BackgroundThis is a protocol for a systematic review of the impact of health coaching on changing the health behaviour of offenders. Prisoners are more likely to suffer from health-related issues when compared to the general population. Health coaching has been shown to influence health outcomes of patients with chronic conditions. This review, therefore, aims to assess the effectiveness of health coaching interventions on the health of adolescent and adult offenders in custodial institutions.MethodsWe plan to conduct a systematic review of the current literature on health coaching interventions delivered in the prison setting. We will include randomised controlled trials and observational studies that compare health coaching to the usual care or other alternative interventions. The ideal interventions will be delivered either by health professionals or peer coaches, and the outcomes extracted in the data collection will be disease-specific, clients’ life and self-management skills, behavioural and psychosocial outcomes. If appropriate, a meta-analysis of the data collected will be carried out on the last stage of the review.DiscussionThis systematic review will identify and gather evidence on the impact of health coaching interventions delivered in the prison setting and can function as a supporting material for health professionals, prison staff, the healthcare system, and public health departments when considering delivering health coaching.Systematic review registrationPROSPERO CRD42016053237.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s13643-017-0524-5) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.