The standard dose of baking soda for heartburn is half a teaspoon dissolved in a full glass of cold water. You can repeat this dose every two hours as needed, but adults under 60 should not exceed six half-teaspoon doses in 24 hours. Adults 60 and older should stop at three half-teaspoon doses per day.
The Right Amount and How to Take It
Stir half a teaspoon of plain baking soda (sodium bicarbonate) into a full glass of cold water, about 8 ounces, and drink it. The baking soda needs to be fully dissolved before you drink it. Take it after meals, not on a completely empty stomach, and wait at least two hours between doses.
If you’re using the effervescent powder form sold in stores rather than the box from your pantry, the dose is slightly different: 1 to 2½ teaspoons in a glass of cold water after meals, with a daily maximum of 5 teaspoons. The effervescent version is formulated differently, so the two aren’t interchangeable spoon-for-spoon.
Why It Works So Quickly
Baking soda is a base, and your stomach acid is, well, acid. When the two meet, they react almost immediately, neutralizing some of the acid and producing water, salt, and carbon dioxide gas. That gas is why you’ll probably burp shortly after drinking it. Relief typically begins within minutes, making it one of the fastest home remedies for occasional heartburn.
The tradeoff for that speed is duration. Baking soda doesn’t stop your stomach from producing new acid the way over-the-counter acid reducers do. It simply neutralizes what’s already there. For many people, the relief lasts 30 minutes to a couple of hours before the burning can return, which is why the dosing allows for a repeat every two hours.
The Sodium Problem
A single half-teaspoon of baking soda contains 616 milligrams of sodium. That’s more than a quarter of the 2,300 mg daily limit most health guidelines recommend. If you take the maximum six doses in a day, you’re consuming nearly 3,700 mg of sodium from baking soda alone, before counting anything you eat or drink.
This matters most if you have high blood pressure, heart disease, kidney problems, or are on a sodium-restricted diet. Even for otherwise healthy people, regularly hitting those sodium levels can contribute to fluid retention and elevated blood pressure over time. Baking soda is best treated as an occasional, short-term fix rather than a daily habit.
Risks of Taking Too Much
The biggest danger with baking soda isn’t the single dose. It’s overuse or taking too much at once, especially on a full stomach. When baking soda reacts with stomach acid, it generates carbon dioxide rapidly. In a stomach already stretched from a large meal, the sudden burst of gas can, in rare cases, cause the stomach wall to tear. Reported cases of gastric rupture involve people who took baking soda after eating heavily, when the stomach had little room to expand.
Chronic overuse creates a different problem. Taking large amounts regularly can push your blood’s pH out of its normal range, a condition called metabolic alkalosis. Symptoms include nausea, progressive weakness, confusion, and muscle twitching. In one documented case, a man in his 30s who had been consuming 60 grams of baking soda daily for two months developed severe alkalosis and dangerously high sodium levels requiring hospitalization. That’s roughly 15 teaspoons a day, well beyond the recommended maximum, but it illustrates how quickly things can escalate when baking soda is treated as harmless.
Who Should Avoid It
Baking soda is intended for adults and teenagers only. Dosing information for children under 12 has not been established, so it’s not appropriate for young kids. People over 60 are limited to three doses per day instead of six, likely because kidney function tends to decline with age, making it harder to clear the extra sodium and bicarbonate.
If you take any prescription medications, be aware that baking soda can interfere with how your body absorbs them. It changes the acidity of your stomach and urine, which affects how quickly certain drugs are broken down or eliminated. As a general rule, separate baking soda from other medications by at least two hours.
When Baking Soda Isn’t Enough
Baking soda is a reasonable option for the occasional bout of heartburn after a spicy meal or a late-night snack. It’s cheap, fast, and already in your kitchen. But if you’re reaching for it more than a few times a week, the heartburn itself is the issue worth addressing, not just the symptom. Frequent heartburn, generally defined as two or more episodes per week, often signals gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD), which can damage the esophagus over time if left unmanaged.
Over-the-counter antacids and acid reducers are designed for more regular use and carry far less sodium per dose. They also last longer, with some providing relief for 12 to 24 hours compared to baking soda’s brief window. For persistent symptoms, these are a better fit than repeatedly dosing baking soda throughout the day.