Electrolyte powders are sold as though everyone needs one. Most people don’t. If you eat a normal diet and sweat moderately, you are getting adequate sodium and potassium from food, and an electrolyte packet is flavored water with a marketing budget.
Where they genuinely earn their place: long or hot training sessions, heavy sweaters, low-carb and fasting protocols that deplete sodium, illness with fluid loss, and hangovers. In those situations the right product matters — and the products differ enormously, by a factor of nearly twenty in sodium content alone.
This guide compares the major options by what is actually in them, explains which sodium level suits which situation, and covers the DIY version that costs a few cents.
The only spec that really matters: sodium
Why sodium dominates
Sodium is the primary electrolyte lost in sweat, by a wide margin. Potassium and magnesium losses are comparatively small. When people feel meaningfully better after an electrolyte drink, sodium is almost always doing the work.
The range is enormous
Per serving, the major brands span roughly 55mg to 1,000mg of sodium. That is not a small formulation difference — it is the difference between a token amount and a serious replacement dose. Buying the wrong end of that range for your situation is the most common mistake in this category.
How much you actually lose
Sweat sodium concentration varies widely between individuals — some people lose several times more per litre than others. Salt crusting on your skin or clothing after training is the practical tell that you are a salty sweater and need the higher-sodium options.
Potassium and magnesium
Both matter, but you lose far less of them in sweat, and most powders provide modest amounts regardless. Do not choose a product on its magnesium content — if you want magnesium, take magnesium.
Sugar: sometimes useful
A small amount of glucose speeds sodium and water absorption through the sodium-glucose cotransport mechanism, which is why oral rehydration solutions contain sugar. For sessions over about an hour, some carbohydrate is a feature. For daily sipping at a desk, it is unnecessary calories.
The comparison, by the numbers
LMNT — 1,000mg sodium, 200mg potassium, 60mg magnesium
By far the highest sodium content of the mainstream options, zero sugar, and priced accordingly. This is a genuine replacement dose built for people losing a lot of salt.
Best for: keto and low-carb diets, fasting, heavy sweaters, hot-weather endurance work, hangovers. Watch for: it tastes very salty if you are not actually depleted, and 1,000mg is a substantial share of a day’s sodium if you are watching blood pressure. Also among the most expensive per serving.
Liquid I.V. — around 500mg sodium, with sugar
Roughly half LMNT’s sodium, plus around 11g of sugar in the standard Hydration Multiplier. That sugar is deliberate — it drives the cotransport absorption the brand markets — but it also means you are drinking calories.
Best for: travel, illness, moderate exercise, anyone who wants a sweeter drink. Watch for: the sugar content, which is often overlooked. Check the label if you are tracking intake.
Nuun Sport — around 300mg sodium, low calorie
Effervescent tablets, roughly a third of LMNT’s sodium, minimal sugar, widely available and inexpensive per serving. The tablet format is genuinely convenient.
Best for: everyday hydration, moderate-length workouts, general use. Watch for: likely insufficient sodium for long or hot sessions if you sweat heavily.
Ultima Replenisher — around 55mg sodium, zero sugar
The gentlest option by a wide margin, stevia-sweetened, with six electrolytes plus zinc and selenium. At 55mg of sodium it is closer to flavored water than a rehydration product.
Best for: people who want flavor and trace minerals without sodium — those on sodium-restricted diets, or light activity. Watch for: do not expect it to fix cramping or heat-related fatigue; there is not enough sodium in it to do that.
DIY — whatever you want, for pennies
A quarter teaspoon of table salt is roughly 575mg of sodium. Add it to 500ml of water with a squeeze of citrus and a little honey or juice if you want carbohydrate. This is chemically equivalent to the commercial products at a small fraction of the cost, and lets you dial sodium to your actual need. The only thing you lose is convenience and flavor engineering.
Pedialyte and oral rehydration solutions
Formulated to clinical rehydration ratios rather than sports-marketing ratios, and genuinely well designed for illness and significant fluid loss. Unfashionable, inexpensive, effective.
What these actually cost
Price per serving, checked September 2026
LMNT lists around $1.50 per stick at standard pricing (roughly $45 for 30), dropping to about $1.30 on subscription and under $1 per stick on their largest bundle with Subscribe & Save. Liquid I.V. runs around $1.27 per stick (about $20 for 16). Nuun tablets are the cheapest of the branded options per serving, and Ultima sits in a similar range to Nuun.
Put that in context
A daily LMNT habit at list price is roughly $45 a month — more than most gym memberships. If you genuinely lose that much sodium daily, it is money well spent. If you are drinking one at a desk because hydration marketing worked, it is an expensive flavored water subscription.
The DIY comparison
A quarter teaspoon of table salt costs a fraction of a cent and delivers roughly 575mg of sodium. Add a pinch of lite salt for potassium and a squeeze of citrus. The gap between that and a $1.50 stick is entirely convenience, flavor, and packaging — not chemistry.
Where to actually spend
Buy the branded product for the situations that warrant a precise, palatable, portable dose — race day, travel, illness, a hot work shift. Use salt and water for routine top-ups at home. Most people who think they need an expensive daily habit need the high-sodium product two or three times a week and plain water the rest of the time.
Subscription pricing is where the savings are
Across all the major brands, subscribe-and-save and bulk bundles cut per-serving cost substantially — often 30-40%. If you have settled on a product you like, the subscription is the difference between reasonable and expensive. Prices change frequently, so check current figures before committing.
Matching the product to the situation
Sessions under an hour, indoors, moderate effort
Water. You do not need an electrolyte product for a 45-minute gym session in air conditioning, and the sports-drink industry would prefer you did not know that.
Sessions over 90 minutes, or any session in heat
300-1,000mg of sodium depending on how much you sweat and how hot it is. Add carbohydrate for anything over about an hour of continuous effort.
Keto, low-carb, or fasting
This is the single best use case. Low insulin increases sodium excretion through the kidneys, which is why “keto flu” — headache, fatigue, lightheadedness, cramping — is very often plain sodium depletion rather than carbohydrate withdrawal. A high-sodium product like LMNT genuinely resolves it. Our intermittent fasting guide covers the same issue on longer fasts.
Illness with vomiting or diarrhea
An oral rehydration solution designed for the purpose. This is a medical situation, not a fitness one, and the clinical formulations are better than the sports ones.
Hangovers
Alcohol suppresses vasopressin, which increases urination and fluid loss. Sodium plus fluid genuinely helps. High-sodium options work best here.
Desk-based daily sipping
Largely unnecessary if you eat normally. If you like the flavor and it makes you drink more water, that is a legitimate reason — just do not believe you are correcting a deficiency.
Hot-weather manual work
Genuinely high need. Construction, landscaping, kitchen work in summer — these are the jobs where people lose serious sodium daily and where the high-sodium products earn their price.
What the marketing gets wrong
“Dehydration affects most people”
Chronic mild dehydration in healthy adults with access to water is far less common than hydration marketing implies. Thirst is a reasonably good regulator. The people genuinely at risk are the elderly, the ill, and those working or training hard in heat.
“More electrolytes is better”
No. Sodium you do not need is simply excreted, and for salt-sensitive people it is a genuine consideration. Match the dose to the loss.
“Hydration multiplier” and absorption claims
The underlying science — sodium-glucose cotransport — is real and decades old. It is the basis of oral rehydration therapy. What is oversold is the implication that a branded ratio is meaningfully superior to salt, sugar, and water in the same proportions. It is not.
Trace mineral lists
Products listing a dozen minerals in microgram quantities are padding a label. Those amounts do not meaningfully contribute to your intake.
“Supports” language
“Supports hydration,” “supports energy,” and similar phrases are regulatory hedges, not claims of demonstrated effect. They mean nothing specific.
Cramping
The evidence that electrolyte depletion causes exercise-associated muscle cramps is weaker than commonly assumed — neuromuscular fatigue appears to be a larger factor. Sodium may help some people; it is not a guaranteed fix, and a product promising to eliminate cramps is overpromising.
How much sodium do you actually lose?
The numbers behind sweat
Sweat rates in exercising adults typically run somewhere between 0.5 and 2 litres per hour depending on intensity, heat, humidity, and individual physiology. Sodium concentration in that sweat varies even more widely between people — some lose a few hundred milligrams per litre, others well over a gram. Two people doing the identical session in the same room can have very different replacement needs.
Estimating your own losses
Weigh yourself naked before and after a training session, accounting for any fluid you drank during it. Each kilogram lost is roughly a litre of sweat. Combine that with whether you are a visibly salty sweater and you have a workable estimate without laboratory testing.
The salty-sweater test
White residue on your skin, stinging eyes from sweat running into them, salt stains on dark training clothes, or a gritty feel on your face after drying. Any of these suggests you are at the higher end of sodium loss and the 1,000mg products are aimed at you.
Why the 1,000mg products exist
Someone losing 1.5 litres of sweat per hour at 1,000mg of sodium per litre is down 1,500mg in a single hour of training. That is the population LMNT is formulated for. For someone doing 45 minutes on a treadmill in air conditioning, the same stick is dramatic overkill.
Daily baseline from food
Most Western diets provide well above the minimum sodium requirement already — often 3,000mg or more daily. This is why sedentary people rarely benefit from supplementation and why the low-sodium products can still be a reasonable choice for light users.
The exception: low-carb and very clean diets
Cutting processed food dramatically cuts dietary sodium, often without the person realising. Combine that with the increased renal sodium excretion that comes with low insulin and you can genuinely become depleted eating what looks like a very healthy diet.
Reading an electrolyte label
Check serving size first
Some brands quote numbers per two scoops or per two tablets. Comparing a one-serving product to a two-serving product makes one look dramatically stronger than it is. Normalise everything to a single serving before comparing.
Sodium chloride vs. sodium citrate
Both provide sodium. Citrate is gentler on the stomach for some people and slightly less salty tasting. Products often blend the two. Neither is meaningfully superior for absorption.
Magnesium forms matter here
Magnesium oxide is poorly absorbed and cheap; malate, citrate, and glycinate are better absorbed. Since electrolyte products contain only modest magnesium anyway, this is a minor point — but it tells you something about how carefully the product was formulated.
Sugar alcohols and sweeteners
Erythritol, stevia, sucralose, and monk fruit all appear across the category. Sugar alcohols in quantity can cause GI upset in some people, which is worth knowing if a product disagrees with you for reasons that have nothing to do with the electrolytes.
“Contains 6 electrolytes”
Chloride is one of them, and it comes free with sodium chloride. Counting it as a separate feature is padding. What matters is the sodium number.
Calorie content
Zero-sugar products are essentially calorie-free. Products built around glucose for absorption typically carry 40-50 calories per serving. Neither is wrong — but if you are drinking three a day and tracking intake, the difference adds up.
Situational protocols
Hot-weather endurance session, 2+ hours
Start hydrated. Aim for roughly 500-1,000mg of sodium per hour depending on your sweat rate, alongside 400-800ml of fluid and 30-60g of carbohydrate per hour if the effort is continuous. This is the scenario where the entire category earns its existence.
Morning gym session, air conditioned, under an hour
Water. Eat normally afterwards. No supplementation needed for the overwhelming majority of people.
Starting a low-carb diet
Front-load sodium in the first two weeks, which is when depletion symptoms peak. 1,000-2,000mg daily of added sodium, spread across the day, prevents most of what people call keto flu. Reduce once adapted.
Extended fast, 24 hours or more
Sodium, potassium and magnesium, with no calories. This is genuinely important rather than optional — much of the headache and lightheadedness attributed to fasting itself is electrolyte depletion, and it is straightforwardly preventable.
Stomach illness
An oral rehydration solution formulated to clinical ratios, sipped slowly and frequently rather than drunk in volume. If you cannot keep fluids down at all, or symptoms persist, that is a medical matter rather than a supplement one.
Long-haul flights
Cabin air is extremely dry and most people under-drink on flights. A single electrolyte serving plus deliberate water intake is a reasonable habit, and one of the more defensible everyday uses of the category.
Hangover
Fluid plus sodium, ideally before bed and again on waking. Some carbohydrate helps. It will not undo the alcohol, but the dehydration component is real and addressable.
A closing perspective
The category is real, the marketing is not
Electrolyte replacement is legitimate physiology with decades of clinical use behind it in the form of oral rehydration therapy. What has happened recently is that a genuinely useful product for a narrow set of situations has been marketed to everyone, every day, at a premium price.
The honest recommendation
Work out whether you are actually losing significant sodium. If you are — long sessions, real heat, heavy sweating, low-carb, fasting, illness, physical outdoor work — buy a high-sodium product and use it in those situations. If you are not, drink water, eat food, and spend the money elsewhere.
And if you just like it
That is a legitimate reason too. If a flavored electrolyte drink is the thing that gets you drinking enough water during the day, the indirect benefit is real even when the direct one is marginal. Just buy it knowing that is what you are paying for.
Electrolytes and specific health situations
High blood pressure
This is the one group who should approach the high-sodium products carefully. A 1,000mg stick is a substantial fraction of the intake many people with hypertension are advised to stay under. That does not make electrolytes off-limits — an athlete with well-controlled blood pressure losing real sodium in training still needs to replace it — but it is a conversation worth having with whoever manages your care rather than a decision to make from a product page.
Kidney disease
Impaired kidneys handle potassium poorly, and potassium supplementation can be genuinely dangerous in that context. Anyone with reduced kidney function should not take electrolyte products containing meaningful potassium without medical guidance.
Pregnancy
Fluid and electrolyte needs rise, and nausea and vomiting in early pregnancy can cause real losses. Oral rehydration solutions are well established here. Very high-sodium sports products are less studied in this population, so the clinical formulations are the safer default.
Older adults
Thirst sensation declines with age, which makes genuine dehydration considerably more likely — this is one of the populations where hydration concern is warranted rather than marketing. Moderate sodium products and consistent fluid intake matter more here than in healthy younger adults.
Medications that affect fluid balance
Diuretics, some blood pressure medications, lithium, and several others interact meaningfully with sodium and potassium intake. If you take any of these, a daily electrolyte habit is something to raise with your prescriber rather than start independently.
Children
For illness, use paediatric oral rehydration solutions at the labelled dose. Adult sports electrolyte products are not formulated for children’s body mass and the high-sodium versions in particular are inappropriate.
This article is general information, not medical advice. If you have high blood pressure, kidney disease, are pregnant, or take medication affecting fluid or electrolyte balance, speak with a qualified healthcare professional before adding an electrolyte supplement. Prices and formulations were checked in September 2026 and change frequently.
Sports drinks vs. electrolyte powders
What Gatorade actually is
A traditional sports drink is a carbohydrate delivery system with some sodium attached — typically around 100-160mg of sodium per 12oz alongside 20-plus grams of sugar. It was designed for athletes doing prolonged work who need both fuel and fluid, and for that purpose it is perfectly reasonable. It is a poor choice for someone who wants sodium without calories.
Why the powder category emerged
Two groups were badly served by traditional sports drinks: people on low-carb diets who wanted sodium without sugar, and endurance athletes who wanted far more sodium than a sports drink provides. The zero-sugar high-sodium powders exist to fill that gap, and the growth of keto and fasting is a large part of why the category exploded.
Coconut water
Genuinely high in potassium, low in sodium — roughly the inverse of what you lose in sweat. Pleasant drink, poor rehydration solution on its own. Add a pinch of salt and it becomes considerably more useful.
Milk
Consistently performs well in rehydration research because it contains sodium, potassium, carbohydrate, and protein, and is absorbed slowly enough to be retained rather than urinated out. Unfashionable, cheap, and effective for post-exercise recovery.
Pickle juice
Popular for cramping, and there is some evidence it helps — but the mechanism appears to be a reflex triggered in the mouth and throat rather than electrolyte replacement, since relief arrives faster than absorption could explain. Interesting, and cheap to try.
The honest ranking for pure rehydration
For serious fluid loss: an oral rehydration solution. For training: a high-sodium powder matched to your sweat rate. For general daily use: water and food. For post-exercise recovery with a protein component: milk. The expensive branded powder is the right answer for a narrower set of situations than its marketing implies.
One last cost check
Electrolyte powders are priced per stick, which makes comparison harder than it needs to be. Work out the cost per gram of sodium rather than the cost per serving — that single conversion usually reorders the list, because the premium brands and the budget brands are often dosing very differently. If you are using one or two sticks a day through summer, a fifty-cent difference per serving is a few hundred dollars a year, which is enough to justify five minutes with a calculator before you subscribe to anything.
Frequently asked questions
Do I actually need an electrolyte supplement?
Most people, most days, no. If you eat a normal diet and exercise moderately in temperate conditions, food provides adequate sodium and potassium. They become genuinely useful for long or hot sessions, heavy sweating, low-carb diets, fasting, and illness.
Which electrolyte powder has the most sodium?
Among mainstream options, LMNT at 1,000mg per stick. Liquid I.V. is around 500mg, Nuun Sport around 300mg, and Ultima around 55mg. That range is the main thing separating these products.
Is Liquid I.V. better than LMNT?
They are built for different purposes. Liquid I.V. has roughly half the sodium plus sugar, which aids absorption and adds calories. LMNT is zero sugar with a much larger sodium dose. Choose on your sodium need and whether you want the carbohydrate.
Can I just use salt water?
Yes. A quarter teaspoon of table salt in 500ml of water is roughly 575mg of sodium, chemically equivalent to what you are buying in a packet. Add citrus and a little juice or honey if you want flavor and carbohydrate. You lose convenience and taste, not effectiveness.
Do electrolytes stop muscle cramps?
Sometimes, but the evidence is weaker than the marketing suggests. Neuromuscular fatigue appears to play a larger role in exercise-associated cramping than electrolyte loss. Sodium is worth trying; it is not a guaranteed fix.
Are electrolyte drinks bad for blood pressure?
A 1,000mg sodium serving is a meaningful share of a day’s intake, and anyone with hypertension or salt sensitivity should account for it. For most healthy, active people replacing genuine sweat losses, it is not a concern.
Should I drink electrolytes every day?
Only if your daily losses justify it — hot-weather work, heavy training, a low-carb diet. Otherwise you are paying for flavored water. If it makes you drink more, that is a real if indirect benefit.
Do electrolytes break a fast?
Zero-calorie electrolyte products do not meaningfully affect a fast, and sodium replacement is one of the more useful things you can do during an extended one. Sugar-containing versions do contain calories.
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