Alcohol vs Caffeine for anxiety
Short answer: For anxiety, more users report improvement with Alcohol — 73% of 52 reports, versus 16% of 240 for Caffeine.
Caffeine has 680 meta-analyses and 2,072 randomized trials on PubMed; the other has not been graded.
Based on 189 reports about Alcohol and 2,414 about Caffeine. Not medical advice.
| Alcohol Substance | Caffeine Substance | |
|---|---|---|
| Users say it helped | 19%helped142 reports · high confidence | 47%helped1,448 reports · high confidence |
| Verdict | Mixed | Mixed |
| Research | Not graded | AResearch: Strong |
| Meta-analyses / RCTs | — | 680 / 2,072 |
| Mainly used for | ||
| Energy % reporting improvement | 70% (10) | 83% (908) |
| Focus % reporting improvement | 73% (11) | 83% (568) |
| Anxiety % reporting improvement | 73% (52) | 16% (240) |
| Mood % reporting improvement | 60% (30) | 74% (137) |
| Sleep % reporting improvement | 10% (29) | 15% (131) |
| Common side effects | hangover, insomnia, poor sleep, heart palpitations | jitteriness, anxiety, insomnia, headache |
| Typical dose reported | 0.5-0.63 g/kg | 100-150 mg / daily |
“taurine (2–3 g daily) and alcohol are the only substances that have seemed to calm my body’s stress and anxiety.”
To avoid reductions in total sleep time, coffee (107 mg per 250 mL) should be consumed at least 8.8 h prior to bedtime and a standard serve of pre-workout supplement (217.5 mg) should be consumed at least 13.2 h prior to bedtime. The results of the present study provide evidence-based guidance for the appropriate consumption of caffeine to mitigate the deleterious effects on sleep.
Sleep Med Rev, 2023 ↗“Personally, I feel and function much better if I keep my caffeine intake very low to zero.”
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Percentages come from first-hand user reports and are not clinical outcomes. Talk to a doctor before starting, stopping or combining anything. How we rate