Coffee drinkers reap health boost – but only if they do it in the morning
A new study shows that drinking coffee in the morning can lower the risk of death, but this benefit disappears for people who drink coffee throughout the day.
The study looked at the coffee habits of over 40,000 adults and found that those who drank coffee in the morning had a 16% lower risk of dying from any cause and a 31% lower risk of dying from heart disease over a 10-year period compared to those who didn’t drink coffee.
However, the heart health benefits disappeared for those who drank coffee all day long. The study found no significant difference in the death rates of all-day coffee drinkers compared to people who didn’t drink coffee.
Professor Lu Qi, a nutrition and health expert at Tulane University, said, “It’s not just about how much coffee you drink, but also when you drink it. Maybe in the future, we should think more about the timing of coffee in our diet advice.”
The study looked at the eating habits of 40,725 adults, including how much coffee they drank and when they had it. This information came from the US National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey between 1999 and 2018. About 36% of people drank coffee in the morning, while 16% had coffee later in the day.
The study found that people who drank coffee in the morning had a lower risk of dying, whether they drank two to three cups a day (moderate drinkers) or more (heavy drinkers). The health benefit was smaller for people who drank just one cup in the morning. The study looked at participants’ medical records for 9 to 10 years after they joined the survey.
The findings were published in the European Heart Journal and were also checked with a smaller group of 1,463 people who kept detailed food and drink diaries for a week.
The study says that drinking coffee in the morning is better for your heart than drinking it in the evening, but it doesn’t explain why. One reason could be that drinking coffee later in the day might mess up your body’s natural clock and hormones like melatonin. This can affect your sleep, cause inflammation, and raise blood pressure, which can harm heart health.
In a related article, Prof Thomas Lüscher, a heart doctor in London, mentions that people who drink coffee all day tend to sleep badly. He also says coffee can reduce melatonin, a hormone that helps you sleep.
The main effect comes from caffeine, but coffee has many other compounds that affect the body. The researchers think that some substances in the blood, which cause inflammation, are higher in the morning. These might be reduced by anti-inflammatory compounds in morning coffee. This idea applies to both caffeinated and decaffeinated coffee.
The latest research builds on a 2022 UK Biobank study, which found that people who drank up to three cups of coffee a day had a healthier heart compared to those who didn’t drink coffee. The NHS recommends not drinking more than four cups a day because too much coffee can raise blood pressure. Pregnant women should limit caffeine to no more than 200mg a day to reduce the risk of low birth weight and miscarriage. A cup of filter coffee has about 140mg of caffeine.
“Overall, there is strong evidence that drinking coffee, especially in the morning, is probably good for your health,” says Lüscher. “So, enjoy your coffee, but drink it in the morning!”
Published: 8th January 2025
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