People who are trying to lose weight often ask, “What exercises burn the most amount of calories in the least amount of time?” Because most people don’t have a couple of hours a day to work out, we want to be as efficient as possible. So here are some exercises that you can burn a significant amount of calories with in just a short amount of time.

Interval Running
When you run, one of the best ways to burn more calories is to vary your speed and intensity. For example, you could run at a moderate clip for one minute, and then go as fast as you can for another 10 seconds. Alternate by going back to your moderate clip for one minute, do an intense “burst” of running for 10 seconds, and so on. Because your body doesn’t know what to expect and therefore can’t adjust, you’ll burn more calories this way than you will with a workout that of moderate intensity all the way through. And running is one of the better calorie burning exercises and whole body cardiovascular exercises you can do.

Rowing
Rowing is one of the best whole body exercises you can do. Because it works every part of your body at once, you use a lot of energy and you burn a lot of calories. Typically, 30 minutes of moderate rowing on the machine will burn between 400 and 425 calories. If you do this for an hour, you should be able to burn up roughly half of your caloric intake for the entire day, assuming you consume 1800 to 2000 calories a day. However, don’t try to work out on a rowing machine for an hour unless you’ve been doing it for a quite a while — at least several weeks — and are in good enough shape to do it.

High-Intensity Weight Training
When you perform high-intensity weight training, you’re going to do your repetitions and your weight sets with a maximum wait time of 20 seconds in between sets. Your heart rate will stay up, and you’ll burn a lot of calories because your muscles will be taxed to their maximum. Lift weights until you can’t lift anymore. You should use a weight that’s heavy enough to max out at about 10 repetitions per set.

Try all of these techniques for 40 minutes a day, four days a week if you can; start slower if you’re more sedentary, and try doing it for 10 minutes a day every day, build up 20 minutes a day every day, and then shift to 40 minutes a day every other day.