For people who are obese, eating a low-carb diet doesn’t seem to make a noticeable difference in their blood sugar or how well their body uses insulin.

Even though low-carb diets can improve some health numbers, in people who are already obese, sticking more closely to a low-carb eating pattern might actually go hand-in-hand with having more body fat and a higher weight.

If you're middle-aged and your body doesn't respond well to insulin, cutting carbs and eating more fat might help you lose belly fat better than a low-fat diet. But if your body handles insulin normally, both diets work about the same for fat loss.

If you're an adult with obesity, sticking more closely to a low-carb diet might help lower your top blood pressure number and overall cholesterol a little — but the data isn't strong enough to say for sure, and it doesn't seem to affect your bottom blood pressure number or triglycerides.

If you're an adult between 20 and 50 who's obese, eating fewer carbs and more fats might be linked to healthier blood pressure, better cholesterol, and lower triglycerides — but we can't say for sure that the diet caused these benefits from this study alone.

People with obesity tend to have higher insulin levels when fasting and their blood sugar spikes more after eating carbs, but their bodies still use the sugar from those carbs just like lean people do.