Despite claims that pickle juice is good for cramps, especially leg cramps, pickle juice comes with many problems.
In this article, we'll explore the questions of whether pickle juice is good for you or not, and why alternative cramp relief supplements are better for you than drinking pickle juice.Pickle juice for muscle cramps
Pickle juice has long been used to help prevent and relieve muscle cramps, especially by athletes. Muscle cramps and spasms can get so bad that people are willing to try anything to get the pain to stop.
Who first discovered that drinking pickle juice can resolve cramps is unknown. However, it’s a practice that’s been ongoing for decades.
In one popular instance, the Philadelphia Eagles drank pickle juice prior to a game against the Dallas Cowboys in 2000. The team credited pickle juice with contributing to their win during the hottest NFL game in history, allowing them to stay hydrated and cramp-free.
Researchers have attempted to study why pickle juice relieves cramps, but they haven’t reached a consensus. Some believe it may be a reaction to the vinegar, while others cite the presence of essential electrolytes such as potassium.
While pickle juice has proved effective in eliminating cramps after they start in some people, drinking pickle juice can come with pretty serious drawbacks for your health.
The problem with pickle juice lies in its sodium content.
The dangers of excessive sodium
It’s no secret that pickle juice contains sodium. While sodium is an important electrolyte that supports many bodily functions, the standard American diet contains an overabundance of sodium.
While salt and sodium are often used interchangeably, they aren’t the same. Sodium makes up about 40% of salt.
According to Harvard Medical School, “Americans eat too much salt - more than a teaspoon and a half a day.”
As professor Nancy Cook at Harvard Medical School explains in Harvard’s article on sodium, sodium has an effect on blood pressure. Research links lower sodium intake with not only lower blood pressure, but a lower risk of developing cardiovascular disease.
You may not think you’re ingesting as much sodium as you are, either. As it turns out, most of the sodium we consume is not through table salt.
According to the CDC, a single slice of bread on average has 200 mg of sodium. A slice of cheese could have 310 mg of sodium. Do you put deli meat on your sandwich? Those six slices of turkey could have 690 mg of sodium.
The 2020-2025 Dietary Guidelines for Americans, established by the USDA and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, recommends that Americans consume less than 2,300 mg of sodium.
The FDA states that “Most Americans exceed the recommended limits for sodium in the diet. On average, Americans eat about 3,400 mg of sodium per day.”
For perspective, a turkey sandwich with lettuce, cheese, and mustard can have up to 1,522 mg of sodium.
Since most Americans consume an overabundance of sodium from food already, adding the excessive sodium from pickle juice on top can be a dangerous combination.
According to the CDC, “excess sodium can increase your blood pressure and your risk for heart disease and stroke. Together, heart disease and stroke kill more Americans each year than any other cause.”
The aforementioned Dietary Guidelines for Americans goes on to say that high blood pressure makes your heart work harder, which can harm your arteries and organs. This could include your heart, brain, and kidneys. If left uncontrolled, high blood pressure can lead to heart attacks, heart failure, stroke, kidney disease, and blindness.
Furthermore, the CDC recommends that Americans find foods that contain less than 5% of their daily value of sodium per serving. Supplements and food that contain less than 140 mg of sodium are considered “Low sodium.”
So, just how much sodium does pickle juice contain?
How much sodium is in pickle juice?
If you search the web for how much sodium is in pickle juice, you'll find many different answers. That's because every pickle juice is different.
To find out how much sodium is in pickle juice, we sampled a dozen popular pickle juice products available on the market today, in 2021. This is what we found.
Most pickle juices and pickle brine on the market have a serving size between 1 fl oz and 2.5 fl oz. For perspective, this is roughly equivalent to an eighth of a cup to a third of a cup.
Sodium content in pickle juice ranged from 185 mg, 250 mg, and 210 mg for 1 oz servings, to 470 mg for a 2.5 oz serving . Even the lowest sodium content observed, 185 mg for an eighth of a cup, is too high to be considered “low sodium” by the CDC or the FDA.
We found that these popular pickle juices and pickle brine juices had an average serving size of 1.7 fl oz with an average sodium content of 300.55 mg. That’s 12.52% of your daily value of sodium on average for just a sip or two of pickle juice!
Other problems with drinking pickle juice
Besides the excessive sodium content of pickle juice, there are other things to consider before taking a swig of the vinegary brine.
Electrolytes
If you’re looking for cramp relief there’s a lot more to consider than the amount of sodium. Electrolytes are found in pickle juice as well as many sports drinks and dietary supplements, and for good reason.
Electrolytes play a critical role in staying healthy.
According to the U.S. National Library of Medicine’s Medline Plus, electrolytes are minerals in the body that carry an electric charge and affect many bodily functions. This includes regulating water retention, the acidity of your blood, muscle function, and nerve processes.
Common electrolytes include calcium, chloride, magnesium, phosphorus, potassium, sodium, and zinc.
Your body can lose electrolytes when you sweat, which makes replenishing them so important.
Depending on which brand of pickle juice you purchased, you might be missing out on the benefit these electrolytes can provide to your body for hydration and cramp relief.
Most of the pickle juice products we sampled contain only sodium and potassium for electrolytes. Even then, the potassium content ranged from 24 mg to 47 mg, with only one product containing 170 mg of potassium.
As such, pickle juice is not a significant source of potassium.
Despite the fact that pickle juice is advertised as containing electrolytes, the products we sampled only contain sodium and a small amount of potassium. We couldn’t find any products in our sample that also included magnesium, chloride, or zinc. At the very least, their nutrition labels don’t list those amounts.
So, if you’re looking for an electrolyte-rich solution to your cramps, pickle juice just doesn’t cut it. Thankfully, we’ve developed a supplement with the big five electrolytes included.
Taste
Another reason pickle juice may not work for you is the taste. Obviously, if you hate the taste of pickles, you won’t be able to stomach drinking pickle juice for your cramps.
This means that a large percentage of the population won’t drink pickle juice to alleviate their cramps. This leaves millions of people searching for a cramp relief supplement.
Luckily, we have a no-taste solution to this concern.
Convenience
While some pickle juice brands offer small bottles or shots of pickle juice for cramp relief, most only offer jars or gallons of brine. This makes it difficult to use pickle juice as a go-to-cure while out and about or while on vacation.
Even when you’re home, do you really want to keep a jar of pickle juice close by at all times, just in case your cramps strike?
With a cramp relief supplement, you can easily take a bottle with you wherever you go, or even keep it on your nightstand. Cramp relief supplements are just more convenient for when your cramps do strike.
Cramp relief without excessive sodium
Now there’s a way to find relief for your worst cramps without the pickle taste or large amounts of sodium.
Pickle Pill is made with only the purest, all natural ingredients from the United States. With 10x the electrolytes of drinking pickle juice, Pickle Pill is the only cramp relief supplement you’ll need.
With a powerful blend of Vitamin D3, magnesium, chloride, potassium, zinc, and 70+ trace minerals, the days of drinking brine are over. Our supplement only includes 70 mg of sodium.
To learn more about our breakthrough cramp relief supplement, check out the Pickle Pill product page.
References
1. “Science Finally Helps Explain Legendary Pickle Juice Massacre.” NBC Sports, 14 June 2010
2. "The Trouble With Excess Salt." Harvard Health Publishing. Harvard Medical School, 1 October 2019
3. "Top 10 Sources of Sodium." Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 26 February 2021
4. "Dietary Guidelines for Americas, 2020-2015 and Online Materials." 9th Edition. Dietary Guidelines for Americans. U.S. Department of Agriculture and U.S. Department of Health & Human Services. December 2020.
5. "Interactive Nutrition Facts Label." U.S. Food & Drug Administration.
6. "Most People Consume Too Much Salt." Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 14 September 2021.
7. "Sodium Q&A." Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 15 September 2021.
8. "Electrolytes." Medline Plus. U.S. National Library of Medicine.