeding to breastfeeding during the adaptation period), approximately 10% of the weight, which is 200-300 grams.

More often, by 3-4 days, the child restores its original weight, and then there is an increase. But I had a case in practice when the child began to gain weight from the 20th day of life, while the girl was active, reflexes were alive, her appetite was good, she could withstand the night interval, stool 4-5 times a day, urination was sufficient, developed according to age. Therefore, do not worry. Our indicator is the well-being of the child. If the baby is active, eats with appetite, sleep is calm, the skin is clean, physiological functions are not disturbed, be calm, your baby is healthy and not hungry. You see from the table the range of weight per year is from 8 to 13 kg. This is the norm. There is no reason to run to the endocrinologist, genetics, to examine the child.

Or the opposite situation: in the first months of life, a child gains 1-1.5 kg while breastfeeding. If the baby does not have colic, he does not spit up, there are no gastrointestinal manifestations, he is active, the skin is clean, physiological functions are not disturbed - this is also the norm. Remember, as often happens, premature babies quickly gain weight and catch up with their peers by the year. And large babies gain weight more slowly. In my entire thirty-year practice, only two children weighed 14-15 kg by the year, although their parents were large and tall. By the age of three, they weighed almost the same, added only in height, the rest of their peers caught up with them.

It is believed that by 4-4.5 months the child should double the weight, and triple by the end of the year.

It happens that the increase in height and weight goes in leaps, seasonality, unevenness, and sometimes asymmetry of growth are noted. Pediatricians are concerned about the circumference of the head and chest, by 2-3 months they should be equal. Further, the breast grows faster. This is important so as not to miss the pathology.

The younger the child, the faster his growth. In the first 3 months of life, body length increases by 3 cm monthly, in the second quarter by 2.5-2 cm monthly. In the third - 1.5-2 cm, in the fourth - 1 cm monthly. The total increase in height in the first year of life is about 25 cm.

Centile tables for assessing the physical development of boys from 0 to 12 months.

In the second year of life, the child should gain 2-2.5 kg in weight, grow by 8-10 cm.

Thank you for your attention.

Baby weight. Weight norms for infants by months in table

All babies are born different, however, the concept of the norm of the weight of a newborn still exists. The normal body weight of a healthy baby at birth is 2,700–3,700 g. The weight of a baby depends on a number of factors.

Dry initial milk formula adapted by Valio Baby 1 NutriValio for feeding children from birth to 6 months More

Follow-up dry milk formula adapted by Valio Baby 2 NutriValio for feeding children from 6 to 12 months Read more

Dry milk drink "Baby milk" Valio Baby 3 NutriValio for feeding children over 12 months Read more

Floor . Boys tend to outnumber more fragile girls at birth.

Heredity . Obviously, tall, stately parents will have larger children than a petite young mother and father of average build.

Nutrition mothers during pregnancy. Often, with a woman’s high-calorie diet, the fetus gains weight even before birth.

Physical and psychological state of mother during pregnancy. Stress and illness, of course, affect the health and, as a result, the weight of the baby.

Mom's bad habits - smoking, alcohol. In this context, the weight of the child also depends entirely on his health.

Weight of the baby at discharge

You need to be prepared for the fact that in the first days of life the baby will lose a little weight - by 6-10% of birth weight. This is easily explained by the fact that the baby is experiencing stress. He needs time to adjust to new living conditions. Mom should improve lactation. At first, the newborn will get by with small portions of colostrum, since his stomach is very small. In the future, weight gain is calculated from the figure at discharge.

Weight gain in infants is a consequence of various reasons.

Appetite .

Feeling well . When the baby is unwell, he eats worse.

Feeding type . Formula-fed babies gain weight faster than babies.

Quality and quantity of breast milk (when breastfed).

Child mobility . Active kids are more fit than lazy ones.

Power mode . When feeding "on demand", weight is gained faster than with the "hourly" mode.

Age . In the first months, babies grow faster, gradually weight gain slows down.

Norms of weight gain for newborns

So how much should a newborn gain weight? A normal increase in the first month of life is 90-150 grams per week. For 2, 3 and 4 months, the baby should "grow" by 140-200 grams per week. From 5 months to six months, the increase will decrease to 100-160 grams per week. Then the child will gain weight little by little and by his first birthday he should weigh about 3 times more than at discharge.

Monthly newborn weight table

This table is, of course, rather arbitrary. It is important to remember that children are individual in their development - one may grow faster, the other slower. If the baby is healthy and cheerful, there should be no reason for parents to worry about “non-standard weight gains”.

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