Is Ginger Ale Actually Good for a Cold?

Ginger ale sits somewhere between medicine and myth in the popular imagination, but the honest answer is that a standard can of commercial ginger ale does very little to fight a cold. Most brands contain negligible amounts of real ginger, a large dose of sugar, and carbonated water. The ginger plant itself, on the other hand, has genuine anti-inflammatory and airway-relaxing properties backed by laboratory research. The gap between those two facts is where the confusion lives, and it is a wide gap.

What Is Actually in a Can of Ginger Ale

If you flip over a can of mainstream ginger ale, the ingredient list reads like any other soft drink: carbonated water, high-fructose corn syrup or sugar, citric acid, natural flavors, and caramel color. The phrase “natural flavors” is doing a lot of heavy lifting. Major brands are not required to disclose exactly how much ginger extract goes into the recipe, and independent analyses have consistently found that the amount is tiny. Some formulations use ginger flavoring compounds rather than any extract from the root at all. A typical 12-ounce can delivers roughly 32 to 36 grams of added sugar, which is comparable to a cola.

This matters because the therapeutic reputation of ginger ale borrows entirely from the therapeutic reputation of ginger. The drink gets credit for the plant’s properties without actually delivering them in meaningful quantities. Drinking ginger ale for a cold is a bit like eating a strawberry-flavored candy and expecting the vitamin C benefits of actual strawberries.

Ginger the Plant Has Real Anti-Inflammatory Compounds

The ginger rhizome contains a family of bioactive compounds, most prominently gingerols and shogaols, that have shown consistent anti-inflammatory effects in laboratory studies. One of the most studied is 6-shogaol, which has been shown to reduce inflammatory markers like COX-2 and iNOS while activating protective pathways in cells and animal models.¹ These are some of the same inflammatory pathways targeted by over-the-counter pain relievers like ibuprofen, which is why ginger has attracted serious research attention.

The gingerol compounds also act as antioxidants, scavenging free radicals that contribute to tissue damage during infection. A comparative study found that 6-shogaol and 10-gingerol were the most potent radical scavengers among the ginger compounds tested, and all four major compounds significantly inhibited the production of inflammatory mediators in immune cells.² This is genuine pharmacological activity, not folk-remedy wishful thinking. But it comes from concentrated ginger, not from a beverage that uses a trace of ginger as a flavoring agent.

Lab Evidence for Ginger Against Respiratory Viruses

One of the more intriguing findings in ginger research involves its activity against human respiratory syncytial virus (HRSV), a common cause of respiratory illness. In cell-culture experiments, fresh ginger extract inhibited viral plaque formation in a dose-dependent manner. At high concentrations, fresh ginger reduced viral plaque counts to roughly 13 to 27 percent of untreated controls, depending on the cell line and timing of exposure. Fresh ginger was most effective when applied before the virus was introduced, and it appeared to interfere with both viral attachment and entry into cells. At higher concentrations, ginger also stimulated the cells to secrete interferon-beta, a signaling protein involved in antiviral defense.³

These results are genuinely interesting, but they come with a massive caveat: cell-culture studies are not the same as drinking something and feeling better. The concentrations used in these experiments are far higher than what you would get from eating ginger or drinking ginger tea, let alone from a can of ginger ale. The leap from “kills virus in a petri dish” to “treats a cold in a person” is one of the biggest in biomedical research, and many compounds that look promising in cell culture fail completely in human trials. Still, the antiviral data helps explain why ginger has been used in traditional medicine for respiratory infections across many cultures for centuries. There is something real happening at the molecular level, even if we cannot yet translate it into a reliable clinical treatment.

How Ginger Affects Your Airways

Beyond fighting inflammation and viruses in lab settings, ginger compounds have a direct physical effect on the airways that could genuinely matter during a cold. Several gingerols and shogaols have been shown to relax airway smooth muscle, the tissue that tightens during coughing, wheezing, and congestion. In one study using both guinea pig and human tracheal tissue, three of the four major ginger compounds tested induced rapid relaxation of precontracted airway muscle. In a mouse model, nebulized 8-gingerol significantly reduced airway resistance when administered before a bronchoconstriction challenge.⁴

A separate study looking at ginger extracts found a similar pattern: both water-based and alcohol-based ginger preparations relaxed tracheal tissue in a dose-dependent way, likely by blocking calcium channels in smooth muscle cells. The researchers concluded that this mechanism supports ginger’s traditional use for cough and airway complaints.⁵ If you have ever noticed that ginger tea seems to ease a tight, scratchy chest during a cold, this airway relaxation effect is a plausible explanation. But again, these effects depend on getting enough of the active compounds to your tissues, which a can of ginger ale almost certainly does not accomplish.

The Sugar Problem

The sugar load in commercial ginger ale is not just a nutritional footnote; it may actively work against you when you are fighting an infection. A typical can delivers the equivalent of about eight teaspoons of sugar. While your immune cells need glucose to function, elevated blood sugar can push the immune response in the wrong direction. Research has shown that high glucose levels can impair immune cell function and drive excessive production of pro-inflammatory cytokines, creating a situation where the body’s defense system is both less effective and more likely to produce collateral damage.⁶

This does not mean that one can of ginger ale will torpedo your immune system. The effect is a matter of degree and context, and a single serving is unlikely to cause a measurable problem in an otherwise healthy person. But if you are sipping ginger ale all day as your cold remedy of choice, you are consuming a substantial amount of sugar while getting essentially no therapeutic benefit from the ginger. That is a poor trade. Diet ginger ale sidesteps the sugar issue, but it still delivers almost no real ginger, so you are left with flavored sparkling water plus artificial sweetener.

Does Carbonation Help Your Stomach

Part of ginger ale’s reputation as a sick-day drink comes from the belief that it settles an upset stomach. A queasy stomach often accompanies colds and flu, so this is a reasonable concern. But the evidence on carbonation and digestion is not very supportive of the folk wisdom.

A study on carbonated beverages and gastrointestinal function found that stomach discomfort from carbonation tends to appear when people drink more than about 300 milliliters of a carbonated fluid, due to mechanical distension of the stomach.⁷ In other words, carbonation is more likely to cause stomach discomfort than to relieve it if you drink a standard serving or more. A separate study testing sweetened carbonated beverages at different levels of carbonation found no differences in gastric emptying, gallbladder function, or post-meal symptoms compared with non-carbonated alternatives. The researchers concluded that 300 milliliters of sweetened carbonated beverage did not meaningfully change upper digestive tract physiology.⁸

Real ginger, by contrast, has well-documented anti-nausea properties. Its compounds interact with serotonin receptors and other pathways involved in nausea signaling, which is why ginger has been studied extensively for motion sickness, post-surgical nausea, and chemotherapy-induced nausea.⁹ Flat ginger ale, which people sometimes let go still before drinking when they feel sick, removes the carbonation problem but still leaves you with sugar water and minimal ginger. You would be better off with actual ginger.

Why Hot Drinks Feel Like They Help

If ginger ale is not doing much, why do so many people swear that warm or hot beverages make them feel better during a cold? There is real science behind that perception, though it is not quite what people assume. A study at Cardiff University’s Common Cold Centre tested the effects of a hot fruit-flavored drink versus the same drink served at room temperature in people with cold and flu symptoms. The hot drink provided immediate, sustained relief of symptoms including runny nose, cough, sneezing, sore throat, chilliness, and tiredness, while the room-temperature version did not produce the same level of improvement. The researchers attributed the effect partly to a placebo mechanism and partly to genuine physiological effects on salivation and airway secretions.¹⁰

This finding actually argues against ginger ale, which is typically served cold. If you want the comfort and symptom relief that comes from a warm beverage, a cup of hot ginger tea made from real ginger root would deliver the temperature benefit, the fluid intake, and at least some of the bioactive compounds. A cold can of soda gives you none of those advantages. The steam from a hot drink can also help loosen nasal congestion, something a carbonated beverage at refrigerator temperature simply cannot do.

Better Ways to Actually Get Ginger’s Benefits

If ginger itself has real properties worth exploiting during a cold, the question becomes how to get enough of it in a useful form. A systematic review covering 109 randomized controlled trials of ginger found that most studies used daily doses in the range of 0.5 to 1.5 grams of ginger.¹¹ That is a small amount, roughly a half-inch to one-inch piece of fresh ginger root, grated or sliced. Making tea from that quantity is simple: steep sliced or grated fresh ginger in hot water for five to ten minutes, strain, and add honey or lemon if you want.

The way you prepare ginger also changes its chemistry. Heating ginger converts gingerols into shogaols, which tend to be more potent anti-inflammatory and antioxidant agents. As temperature increases, the conversion happens faster.¹² This means that brewing fresh ginger into hot tea may actually produce a more pharmacologically active drink than eating the same amount of raw ginger. Dried ginger powder, which has already undergone some of this conversion during processing, is another convenient option. You can stir a quarter teaspoon into hot water or broth.

Ginger supplements in capsule form are yet another route, though quality and actual ginger content vary widely between brands. If you go this route, look for standardized extracts that list the gingerol or shogaol content. For cold symptom relief specifically, though, the hot tea approach has the advantage of combining the bioactive compounds with the demonstrated benefits of hot fluid intake.

When Ginger Could Cause Problems

Ginger is generally safe at the doses found in food and tea, but it is not consequence-free for everyone. Research evaluating ginger’s potential for herb-drug interactions found that overconsumption could disturb the normal activity of certain liver enzymes and drug transporters, which could elevate the risk of interactions with conventional medications.¹³ This is particularly relevant for people taking blood thinners, certain heart medications, or diabetes drugs, since ginger can influence blood clotting and blood sugar regulation.

At the amounts you would get from a cup or two of ginger tea per day, interactions are unlikely to be clinically significant for most people. The concern is more about concentrated ginger supplements taken alongside prescription drugs. Pregnant women, who sometimes use ginger for morning sickness, should keep doses moderate and talk to their provider, since very high doses have raised theoretical concerns about uterine stimulation in some animal studies. Children under two generally should not be given concentrated ginger preparations, though small amounts in food are considered fine.

The Hydration Factor People Overlook

The one genuinely useful thing about ginger ale during a cold has nothing to do with ginger and everything to do with fluid. Staying hydrated is one of the most straightforward ways to support your body during a respiratory infection. Adequate fluid intake keeps mucus thinner and easier to clear, prevents dehydration from fever and mouth breathing, and supports the basic metabolic processes your immune system relies on. If someone who otherwise refuses to drink anything will sip ginger ale, the hydration benefit is real, even if it comes packaged with sugar and negligible ginger.

But water, broth, herbal tea, and diluted juice all accomplish the same thing without the downsides. If the appeal of ginger ale is psychological comfort during illness, that comfort has value too. Feeling cared for and having a familiar routine can reduce the subjective misery of being sick, and that effect is not trivial. The problem arises only when people treat ginger ale as medicine rather than comfort food, or when they choose it over options that would actually deliver therapeutic compounds alongside the fluids.

Why This Myth Persists

The ginger ale cold remedy is a perfect example of what happens when a legitimate traditional remedy gets industrialized into something unrecognizable. Ginger has been used medicinally in Chinese, Indian, and Middle Eastern traditions for thousands of years, and modern research has validated several of its purported mechanisms. At some point, the association between “ginger” and “stomach and respiratory relief” transferred onto “ginger ale,” a sweet carbonated drink that happens to share a name with the root. Generations of parents gave it to sick children, the children grew up and gave it to their own sick children, and the cycle continued without anyone stopping to check whether the drink actually contained enough ginger to matter.

The placebo component should not be dismissed entirely. If you grew up being handed a glass of ginger ale whenever you felt lousy, the ritual itself carries reassurance. The cold fizz on a sore throat can feel briefly soothing. And the mild calories from the sugar can be welcome when you have no appetite. None of these things are pharmacological, but they are real in the sense that they affect how you feel. The key is being honest about which benefits are coming from where: the comfort is psychological, the hydration is basic physiology, and the ginger is mostly absent.