A healthy weight for a 5’7″ female falls between roughly 121 and 153 pounds, depending on which measurement system you use and your individual body composition. That range comes from two widely used tools: BMI charts and clinical formulas designed to estimate ideal body weight. But the number on the scale only tells part of the story, and understanding what actually drives a “healthy” weight can help you interpret these ranges in a way that’s useful for your body.
The Standard BMI Range
BMI, or body mass index, is the most common tool used to classify weight. It divides your weight in kilograms by your height in meters squared. For a woman who is 5’7″, the CDC’s BMI categories translate to these approximate weight ranges:
- Underweight (BMI below 18.5): under 118 pounds
- Healthy weight (BMI 18.5 to 24.9): 118 to 153 pounds
- Overweight (BMI 25 to 29.9): 154 to 191 pounds
- Obese (BMI 30 or higher): 192 pounds and above
These cutoffs apply to all adults 20 and older regardless of age, sex, or race. Both the CDC and the World Health Organization use the same thresholds. That universality is part of what makes BMI useful as a quick screening tool, but it’s also the source of its biggest limitation: it doesn’t distinguish between muscle and fat, and it doesn’t account for where your body stores weight.
The Hamwi Formula Estimate
Clinicians sometimes use a formula called the Hamwi method to estimate ideal body weight. For women, it starts at 100 pounds for the first 5 feet of height, then adds 5 pounds per additional inch. At 5’7″, the calculation lands at 135 pounds.
Because bone structure varies from person to person, the formula includes a 10% adjustment for frame size. A small-framed woman at 5’7″ might aim closer to 121.5 pounds, while a large-framed woman could be healthy at 148.5 pounds. This range overlaps heavily with the BMI “healthy weight” window but narrows it toward a midpoint that many clinicians treat as a rough reference.
Why the Scale Doesn’t Tell the Whole Story
Two women who are both 5’7″ and 145 pounds can look entirely different and have very different health profiles. The reason is body composition. Someone with more muscle and less fat at that weight is in a different metabolic position than someone carrying the same weight primarily as body fat. Research on collegiate athletes illustrates this clearly: BMI correctly matched body fat classifications only about 66% of the time. The most common error was labeling athletes as overweight when their actual body fat percentage was normal.
Healthy body fat percentages for women shift with age. In your 20s, an excellent range is roughly 14 to 16.5%. By your 40s, that “excellent” window widens to about 14 to 20%, and by your 50s it stretches to around 14 to 22.5%. This isn’t a sign of declining health. It reflects the natural and expected changes in how your body stores and uses fat over the decades. If you strength train or carry above-average muscle mass, your weight may sit at the higher end of a BMI chart while your body fat percentage remains in a healthy zone.
Waist-to-Height Ratio: A More Practical Measure
Where you carry your weight matters at least as much as how much you weigh. Fat stored around the midsection, particularly deep abdominal fat, is more strongly linked to heart disease, type 2 diabetes, and metabolic problems than fat stored in the hips and thighs. A simple way to check this is the waist-to-height ratio: divide your waist circumference by your height, both in the same unit.
For a 5’7″ woman (67 inches), a healthy ratio is 0.4 to 0.49, which means a waist measurement of roughly 27 to 33 inches. A ratio of 0.5 to 0.59 signals increased health risk, and 0.6 or above indicates the highest risk category. You can measure this at home with a flexible tape measure placed around your waist at the level of your navel. It takes 10 seconds and gives you information that BMI alone cannot.
How Weight Distribution Changes With Age
Women at midlife tend to gain about 1.5 pounds per year on average, but the bigger shift isn’t necessarily the number on the scale. It’s where the weight goes. Before menopause, women typically carry more fat in the lower body, around the hips and thighs. After menopause, fat redistributes toward the midsection, a pattern that persists even after accounting for aging, total body fat, and reduced physical activity. Each of those factors independently increases deep abdominal fat storage, and menopause adds to the effect.
This is one reason nearly two-thirds of women ages 40 to 59 and about three-quarters of women over 60 in the United States carry a BMI above 25. The hormonal shift doesn’t necessarily cause weight gain on its own, but it does change the body’s preferred storage location in a way that can increase metabolic risk even if your weight stays the same. Menopausal hormone therapy doesn’t appear to cause weight changes, but it can redirect some of that central fat back toward peripheral sites.
Putting the Numbers Together
If you’re 5’7″ and looking for a target, 118 to 153 pounds is the standard healthy BMI range, with 121 to 149 pounds as a tighter estimate based on the Hamwi formula. But these numbers work best as starting points, not final answers. A weight of 155 pounds with strong muscle mass and a 30-inch waist is a very different health picture than 140 pounds with low muscle mass and a 35-inch waist.
The most complete picture comes from combining a few simple measurements: your weight, your waist circumference, and if possible, an estimate of your body fat percentage (many gyms and clinics offer quick assessments). Together, these give you a much clearer sense of where you stand than any single number can provide. Your age, activity level, and frame size all shift what “healthy” looks like for your specific body, and that’s completely normal.