Can you drink tea when pregnant?

Find out if it's safe to drink tea during pregnancy, plus precautions to take to keep you and your baby healthy.

The official advice on drinking tea in pregnancy

Yes, you can drink tea during pregnancy, but you might need to drink less than normal or switch to decaf. This is because tea contains caffeine.

When you're pregnant, the NHS says you should limit the amount of caffeine you drink to around 200mg a day. Higher levels of caffeine can lead to low birthweight and have also been linked to miscarriage.

An average cup of standard tea has around 75mg of caffeine. You can find out the caffeine content of other popular drinks here.

The longer you brew your tea, the more caffeine it will have, so you could also consider taking the teabag out a bit earlier.

Decaf tea

Decaf tea has very little caffeine, but it's not usually completely caffeine free. The NHS doesn't suggest any limits to the amount of decaf tea you can have in pregnancy, but like everything, it's probably best to enjoy it in moderation.

Fruit and herbal teas

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Fruit and herbal teas don't usually contain caffeine, and are generally safe to drink in pregnancy. However, the NHS recommends limiting the amount you drink to no more than 4 cups of herbal tea per day.

This is because some herbal teas can contain ingredients that may affect your pregnancy if you drink lots and lots of them (for example, raspberry leaf is often used in herbal teas, and also associated with speeding up labour).

The ingredients are generally fine in smaller doses though, so if you're having a healthy pregnancy and you limit yourself to a few cups a day, you should be fine.

If you're having any complications with your pregnancy, it might be a good idea to check with your midwife before drinking herbal tea, just to be on the safe side.

Pregnancy-safe drink recipes

If you're cutting down on caffeine, why not try these pregnancy-safe drinks?

• Homemade hot chocolate
• Avocado and banana smoothie
• Elderflower fizz
• Berry spring cooler
• Summer sparkle mocktail

We like The Whole 9 Months, a week-by-week pregnancy nutrition guide, packed full of recipes and medical advice. See more details here at Amazon.

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Looking for more pregnancy diet info? Check out our articles below, or swap tips with other mums-to-be in our forum.

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