Best Sports Drinks (Dec. 2024) - Rated by CherryPicks' Experts

How to Pick the Best Sports Drink

Benefits of sports drinks for athletes

• It helps replace electrolytes: This is one of the greatest benefits you enjoy when you take sports drinks during exercise sessions. Sweating during exercise can cause a drop in your electrolyte levels which could lead to muscle cramps, tiredness, and dizziness. Sports drinks help in replacing the lost electrolytes.
• It helps to replace lost fluids: To remain efficient during and after exercise sessions, you need to stay hydrated. Sports drinks help in replacing fluids which is important for endurance athletes.
• It helps increase efficiency: Taking sports drinks helps you meet your nutrition recovery goals after each exercise session. This will help you become efficient in carrying out other tasks. It also helps improve your performance level.
• Boost sugar level: The amount of sugar you need in your body is determined by the type and intensity of the exercise. Certain exercise activities require a good sugar boost to enable you to become efficient with each session.

What to consider before buying sports drinks

Free of chemicals and artificial color

The market is flooded with many sports drinks. Most of these sports drinks are filled with harmful chemicals and artificial colors. Taking such drinks can have an adverse effect on your overall health due to the acidic nature of the chemicals added.

When choosing your next sports drinks, ensure that they’re free from these harmful chemicals and artificial colors. You’re still sure of getting the desired energy and hydration.  

Choose your ideal flavor

There are several varieties of sports drinks available in the market. This means that you can choose from many flavors available. Some top choices include berry, orange, lemon-lime, citrus, fruit punch, etc. Although the flavor of the sports drinks doesn’t have a specific nutritional value, having to choose a flavor you’re comfortable with allows you to enjoy your drink while you rehydrate.

Caffeine amount

While caffeine is an essential ingredient in almost all energy drinks, excess consumption of it can become harmful to your health over time. The recommended amount of caffeine you should take in a day shouldn’t be more than 400 milligrams. Ensure that you consume take sports drinks with less than 300 milligrams amount of caffeine.

However, you must know that it is common for sports drinks to contain little or no amount of caffeine. This will reduce the amount of addiction you can get through the excess intake of caffeine.

Too much added Sugar 

Consuming sports drinks with too much-added sugar isn’t the best way you can use to boost your energy level. You’ll feel sluggish when you consume too much sugar. You’re also at risk of becoming diabetic or causing an increase in blood sugar levels.

Several sports drinks are sugar-free that you can consider. This is important if you’re trying to control your blood sugar levels or are already diabetic. You can also go for sports drinks that don’t necessarily add too much artificial sugar.

Chose sports drinks based on their nutrients

While the taste of the sports drinks is an important factor to consider, the nutritional value offered by each sports drink is something you must not take for granted. When choosing your next sports drink, consider the following nutritional content.

• Carbohydrates: Sports drinks should contain a sufficient amount of carbohydrates since they’re your major source of energy. The more carbohydrates contained in the sports drink, the better.
• Calories: The sports drink you go for should contain about 45 to 160 calories per serving. Remember that calories are essential to providing more energy to your body during exercise.
• Sodium: Essential nutrients such as sodium chloride, bicarbonate, or citrate are components of electrolytes. They help in metabolizing carbohydrates and allow your muscles to function properly. You need more level of sodium during exercise activities because your body needs to be kept hydrated even while sweating.
• Potassium: Potassium also has similar functions to sodium. When choosing a sports drink, it should also contain nutrients rich in potassium such as monopotassium phosphate, dipotassium phosphate, or l-lactate.

Sports drinks supplement what our bodies need, But the choice is not easy. The above table was obtained after detailed parameter analysis, so you can feel free to choose.

Top 10 Sports Drinks Sellers: CPR Seller Rank List

CPR sellers rank is based on CherryPicks-AI bestselling ranking system that helps us analyze each seller's sales trends. The List of top seller ranks is our in-house data, essential for our product ranking to help you make the right shopping choice.