A dietitian recommends the #1 drink for weight loss.

Drinking this popular beverage may help you achieve your weight loss objectives.

There are numerous popular drinks that TikTok and Instagram stars claim will help you lose weight quickly, ranging from lemon water to apple cider vinegar shots. Not to mention the huge demand for “weight-loss teas.” Unfortunately, there is no one-size-fits-all food or beverage for weight loss. The best way to lose weight is to eat enough of fruits and vegetables, whole grains, and lean protein, exercise consistently, and develop appropriate sleep habits.

If you want to eat healthy and lose weight, optimizing your calories by selecting nutrient-dense meals is a good place to start. In contrast to nutrient-dense foods like fruits, vegetables, and whole grains, sugary beverages are high in calories but provide little to no added nutritional value. Furthermore, sugary drinks do not deliver the same level of satiety as solid foods. According to a 2023 review published in The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, most people do not compensate for those liquid calories by eating less.

So, what should you drink if you want to lose weight? Continue reading to find out our top choice for weight loss drinks.

How to Lose Weight When You’re Not Sure Where to Begin, According to a Dietitian, a recipe photo. Enjoy warm honey green tea while eating well.

How Drinking Tea Can Help With Weight Loss

There is a lot of emphasis on how to fill your plate when attempting to reduce weight or improve your health. However, selecting appropriate beverages to stay hydrated will help you achieve your weight loss goals. Here’s why we encourage drinking tea more often.

Tea is the second most popular beverage in the world, after water. There are two types of tea: genuine teas and herbal teas. True teas, such as green, oolong, black, and white teas, are created from the leaves of the same plant, Camellia sinensis, whereas herbal teas are made from spices, flours, and leaves of edible, non-tea plants.

Swapping higher-calorie liquids, such as sweetened coffee, for lower-calorie unsweetened tea will significantly reduce your overall calorie intake. According to the National Center for Health Statistics, Americans consume an average of 145 calories per day from sugar-sweetened beverages, so selecting a drink with significantly less sugar can make a large difference over time.

True teas all include catechins, a naturally occurring polyphenol associated to improved metabolism and driving the body to break down fat for energy, according to a 2020 review in the International Journal of Molecular Sciences. Green tea, particularly matcha-grade green tea, contains the highest concentration of catechins.

The Best Drink for Weight Loss.

When it comes to healthier beverages, green tea is our top choice for weight loss. Although all teas have potential health advantages, here’s why green tea stands out.

Helps you cut back on sugar.

A 2019 study in Circulation found that drinking too much sugar-sweetened beverages on a regular basis had a deleterious impact on one’s health. Swapping a sugar-sweetened beverage for something like unsweetened green tea is an excellent way to reduce your overall added sugar consumption. Drinking two to three cups of green tea per day may provide additional health benefits, such as a lower risk of heart disease, stroke, and type 2 diabetes, according to a 2019 meta-analysis published in Molecular Nutrition and Food Research.

Provides a lot of catechins.

Although all real teas contain catechins, green tea has the largest concentrations by far. As previously stated, catechins are the active component of green tea that researchers are particularly interested in. The most common and abundant catechin in green tea is epigallocatechin gallate (EGCG).

According to Molecules’ 2018 review, green tea (and EGCG in particular) may help you lose weight by raising your metabolic rate and stimulating fat-burning for energy. Your metabolic rate is the number of calories your body burns while performing daily activities, so having a higher metabolic rate may lead to weight loss.

Combining green tea with exercise appears to increase the efficiency of EGCG. A small 2018 study published in the International Journal of Sport Nutrition and Exercise Science discovered that females who drank a cup of matcha green tea before working out burnt more fat than those who did not.

In the long run, there is little study on green tea drinking and weight status. A 2022 study from Korea, published in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, indicated that drinking four or more cups of green tea per day was associated with a 44% decreased incidence of abdominal obesity. However, the connection was only observed in women.

Contains caffeine.

Green tea may be especially useful for weight loss due to its unique blend of catechins and caffeine. Caffeine is a naturally occurring stimulant that can make you feel more alert and improve your athletic performance. Caffeine and ECGC appear to function synergistically to burn calories. A 2017 systematic analysis by Nutricion Hospitalaria discovered that green tea extract was only helpful for weight loss when paired with 80 to 300 milligrams of caffeine per day.

Potential Side Effects

Green tea extract is commonly used in weight-loss pills and products. Green tea pills, according to the National Institutes of Health Office of Dietary pills, have been linked to potential side effects such as constipation, nausea, liver damage, and high blood pressure. However, there have been no reports of safety problems associated with drinking green tea.

Sleeping problems

One 8-ounce cup of green tea contains approximately 30 mg of caffeine, which is significantly less than the 90 to 100 mg found in a standard cup of coffee. However, if you are sensitive to caffeine and find it interferes with your ability to sleep soundly at night, decaffeinated green tea may be a better option.

May interfere with iron absorption.

Green tea includes natural substances called tannins and oxalates, which can impair the body’s capacity to absorb iron. Although research has indicated that tannins can limit iron absorption in a single meal, long-term studies have not convincingly proved that tea drinkers are more likely to develop iron insufficiency, according to a 2017 review in Current Developments in Nutrition.

The Bottom Line

Although the effects of green tea for weight loss are unlikely to be significant, it does provide certain health benefits in addition to plain water. Consider drinking green tea as a weight loss drink since it can keep you hydrated, provide an energy boost from caffeine, and contain potent antioxidants in the form of catechins.