There is a large, growing and very competitive market for electrolyte powders, drinks and tablets. In 2024, the electrolyte drink market was valued around \u20ac32 billion.<\/p>\n
The products are designed to be consumed before, during and after exercise \u2013 and manufacturers claim they\u2019ll optimise your hydration, health and performance. There are even options to supplement your daily hydration, whether or not you are exercising.<\/p>\n
But do you really need to replenish the electrolytes lost in your sweat?<\/p>\n
And are sports drinks, electrolyte powders and salty supplements actually the best way to do it?<\/p>\n
What do electrolytes do?<\/p>\n
Electrolytes are minerals \u2013 such as sodium, potassium, calcium and magnesium \u2013 that carry an electrical charge that influences how water moves in your body.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey help maintain the fluid balance,\u201d explained Dr Amy West, a sports medicine physician. They help move fluid into and out of your cells and regulate blood pressure, heart rhythm, muscle and nerve function.<\/p>\n
[\u00a0Protein powders: What are they and do they work?Opens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n While they\u2019re found in supplements and sports drinks, they\u2019re also in the foods we eat every day. \u201cWhen we talk about potassium, it\u2019s in a banana,\u201d says Heidi Skolnik, a nutritionist. \u201cWhen you eat a pretzel, there\u2019s sodium on it.\u201d<\/p>\n As you sweat, you lose both fluid and electrolytes and if you lose enough fluid, you can become dehydrated. The volume of blood in your body drops and \u201cyour heart has to pump harder to get the same amount of blood circulating,\u201d Skolnik says.<\/p>\n Do you really need to replace them?<\/p>\n When you lose an exceptionally large quantity of water and electrolytes, as you might if you\u2019re having a serious bout of diarrhoea, you need to replace both. In those situations, doctors often recommend a rehydration solution such as dioralyte, which typically has more sodium and potassium than your average sports drink.<\/p>\n But experts say you probably don\u2019t need to reach for a sports drink during your regular workouts. Even if those workouts are strenuous or happen in hotter weather, drinking water when you\u2019re thirsty is enough to keep you hydrated. The sugar and carbohydrates found in many sports drinks certainly may help competitive athletes maintain their energy, but the electrolytes have little impact.<\/p>\n In the 1990s, standard medical advice recommended sodium-rich drinks for athletes during any exercise that lasted more than an hour. But more recent research has found that even as you lose sodium through sweat and urine, your body maintains the concentration of sodium in your blood. In several small studies athletes didn\u2019t tend to report a performance difference between working out with water and electrolyte-infused drinks, even after five hours of running in heat.<\/p>\n It\u2019s been well-established for at least a decade that electrolytes don\u2019t do much for performance, says Ricardo Da Costa, an associate professor in sports dietetics at Monash University in Australia. \u201cBut the marketing strategies from the sports drinks companies are more potent than the researchers.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cEverybody thinks that they need to replace lost electrolytes right away,\u201d says Tamara Hew-Butler, a sports medicine scientist. \u201cYou don\u2019t. You will make it up generally in your meals.\u201d<\/p>\n Most of the time, you are fine just drinking water when you\u2019re thirsty. If you\u2019re spending hours outside in the heat for several days and start feeling dehydration symptoms, like lightheadedness, you might reach for a sports drink or supplement, especially if you aren\u2019t getting enough electrolytes in your diet, says Robert Kenefick, a professor of biomedical and nutritional sciences at the University of Massachusetts-Lowell.<\/p>\n In rare cases, you can have too much fluid, but not enough sodium in your blood, a condition called hyponatremia, which can cause nausea, fatigue and, in the most severe cases, seizures or death. It\u2019s more likely to happen if you have certain medical conditions such as heart, liver or kidney problems.<\/p>\n For athletes, it can happen if they drink so much fluid before, during and after long workouts that it dilutes the electrolytes in their blood. However, most sports drinks don\u2019t contain enough sodium to prevent it, says Dr Da Costa.<\/p>\n Is there a downside?<\/p>\n Aside from the cost, experts say there\u2019s little downside to consuming electrolyte drinks. As long as you\u2019re otherwise healthy, they do not have enough electrolytes to overload your system (called hypernatremia), says Dr Kenefick. And the sweet taste could motivate you to hydrate.<\/p>\n Like most supplements, however, electrolyte products are not well regulated and can even be contaminated, says Dr Hew-Butler. In 2015, she and her team found unsafe levels of arsenic in Muscle Milk and Gatorade powders that had been provided to college athletes. The athletes showed no signs of having been harmed by the exposure.<\/p>\n You won\u2019t see \u201carsenic\u201d on a supplement label, but you should check for the amount of sugar in the drinks, which can be almost as high as some sodas. As you are reading the label, Dr Kenefick cautioned buyers to be sceptical of what it promises.<\/p>\n \u201cThe beverage market is very competitive and everyone\u2019s looking for an edge,\u201d he says. \u201cA lot of the beverages that are out there are using electrolytes as a marketing tool.\u201d \u2013 This article originally appeared in the New York Times<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"There is a large, growing and very competitive market for electrolyte powders, drinks and tablets. 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