Can you drink coffee during intermittent fasting?

Black coffee fits perfectly with intermittent fasting. A review published in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology explicitly names coffee and tea as 'beverages of choice' within an eating pattern that combines time-restricted fasting (12 to 16 hours per day) with a Mediterranean diet. The reasoning is straightforward: black coffee contains virtually no calories and does not trigger an insulin response.

Coffee on its own is nothing to be afraid of either. Up to 3 to 5 cups per day is not harmful from a cardiovascular standpoint. In fact, moderate coffee consumption is linked in multiple studies to a lower risk of arrhythmias, heart attack and stroke compared with drinking no coffee at all. These are associative findings, not proof of cause and effect, but the pattern is consistent.

The caveat lies in what you add to the coffee. Milk, cream or sugar provide calories and can break the fasting period, depending on how strictly you follow your fasting schedule. If you want to keep your fast undisturbed, choose black coffee or coffee with just a very small splash of plant-based milk.

Intermittent fasting itself does not carry major risks for most healthy adults, but for people with diabetes, pregnant women, women who are breastfeeding and people who are still growing, professional advice is genuinely sensible. In these groups, a nutrient deficiency can develop more quickly.