Hi, I’m John Berardi.
I’m a Canadian-American researcher, educator, and coach whose work sits at the intersection of nutrition science, behaviour change, and real-world health outcomes.
My academic training spanned medicine, psychology, philosophy, exercise science, and nutritional biochemistry, culminating in a PhD from Western University and faculty appointments at the University of Texas at Austin and Eastern Michigan University.
While still in academia, I founded Precision Nutrition, which grew into the world’s largest nutrition coaching, education, and software company, and Change Maker Academy, dedicated to helping health professionals build evidence-based, high-impact practices.
My book Change Maker: Turn Your Passion For Health and Fitness Into A Powerful Purpose and Wildly Successful Career – which kicked off the Change Maker movement – won several awards, became a best-seller, and continues to be highly rated and reviewed on places like Amazon.com.
For over a year, I hosted The Dr. John Berardi Show, a podcast that went beyond health and fitness to seek out important life lessons in a seemingly unlikely place, amid competing points of view. While in production, our episodes regularly appeared on top podcast lists, alongside shows like Joe Rogan’s, Tim Ferriss’, etc.
I have been recognized as one of the 20 smartest coaches in the world and one of the 100 most influential people in health and fitness.
Over my 25-year career, I’ve advised:
- Apple,
- Equinox,
- Nike,
- Titleist,
- San Antonio Spurs,
- Carolina Panthers,
- US Open Champ Sloane Stephens, and
- 2-division UFC Champ Georges St. Pierre.
More recently, my focus has shifted toward the clinical space, working directly with clinicians and individuals living with obesity through the GLP Coaching Institute, a GLP education and coaching platform set to support over 100,000 GLP users in 2026.
I occasionally share what I’ve been up to, what I’ve been learning, who I’ve been learning with, and what’s getting me excited on Instagram and Facebook.
If you’re interested in my extended bio, please click any of the links below for more on my work as a:
Or you can click here to contact me.
Writer
Since the year 2000 I’ve written countless articles for nearly every site or magazine that covers health, fitness, and nutrition. In addition, I’ve also had the great pleasure of leading the world-class content team at Precision Nutrition, as Editor-in-Chief.
In addition to articles, I’ve written:
I’ve also written (or been a co-author of):
And, my latest book, the culmination of 30 years in the industry, is Change Maker: Turn Your Passion For Health & Fitness Into A Powerful Purpose and A Wildly Successful Career.
If you work in health and fitness, or you hope to one day, I highly encourage you to pick up a copy of my new book ASAP. It took me over a year to write and it contains everything I’ve learned in the last few decades in. You get it all for under $30, a heckuva deal.
Coach
I’ve personally coached and consulted with thousands of people from all walks of life–from everyday people who could be your neighbours, right up to athletes at the highest level of sport.
For years I lead the extraordinary coaching team at Precision Nutrition, and co-developed Precision Nutrition Coaching, which broke ground as the first web-based nutrition coaching system.
(If you’re looking for exercise, nutrition, and lifestyle coaching, I encourage you to check it out. Spots are limited and sell out quickly when opened to the public).
I currently lead the team at the GLP Coaching Institute where we’re working directly with clinicians and individuals living with obesity through a GLP education and coaching platform set to support over 100,000 GLP users in 2026.
Professor
I studied Pre-Med, Psychology, and Philosophy at Lock Haven University, Exercise Science at Eastern Michigan University, and received my PhD (in Exercise and Nutritional Biochemistry) at Western University under renowned sport nutrition researcher Dr. Peter Lemon.
Since then I’ve been an assistant adjunct professor at the University of Texas and a course instructor at Eastern Michigan University, teaching courses in Exercise Science, Nutrient Metabolism, Fitness and Wellness, and Exercise Nutrition.
Researcher
In my doctoral studies, my research focused primarily on exercise nutrition; specifically, what to eat before, during and after exercise to optimize performance. Since then I’ve been involved in a host of studies (click here for publications) covering a wide range of disciplines from online coaching, to probiotics and mood, to dietary supplementation and urinary pH.
In addition, at Precision Nutrition, I developed a new kind of research that falls somewhere between heavily-controlled, small-scale laboratory studies typically done at universities, and the loosely-controlled, large-scale epidemiology studies typically funded by groups like the National Institutes of Health.
Using this medium-scale method, PN rapidly tests hypotheses with thousands of real, motivated people, collects and interprets the data online, and turns those data into better coaching methods for their clients. Here’s an example. And here’s another.
Speaker
For the last 25 years I’ve traveled the world to teach the latest in health, fitness, and nutrition science at hundreds of conferences. Here’s an example talk from Fitness Business Summit. And here’s another from the NSCA’s national conference.
While my travel schedule is limited nowadays–my great joy is staying home to spend time with our 4 children–I do, on occasion, appear at health, fitness, and medicine events.
Guest
Although I travel very little, I do enjoy great conversations with thoughtful interviewers and have recorded hundreds of podcasts in the last few years. Some of my favorites include this conversation with Mike Cazayoux, this one with Jay Ferrugia, this one with Dr. Michael Gervais, and this one with Kelly and Juliet Starrett.
Athlete
As a young man, I competed at a fairly high level in track and field, rugby and football. I also won a US national junior bodybuilding title back in 1995.
These days, the majority of my athletic time is spent strength training and preparing for masters-level track and field meets, where I compete as a 100m and 200m sprinter and am a multi-year provincial and national medalist in both events.
Entrepreneur
My first venture, Precision Nutrition went on to become the world’s largest nutrition coaching, education, and software company.
Precision Nutrition is a 100% remote company, uses a distributed authority organization structure (i.e. Holacracy), is known for its unique use of Jobs To Be Done research, and was named one of the World’s Most Innovative Companies by Fast Company magazine.
In 2017, I sold 80% of my ownership in the company at a valuation of nearly to $200M and it’s continued to grow year over year.
My next venture, Change Maker Academy was aimed at helping folks passionate about health and fitness turn that into a powerful purpose and a wildly successful career. Although we closed our doors in 2024 to focus on getting our ideas out to more people via my book Change Maker: Turn Your Passion For Health & Fitness Into A Powerful Purpose and A Wildly Successful Career.
Currently, I lead the GLP Coaching Institute where we’re working directly with clinicians and individuals living with obesity through a GLP education and coaching platform set to support over 100,000 GLP users in 2026.
Podcaster
For over a year, I hosted The Dr. John Berardi Show, a podcast that sought important life lessons in a seemingly unlikely place, amid competing points of view.
In each episode, I looked at fascinating—sometimes controversial—topics through the minds of divergent thinkers. And together we teased out unifying threads from ideas that may have felt irreconcilable.
We live in an age of divisiveness. This show offered an alternative. I searched for common ground, uncommon wisdom, and deep insight into what it means to live a better life.
The show regular appeared on Apple’s top podcast lists, alongside podcast like Joe Rogan’s, Tim Ferriss’, etc.
