Being overweight or obese puts a person at greater risk for a wide variety of serious health problems. Obesity is recognized as a national problem that has grown tremendously over the last three decades, contributing to increases in medical expenditures for treatment of related diseases.

In 2019, 71% of adults were overweight or obese, up 6 percentage points from 2011 and above the national rate of 67%. Arkansas is 45th in the nation on this indicator, including the 50 states and Washington, D.C. The state's rate is only slightly lower than those in the three highest states, Kentucky (72%), West Virginia (72%), and Mississippi (73%). Rates are higher for males (73%) than females (68%). The rate for males is 3 percentage points higher than in 2011; the rate for females is 8 points higher. Non-Hispanic American Indians & Alaskan Natives (81%) and Hispanics (77%) had the highest rates by race/ethnicity, followed by Black non-Hispanics (72%) and White non-Hispanics had the same rate (70%)

Within the state, the lowest rates were in Baxter and Fulton counties, both 64%. The highest rate was in Ouachita County, at 80%.

National data comes from a federal government survey designed to collect scientific data on health risks and behaviors. Respondents were asked for their height and weight for a computation of Body Mass Index.

Beginning in 2011, the Centers for Disease Control made two changes to the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System on which this indicator is based. The survey now includes cell-phone users, and a new statistical method is used to weight responses. As a result, changes from 2010 and years prior to 2011 and later may be a result of those technical changes rather than true trends. State and county data and data for subgroups are from the Arkansas Department of Health.