Benefits of Beet Tea: What the Research Shows About This Earthy Wellness Drink

Beet tea — sometimes called beet root tea — sits at an interesting crossroads between herbal wellness drinks and functional nutrition. Made by steeping dried beet root, beet powder, or beet slices in hot water, it delivers some of the same compounds found in whole beets, though how much carries over into the cup depends on several factors worth understanding.

What Beet Tea Actually Contains

Beets (Beta vulgaris) are one of the more nutritionally dense root vegetables, and their dried or powdered forms retain a meaningful concentration of bioactive compounds. The key ones relevant to beet tea include:

• Nitrates — naturally occurring compounds that the body converts into nitric oxide
• Betalains — the pigments that give beets their deep red-purple color, which also function as antioxidants
• Folate (vitamin B9) — a B vitamin involved in DNA synthesis and red blood cell formation
• Potassium and manganese — minerals that support various metabolic and cardiovascular functions
• Dietary fiber — though much less present in tea form than in whole beets

The extent to which these compounds survive the drying and steeping process varies. Water-soluble compounds like nitrates and betalains do transfer into hot water reasonably well, which is part of why beet tea has attracted research interest.

The Nitric Oxide Connection 🌿

The most studied aspect of beet consumption — including concentrated beet juice and tea — involves dietary nitrates and nitric oxide production. Here's how it works:

When you consume nitrates from food, bacteria in your mouth convert them to nitrites. Those nitrites then enter the digestive system, where the body can further convert them into nitric oxide (NO) — a molecule that plays a key role in relaxing and widening blood vessels.

Several clinical trials, mostly using concentrated beet juice rather than tea specifically, have shown measurable effects on blood pressure and exercise performance in healthy adults. The research on beet tea is less extensive than on juice or whole beets, and the nitrate concentration in tea will generally be lower — something worth keeping in mind when interpreting study findings.

What the Research Generally Shows

It's worth distinguishing between well-established findings (like nitrate-to-nitric oxide conversion as a physiological mechanism) and emerging areas (like beet compounds and cognitive function), where research is still building.

Betalains: The Pigment With Antioxidant Properties

Betalains are relatively rare in the food supply — beets are one of the few significant sources. These pigments show antioxidant and anti-inflammatory properties in lab-based and some observational research, meaning they may help neutralize certain types of oxidative stress at the cellular level.

However, betalain bioavailability varies considerably from person to person. A well-known indicator of this is beeturia — the reddish or pink discoloration of urine that some people notice after eating beets. People who experience this are thought to absorb betalains differently than those who don't, though the full significance of this is still studied.

Variables That Shape Individual Outcomes

How beet tea affects any one person depends on a range of factors:

• Health status — people with already-low blood pressure, kidney conditions (beets are relatively high in oxalates), or iron metabolism issues face different considerations than healthy adults
• Medications — dietary nitrates can interact with certain blood pressure medications and some heart medications; this is a meaningful consideration
• Gut microbiome — the oral bacteria needed to convert nitrates to nitrites vary between individuals, including in people who use antibacterial mouthwash regularly
• Preparation method — steeping time, water temperature, and whether fresh, dried, or powdered beet is used all affect the concentration of active compounds
• Overall diet — someone already eating a diet high in leafy greens and other nitrate-rich vegetables has a different baseline than someone who doesn't

Who Tends to Be in Different Positions

Research on beet-based drinks has focused most on healthy, physically active adults — particularly athletes studying endurance performance. Findings from this group don't automatically translate to older adults, people managing chronic conditions, or individuals on specific medications.

People with low stomach acid, those who've had digestive surgeries, or those on proton pump inhibitors may also process these compounds differently.

At the same time, beet tea is generally a low-risk addition to a varied diet for most healthy adults — but "low-risk for most" is not the same as "appropriate or beneficial for everyone." 🍵

The Gap Worth Acknowledging

The research on beets, beet juice, and to a lesser extent beet tea points to a genuinely interesting nutritional profile — particularly around nitrates, nitric oxide, and betalain antioxidants. What that profile means in practice depends entirely on your baseline health, what else you're eating and taking, your individual physiology, and the specific form and concentration of beet you're consuming.

That gap — between what the research shows generally and what applies to your specific situation — is one that your own health context has to fill.