4 Easy Ways to Improve Your Daily Water Intake

You probably don't drink enough water every day, but you need to for a healthy life. Check out four easy ways to drink more water.

Water is an essential nutrient that keeps us healthy. It can help us control our weight, and boosts our mood and energy levels. According to the United States Department of Agriculture, women need to drink about 91 ounces of total water a day, while men average 125 ounces. For most of us, that’s a tough goal to achieve. Let’s delve into these four fun and easy ways to improve your daily water intake.

1. Use a Drink Water Reminder App

Lifesum’s app has both a water tracker and a drink water reminder built right in. Just set your daily water bottle intake goal and the app does the rest. Tracked water intake is displayed in your diary, as well as featured tips to increase your daily consumption. For most of us with our active lives, it’s hard to remember every drink we’ve had throughout the day. By 8 p.m., are you really going to remember if you’ve had five or six bottles? Use Lifesum’s handy app to program and track water intake so you can create good water habits.

2. You Can Chew Your Water?

You don’t have to rely on just the water you drink to meet your daily intake goals. Foods like watermelon and spinach are almost 100 percent water by weight, and those numbers count. Plus, they’re full of amino acids, mineral salts, and vitamins that you’re body loves too. Eating water-rich fruits and vegetables like strawberries can also resupply your body with the fluids you lose when you work out. All that sweat needs to be replenished somehow, and you don’t want to reach for a glass full of artificial ingredients like those in most sports drinks.

3. Mix It Up

Add a little interest to your water routine — try drinking carbonated water. Its bubbly effervescence really hits the spot. Don’t forget that herbal teas, broth, and soups all count toward your daily intake requirements too.  Energy drinks and juices do contain a lot of water, but they may also contain a ton of sugar too. Good old-fashioned water is calorie-free, and you can always add a zero-calorie drink mix to your water. They come in a large variety of flavors, like the popular Crystal Light drink mixes, for a sweet-tasting treat.

4. Make It Convenient and Prep It

A fun trick to improve your daily water intake is to fill eight water bottles each night with filtered water. Add your favorite flavorings from fruits to cucumber, to lemon or a powdered mix like peach tea. Overnight, the bottles chill and infuse the water with flavor. Whenever you’re thirsty, just reach for one of your delicious premade drinks, icy cold in the fridge. Drink them all, and voila, you’ve met your daily quota. Use your water tracker app to remind you that they’re there.

Drinking water with each meal, and more before, during and after exercise are all easy ways to improve your daily water intake. Take in a big glass of water if you’re hungry too. We often confuse thirst with hunger, and that habit might save you a snack’s worth of calories every day.

All of the content and media on Lifesum is created and published for information purposes only. It is not intended to be used as a substitute for medical advice or treatment. Users should always consult with a doctor or other health care professional for medical advice. If you have or think you are at risk of developing an eating disorder, do not use the Lifesum app and seek immediate medical help.