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A New Parent’s Guide to Baby-Led Weaning
A New Parent’s Guide to Baby-Led Weaning
Photo by Ann-Marie Espinoza

A New Parent’s Guide to Baby-Led Weaning

Wondering if baby-led weaning is right for you? Here’s the what, why, when and how, plus insight from the experts.

author-Jennifer LaBracio
By Jen LaBracio, CPST and Briana Engelbrecht
Fact Checked by Amylia Ryan
Updated On
Updated On
Our editors independently test and curate products. If you make a purchase via our links we may earn a commission.
Photo by Ann-Marie Espinoza

In This Article

Benefits of Baby-Led Weaning
Is Baby-Led Weaning Safe?
When To Start Baby-Led Weaning
How to Start Baby-Led Weaning
First Foods to Try for Baby-Led Weaning
Baby-Led Weaning vs. Purées
Can you do baby-led weaning and purées?
Does baby-led weaning prevent picky eating?
Baby-Led Weaning Supplies

With independence at its core, baby-led weaning is a feeding method that skips the purées and spoon-feeding and lets baby self-feed safely prepared finger foods right from the start. And perhaps a better way to think of it is “baby-led feeding,” since baby’s in charge and trying out solid food. 

If the thought of handing a seven-month-old a steamed broccoli floret makes you nervous, you’re not alone. We’re covering the safety considerations to keep in mind, why some families choose this approach, the benefits for babies and what kinds of foods make the best first choices. Plus, we talked to feeding experts and a pediatrician to get their take on how to make baby-led weaning safe, manageable and maybe even fun.

Benefits of Baby-Led Weaning

Baby-led weaning has several benefits, including helping babies learn to chew and feed themselves and simplifying the transition to solid foods. According to Jenny Best, founder of the baby feeding resource Solid Starts and its popular Instagram account, benefits of baby-led weaning include:

  • It helps babies become safe eaters. “Baby-led weaning rapidly advances oral motor skills babies need to become safe eaters,” explains Best. “For babies to learn how to chew food thoroughly, they need to practice with chewable food.”

  • Fewer transitions.”When baby starts solids with ‘real’ food, there's no transition that needs to be done later on,” says Best, “whereas with spoon-feeding of textureless purées, the parent will need to transition baby from spoon-feeding to self-feeding.” She says that waiting too long to move from spoon-feeding to self-feeding can make the transition harder for both babies and parents. Katie Ferraro, a registered dietitian and the creator behind the popular baby-led weaning Instagram account Baby Led Wean Team, adds that baby-led weaning actually simplifies the transition to solid foods. There’s no need to purchase expensive pouches, no time required to prepare separate baby foods, and baby is given ample opportunity to practice the most important skill: learning how to eat.

Is Baby-Led Weaning Safe?

The most common question from parents considering baby-led weaning is whether it's safe. And it’s totally understandable, considering that making the jump from formula or breast milk to solids can be intimidating enough—let alone going right to actual pieces of food. 

“Choking in babies does happen, and it’s scary,” says Dr. Tracy Agnese, a pediatrician and founder of Taking Care of Mom and Baby. But when done properly, baby-led weaning is safe.

“The most common misconception around BLW is that it increases the risk of choking,” says Best. “In fact, when a baby cognitively decides to put food in their mouth, their brain is more ready to coordinate chewing and safe swallowing. The risk of choking is actually higher when a caregiver places food in baby's mouth—the brain is not always ready for it.”

“Babies who start solid foods with a baby-led approach are at no higher risk of choking than are traditionally spoon-fed babies, provided that the parents and caregivers are educated about reducing choking risk,” reassures Ferraro, citing a study from the American Academy of Pediatrics and another one from the Journal of Human Nutrition and Dietetics. 

Ferraro also emphasizes that gagging is a normal part of learning to eat and actually helps babies develop their oral motor skills as they explore new textures. What’s key is recognizing the difference between gagging and choking—gagging is a protective reflex, while choking is a medical emergency. But understanding the distinction can help parents and caregivers feel more confident as their baby learns to self-feed. 

She recommends taking a refresher infant CPR course when your baby starts solid foods so you’re prepared in the event of a choking incident.

When To Start Baby-Led Weaning

The AAP updated its guidelines to recommend waiting until babies are six months old to introduce any solid foods, and this includes starting baby-led weaning. In addition to age, the most important thing to look for are signs of readiness. According to Dr. Agnese, here are a few clues your baby is ready:

  • Able to sit up with minimal support and have good head and neck control.

  • Shows an interest in foods, watching what you're eating and looking like they want to take a bite.

  • Able to grab objects with their hands and bring them to their mouth.

  • No longer reflexively pushing food out of their mouth with their tongue. (This is called the extrusion reflex and usually goes away around four to five months old.)

“All babies demonstrate their readiness to start solid foods at different times, so there is no one size fits all schedule,” Ferraro says.

She also encourages parents and caregivers to remember that breast milk or formula should continue to provide the majority of baby’s nutrition as they transition to solid foods.

“Our goal is that by age one, baby should be getting more nutrition from food and less from milk. It doesn’t happen overnight. Just like babies don’t magically wake up on their first birthday and know how to eat 100 foods, they also don’t know how to get more nutrition from food and less from milk without practicing,” Ferraro explains. 

“I encourage parents to think of the “weaning period” (from six to 12 months) as baby’s opportunity to practice learning how to eat, and stop focusing on how much the baby is eating.” 

How to Start Baby-Led Weaning

“Practice makes perfect,” explains Ferraro. “The more time and space you give your baby to explore new textures, tastes and flavors, the more proficient they will become in self-feeding.”

While there is no one-size-fits-all schedule for BLW, Ferraro recommends the following:

  • Six to seven months old: offer solid foods one to two times per day

  • Eight to nine months old: offer solid foods two to three times per day

  • Ten months and up: aim to offer solids three times a day and mirror the family meal schedule if possible 

These are general guidelines; always adjust based on your baby’s hunger cues and reach out to your pediatrician if you have any questions or concerns.

First Foods to Try for Baby-Led Weaning

When choosing the best first foods for baby-led weaning, there are three things to consider: 

  • A food’s safety

  • How easy it is for baby to self-feed

  • Nutrition

“We want to choose foods that are a low risk for choking but that baby can easily pick up with their hands,” explains Best. And from a nutrition perspective, she recommends focusing on foods that are high in iron (like beans and broccoli), as a baby’s iron stores begin to deplete between four and six months.

A few other favorite first BLW foods may include:

  • Mango pits

  • Large broccoli or cauliflower florets (steamed), or other steamed veggies that are easy to hold

  • Beans blended into a paste on a teething rusk (aka teething wafer)

  • Nut butters mixed into applesauce 

As for foods to avoid, stay away from hard, round foods like nuts, whole grapes, raw carrots and round candies, Dr. Agnese says.

If you want some guidance on what to serve your baby and how to safely prepare it with their age and state in mind, consider checking out Solid Starts’ free First Foods Database. It’s a resource created specifically for babies by a team of board certified pediatricians, an allergist, infant swallowing specialists, lactation consultants and a licensed pediatric dietician. 

Baby-Led Weaning vs. Purées

One of the biggest debates you may come across as you research BLW is if one way of feeding your baby—starting off with purées, for example—is “better” than another. But here’s the good news: this isn’t something you need to stress about.

“There is no one right or wrong way to feed your baby,” says Ferraro. “As a dietitian specializing in baby-led weaning, I can certainly extol the benefits of a baby-led approach, but not all parents may be comfortable with it or prefer traditional spoon-feeding. And that is their prerogative.”

Dr. Agnese agrees that both methods are ultimately fine. “Do what's most comfortable and easiest for your family,” she says.

Can you do baby-led weaning and purées?

For some parents, a hybrid approach of baby-led weaning plus purées works well. “It doesn't have to be so black and white,” explains Dr. Agnese. “If your child is over six months old and you want to do a combination of BLW and purées, that's totally fine.”

It’s also important to remember that even if you’re introducing solids primarily through baby-led weaning, that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t ever give them purées. Feeding your baby puréed foods is also part of the process. “Purées are an important texture for babies to master—it’s just not the only texture babies can eat,” Ferraro says. “You can honor the self-feeding principles of baby-led weaning and still offer naturally puréed foods like yogurt or oatmeal by using a pre-loaded spoon approach,” she says. That just means you load up the spoon for your baby, then hand it to them so they can feed themselves.

Does baby-led weaning prevent picky eating?

Is baby-led weaning the magic solution to preventing picky eating? Unfortunately, no. But because a baby-led feeding approach often means exposure to a larger variety of foods, there is the potential to reduce picky eating down the road.

“There’s no way to prevent picky eating,” explains Ferraro. “Selective eating, picky eating, whatever you call it—it’s a component of typical childhood development.” 

“With traditional spoon feeding, babies have around 10-15 foods they’ve tried by 12 months. And if you lose those foods to picky eating, that becomes a very challenging child to feed,” she says. “But if your baby has 100 foods by the time they turn one, and you lose 10 or 15 foods to picky eating, no big deal, right? The potential for ‘diet diversity’ with the baby-led approach and its benefits extend into later childhood.”

Baby-Led Weaning Supplies

You don’t need a ton of specific baby gear to start baby-led weaning, but if your baby is showing all the readiness signs and you’re ready to begin, there are a few items you’ll want to have on hand. The top three things you’ll need to start are a high chair, bib and some tableware. “You want to look for a high chair that has a totally upright seat (no recline whatsoever), a footrest (or can be modified to have one) and that has a removable tray so baby can be part of the family meal from day one. After that, the best feature to look for is simply a chair that grows with the child so that you don't need to buy a new chair as your baby becomes a toddler, and then a preschooler,” explains Best.

Baby-led weaning is also messy! A few bibs made from silicone or another waterproof, wipeable material are helpful to have on hand. You may also consider a wipeable splat mat underneath the high chair, because babies also love to toss things on the floor. Lastly, look for spoons that are easy for little hands to hold, bowls and plates with suction bottoms and small cups that are appropriately sized for tiny mouths.

Here are a few of our suggestions, but be sure to check out our full BLW gear guide for even more recommendations. 

Expert Sources

Babylist uses high-quality subject matter experts to provide accurate and reliable information to our users. Sources for this story include:

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