By Dr. Jane Smith · Published October 26, 2026 · 14 min read
A high blood pressure diet fills most of your plate with vegetables, fruit, whole grains, beans, nuts and low-fat dairy, and cuts back on sodium, alcohol, added sugar and fatty meats. That pattern is the DASH diet (Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension), and in its original 1997 trial it lowered systolic blood pressure by 11.4 mmHg in people with hypertension within eight weeks, without any cut in salt or body weight.
This guide covers the DASH servings for each food group, the foods that do the most work, the foods to limit, and how much each extra change adds: less sodium, more potassium, less alcohol and weight loss. Our complete DASH diet guide covers the plan's background and variations; this article stays on one question: what to eat when your readings are high.
Important
Medical Disclaimer
This article is for informational purposes only and is not medical advice. If you take blood pressure medication, have kidney disease or have been told to limit potassium, talk to your doctor before changing your diet, using a salt substitute or taking supplements.
What a High Blood Pressure Diet Does, and How Much
Each part of a high blood pressure diet lowers your readings by a few points, and the largest single effect in trials comes from the whole DASH eating pattern rather than any one food. That matters because high blood pressure is common and mostly uncontrolled: the CDC counts 48.1% of US adults with high blood pressure, and only 22.5% of them have it under control.
Normal blood pressure is below 120/80 mmHg. Under the ACC/AHA categories, which the 2025 guideline kept unchanged, stage 1 hypertension is 130–139 systolic or 80–89 diastolic, and stage 2 is 140/90 or higher.
Here is what the main dietary changes did to systolic pressure (the top number) in controlled trials:
| Change | Evidence | Systolic drop |
|---|---|---|
| DASH eating pattern | 8-week feeding trial, 133 adults with hypertension | 11.4 mmHg |
| DASH plus about 1,500 mg sodium, vs. a typical diet with about 3,300 mg | 30-day feeding periods, adults with hypertension | 11.5 mmHg |
| Cutting alcohol by about half (6+ drinks a day) | 36 trials, 2,865 adults | 5.5 mmHg |
| Beetroot juice or dietary nitrate | 16 short trials, 254 adults | 4.4 mmHg |
| More potassium | 22 trials, 1,606 adults | 3.5 mmHg |
| Magnesium supplement, about 370 mg a day | 34 trials, 2,028 adults | 2.0 mmHg |
| Losing weight | 25 trials, 4,874 adults | About 1 mmHg per kg lost |
These results come from different trials, so they don't simply add up. But they do stack to a degree: in the DASH-Sodium trial, cutting sodium lowered blood pressure further even in people already eating the DASH way.
DASH Diet Servings for High Blood Pressure
At 2,000 calories a day, the DASH plan calls for 6–8 servings of grains, 4–5 servings each of vegetables and fruit, 2–3 servings of low-fat dairy, no more than 6 ounces of lean meat, poultry or fish, and 4–5 servings of nuts, seeds or legumes a week. The NHLBI's DASH guide scales the servings up or down for other calorie needs:
| Food group | 1,600 kcal | 2,000 kcal | 2,600 kcal | One serving |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grains (mostly whole) | 6 | 6–8 | 10–11 | 1 slice bread, 1 oz dry cereal or ½ cup cooked rice, pasta or cereal |
| Vegetables | 3–4 | 4–5 | 5–6 | 1 cup raw leafy greens or ½ cup cut-up raw or cooked vegetables |
| Fruits | 4 | 4–5 | 5–6 | 1 medium fruit, ¼ cup dried fruit or ½ cup fresh, frozen or canned fruit |
| Fat-free or low-fat dairy | 2–3 | 2–3 | 3 | 1 cup milk or yogurt, or 1½ oz cheese |
| Lean meat, poultry, fish | 3–6 oz | 6 oz or less | 6 oz | 1 oz cooked meat, poultry or fish, or 1 egg |
| Nuts, seeds, legumes | 3 a week | 4–5 a week | 1 a day | ⅓ cup nuts, 2 Tbsp peanut butter or seeds, or ½ cup cooked beans |
| Fats and oils | 2 | 2–3 | 3 | 1 tsp vegetable oil or soft margarine, or 2 Tbsp salad dressing |
| Sweets and added sugars | 0 | 5 or less a week | 2 or less a day | 1 Tbsp sugar or jam, ½ cup sorbet or 1 cup lemonade |
The plan was built to hit specific nutrient goals. For a 2,100-calorie day, the DASH studies aimed for 4,700 mg of potassium, 500 mg of magnesium, 1,250 mg of calcium and 30 g of fiber, with saturated fat at just 6% of calories and sodium at 2,300 mg or less.
Dairy is part of why it works. In the original trial, a diet that only added fruit and vegetables lowered systolic pressure by 2.8 mmHg, while the full DASH diet, with low-fat dairy and less saturated fat, lowered it by 5.5 mmHg across all participants. A 2020 meta-analysis of 30 trials with 5,545 adults found an average drop of 3.2/2.5 mmHg, larger in trials where people ate more than 2,400 mg of sodium a day and in trials of younger adults (mean age under 50).
Foods to Eat for High Blood Pressure
The foods that lower blood pressure most reliably are the ones rich in potassium, magnesium, calcium and fiber: vegetables, fruit, beans and lentils, nuts and seeds, whole grains and low-fat dairy.
Potassium-Rich Vegetables, Fruit and Beans
Eating more potassium lowers blood pressure, mainly in people who already have hypertension. A WHO-commissioned meta-analysis in The BMJ of 22 trials found that higher potassium intake lowered systolic pressure by 3.5 mmHg on average and by 7.2 mmHg when intake reached 90–120 mmol a day, which is about 3,500–4,700 mg (our conversion, at 39.1 mg per mmol). In cohort studies, higher potassium intake was linked to a 24% lower risk of stroke.
Adult women need 2,600 mg of potassium a day and men 3,400 mg, according to MedlinePlus, and the DASH studies aimed higher, at 4,700 mg. These everyday foods carry the most, per 100 g as eaten, from USDA FoodData Central:
| Food (per 100 g) | Potassium | Magnesium |
|---|---|---|
| Almonds | 733 mg | 270 mg |
| White beans, boiled | 561 mg | 63 mg |
| Potato, baked with skin | 535 mg | 28 mg |
| Avocado, raw | 485 mg | 29 mg |
| Sweet potato, baked in skin | 475 mg | 27 mg |
| Spinach, boiled | 466 mg | 87 mg |
| Salmon, Atlantic, farmed, cooked | 384 mg | 30 mg |
| Lentils, boiled | 369 mg | 36 mg |
| Black beans, boiled | 355 mg | 70 mg |
| Yogurt, plain, low-fat | 234 mg | 17 mg |
| Orange, raw | 181 mg | 10 mg |
Almonds lead per 100 g, but a DASH serving of nuts is 1½ oz (about 43 g), which works out to roughly 310 mg of potassium by our calculation. Foods you eat in bigger portions, like potatoes, beans and cooked greens, add up faster. Our list of 35 potassium-rich foods gives amounts per serving.
Magnesium: Nuts, Seeds, Leafy Greens and Whole Grains
Magnesium has a smaller but real effect. A meta-analysis of 34 placebo-controlled trials found that a median 368 mg a day of supplemental magnesium for about three months lowered blood pressure by 2.0/1.8 mmHg. The recommended intake is 400–420 mg a day for men and 310–320 mg for women, and the DASH studies aimed for 500 mg.
Good food sources include nuts and seeds, leafy greens such as spinach, beans, soy foods and whole grains. Our guide to magnesium-rich foods ranks 30 of them. If you're thinking about a supplement, ask your doctor first, especially if you have kidney disease.
Low-Fat Dairy
Two to three daily servings of fat-free or low-fat milk, yogurt or cheese are the DASH plan's major sources of calcium and protein. Choose plain yogurt over sweetened versions and lower-sodium cheeses where you can.
Beets and Beetroot Juice
Beetroot juice is a concentrated source of dietary nitrate. In a meta-analysis of 16 short trials, nitrate supplements or beetroot juice lowered systolic pressure by 4.4 mmHg. The trials lasted from two hours to 15 days, so treat beets as one helpful vegetable among many, not a treatment.
Fish, Poultry, Eggs and Healthy Fats
Keep lean meat, poultry and fish to about 6 ounces a day, and choose fish often. Eggs are fine: a 2020 meta-analysis of 15 trials found they had no significant effect on blood pressure. For cooking, the DASH plan uses vegetable oils such as canola, corn, olive or safflower, and soft margarine instead of butter.
Foods to Avoid With High Blood Pressure
Limit the foods that pack sodium, saturated fat, added sugar or alcohol into your day: processed and cured meats, salty snacks and packaged meals, fatty meats and full-fat dairy, sweets and sugary drinks, and alcohol. None of them is banned, but each one makes the DASH targets harder to hit.
| Food | Why it matters | Swap |
|---|---|---|
| Deli meats, bacon, sausage, hot dogs | Processed foods supply most of the sodium people eat | Home-cooked chicken, fish, eggs or beans |
| Canned soups, frozen meals, restaurant and fast food | Sodium | Homemade versions; low-sodium products |
| Chips, salted nuts, salted pretzels | Sodium | Unsalted nuts, unsalted popcorn or pretzels |
| Fatty red meat, full-fat cheese, butter, cream | Saturated fat; DASH keeps it near 6% of calories | Lean poultry, fish, low-fat dairy, vegetable oils |
| Sweets, soda, sweetened drinks | Added sugar; DASH allows 5 or fewer servings of sweets a week | Fruit, water, low-fat milk |
| Alcohol | Raises blood pressure in heavier drinkers | Fewer drinks and more alcohol-free days |
| Black licorice | Glycyrrhizic acid raises blood pressure | Other sweets, in small amounts |
| Grapefruit and its juice (only with some drugs) | Interacts with some blood pressure medications | Ask your pharmacist about your prescription |
Black licorice surprises people. In a 2024 randomized crossover trial in 28 healthy young adults, licorice containing 100 mg a day of glycyrrhizic acid raised home systolic pressure by 3.1 mmHg in two weeks, a dose previously thought safe. Grapefruit is a problem only with certain drugs: the FDA names nifedipine (Procardia, Adalat CC) as an example, and Seville oranges, pomelos and tangelos can act the same way.
Sodium: The Limits That Matter
Keep sodium under 2,300 mg a day, about one teaspoon of salt, and aim lower, toward 1,500 mg, if your blood pressure is high. Americans eat more than 3,300 mg a day on average, according to the CDC, and most of it comes from processed and restaurant foods rather than the salt shaker. Our low sodium diet guide shows where it hides and how to read labels for it.
The DASH-Sodium trial put 412 adults through 30 days each at about 3,300, 2,300 and 1,500 mg of sodium. Going from the highest to the lowest level lowered systolic pressure by a combined 6.7 mmHg on a typical American diet and by 3.0 mmHg on the DASH diet (our sums of the trial's two steps). The DASH diet at the lowest sodium level produced the lowest readings of all. The NHLBI notes the 1,500 mg level worked especially well for middle-aged and older adults, Black adults and people who already had high blood pressure.
Potassium-enriched salt substitutes are one way to cut sodium and add potassium at once. In a trial of 20,995 adults in rural China who had a past stroke, or were 60 or older with high blood pressure, a salt substitute made of 75% sodium chloride and 25% potassium chloride lowered the rate of stroke by 14% and death by 12% over almost five years. The 2025 AHA/ACC guideline now recommends these substitutes, but not for people with chronic kidney disease. For a full week of meals built around these limits, see our 7-day low sodium meal plan.
Alcohol and Caffeine
Alcohol raises blood pressure in a dose-dependent way, so drinking less helps; caffeine causes only a short-lived rise.
Alcohol
The 2025 guideline advises reducing or eliminating alcohol. If you drink, the long-standing limits are no more than two drinks a day for men and one for women, where one standard drink is 12 oz of 5% beer, 5 oz of 12% wine or 1.5 oz of 40% spirits.
The biggest gains go to heavier drinkers. A meta-analysis of 36 trials found that in people who drank more than two drinks a day, cutting back lowered blood pressure, and people who drank six or more a day and halved their intake saw drops of 5.5/4.0 mmHg. In people who drank two or fewer, cutting back made no significant difference.
Caffeine
Caffeine raises blood pressure briefly, but regular coffee drinking doesn't appear to keep it high. In a meta-analysis of trials in people with hypertension, 200–300 mg of caffeine raised blood pressure by 8.1/5.7 mmHg within the first hour, and the rise lasted at least three hours. Yet in two-week coffee studies blood pressure didn't rise, and cohort studies found no link between habitual coffee and heart disease.
A 12-oz cup of brewed coffee holds 113–247 mg of caffeine, and the FDA cites 400 mg a day as generally safe for healthy adults. Because the rise lasts hours, a reading taken soon after coffee can come out higher than your usual one.
Losing Weight Lowers Blood Pressure Too
If you carry extra weight, losing some lowers blood pressure by roughly 1 mmHg for every kilogram lost. In a meta-analysis of 25 trials with 4,874 participants, an average loss of 5.1 kg (about 11 lb) lowered blood pressure by 4.4/3.6 mmHg. Groups that lost more than 5 kg saw systolic drops of 6.6 mmHg.
The DASH plan lends itself to weight loss because it is rich in lower-calorie foods such as fruit and vegetables, and the NHLBI suggests swapping sweets for them to cut calories further. To find a realistic intake, our weight loss calculator estimates the daily calories for your goal. Caloria, the AI calorie tracker, sets a daily calorie target from your age, sex, height, weight and goal, and logs each meal's calories and macros from a photo, so you can see whether your DASH portions fit it.
A Sample Day on a High Blood Pressure Diet
This day hits the 2,000-calorie DASH serving targets for every food group. It is cooked without added salt, with herbs, garlic, lemon and spices for flavor.
Sample day: DASH servings for high blood pressure
- Breakfast: 1 cup cooked oatmeal with a sliced banana and cinnamon; 1 cup low-fat milk
- Lunch: Salad of 2 cups raw spinach, ½ cup cherry tomatoes and ½ cup chickpeas with 2 Tbsp vinaigrette; 2 slices whole-wheat bread; an orange
- Snack: 1 cup plain low-fat yogurt with ½ cup blueberries and ¼ cup dried apricots
- Dinner: 4 oz baked salmon; 1 cup cooked brown rice; 1 cup steamed broccoli tossed with 1 tsp olive oil
| Food group | Sample day | 2,000-kcal DASH target |
|---|---|---|
| Grains | 6 servings | 6–8 |
| Vegetables | 5 servings | 4–5 |
| Fruits | 4 servings | 4–5 |
| Low-fat dairy | 2 servings | 2–3 |
| Lean meat, poultry, fish | 4 oz | 6 oz or less |
| Nuts, seeds, legumes | 1 serving | 4–5 a week |
| Fats and oils | 2 servings | 2–3 |
| Sweets | 0 | 5 or less a week |
Serving counts are our tally using the NHLBI serving sizes above; calories depend on your exact portions.
For six more days built the same way, see our 7-day DASH diet meal plan.
When Diet Needs Medical Backup
Diet works alongside treatment, not instead of it, once blood pressure reaches certain levels. Under the 2025 AHA/ACC guideline, adults with stage 1 hypertension and a 10-year cardiovascular risk below 7.5% start with lifestyle changes for three to six months, while those at higher risk, and everyone with stage 2, also get medication.
A few groups need to adjust the advice above:
- Kidney disease: people with kidney problems, especially on dialysis, may need to limit potassium-rich foods and should avoid potassium salt substitutes unless their doctor approves.
- Medications that raise potassium: ACE inhibitors, ARBs and potassium-sparing diuretics such as spironolactone can raise blood potassium, so ask your doctor before adding a potassium salt substitute or supplement.
- Medications that interact with grapefruit: check your prescription's label or ask a pharmacist before eating grapefruit or drinking its juice.
If your readings drop after you change how you eat, tell your doctor rather than cutting your dose yourself.
What to Change First
You don't need to overhaul everything at once. The biggest gains come from adding produce, beans and low-fat dairy, then trimming sodium and alcohol:
The DASH trials used ordinary foods, not specialty products, and showed results within weeks. Start with the swaps that are easiest for you, then build from there.