Is It Safe to Drink Clove Water During Pregnancy?

Clove water made with a small number of whole cloves steeped in hot water is generally regarded as safe during pregnancy when consumed in amounts typical of food flavoring. The trouble is that “clove water” has no standard recipe, and the concentration of active compounds can vary wildly depending on how many cloves you use, how long you steep them, and whether you’re adding clove oil or powder. No rigorous human trials have tested clove water specifically in pregnant women, which means the reassurance about culinary quantities sits alongside genuine uncertainty about what happens at higher doses.

What Makes Clove Water Biologically Active

Cloves are not a bland spice. They are one of the most phenol-rich plant materials used in cooking, and the compound responsible for most of their biological punch is eugenol. A gas chromatography analysis of clove aqueous extract found that eugenol accounted for the largest share of its chemical makeup, with 58 different compounds identified in total.¹ Eugenol is what gives cloves their distinctive warm, numbing flavor, and it is the same compound that makes clove oil a folk remedy for toothaches. Other active components include eugenol acetate and gallic acid.²

This matters for pregnancy because eugenol is not inert. It interacts with several body systems: it affects how blood clots, how the liver processes toxins, and how reproductive hormones behave. At the concentrations found in a single cup of lightly spiced tea, those interactions are minimal. At higher concentrations, they become medically relevant. The entire safety question around clove water in pregnancy comes down to how much eugenol and its related compounds you’re actually consuming.

The Difference Between Food Amounts and Medicinal Amounts

One survey of herbal use among pregnant Saudi women noted that cloves consumed “in food and in small amounts” are generally considered safe, while also acknowledging that “there is insufficient information about the possible adverse effects of consuming cloves in large amounts during pregnancy.”³ That distinction between food-level and supplement-level doses runs through virtually all the safety literature on cloves.

A cup of clove water made by steeping one or two whole cloves in boiling water for five to ten minutes extracts a relatively small amount of eugenol. Compare that to someone who stirs in half a teaspoon of concentrated clove oil, or who brews a strong decoction from a tablespoon of ground cloves. The eugenol content in the second scenario can be many times higher. Clove essential oil is roughly 70 to 90 percent eugenol by weight, so even a few drops dramatically change the dose profile. There is no widely accepted threshold that separates a “food amount” from a “medicinal amount” during pregnancy, which is part of why the guidance tends to be vague.

If you are making clove water at home, keeping it light (one or two whole cloves per cup, steeped briefly) puts you squarely in the culinary range. Adding clove essential oil to water, or brewing a highly concentrated batch meant to last the day, pushes you into territory where the safety data simply doesn’t exist for pregnant women.

Hormonal and Uterine Concerns

One of the more specific worries about clove during pregnancy involves its effects on reproductive hormones. A comprehensive review covering 76 studies found that clove and its main constituents, especially eugenol and β-caryophyllene, can influence sex hormone levels, fertility, the menstrual cycle, and other aspects of reproductive function.⁴ The same review noted that the main mechanism behind these effects is not well understood, and that the type of extract, dose, and duration of use all matter.

In a rat study on polycystic ovarian syndrome, eugenol administration shifted hormone levels toward normal values, affecting FSH, progesterone, testosterone, and estradiol.⁵ On one hand, that hormonal activity is the reason clove has been studied as a potential treatment for reproductive disorders. On the other hand, the ability to modulate reproductive hormones is exactly what you want to be cautious about during pregnancy, when hormonal balance supports the developing fetus.

A broader review of essential oils and pregnancy raised concerns about the potential for some essential oil constituents to cause abortion, modulate reproductive hormones, produce maternal toxicity, or harm the developing embryo.⁶ That review covered essential oils generally rather than clove specifically, and the doses involved in animal studies tend to be far higher than what you’d get from a cup of spiced water. Still, the finding explains why many healthcare providers are cautious about recommending concentrated herbal preparations during pregnancy.

Blood-Thinning Effects

Eugenol and its derivative acetyl eugenol are potent inhibitors of platelet aggregation, the process that makes blood clot. Lab research found that acetyl eugenol abolished the platelet-clumping response triggered by arachidonic acid at low concentrations and produced dose-dependent inhibition of collagen-triggered clotting as well.⁷

For most people, a mild antiplatelet effect from spiced food is a non-issue. During pregnancy, the calculus changes. Pregnancy already shifts the balance of clotting factors, and many pregnant women take prenatal supplements that include omega-3 fatty acids, which themselves have mild blood-thinning properties. If you are approaching delivery, have a scheduled cesarean section, or have been diagnosed with a clotting disorder or placenta previa, even a modest additional antiplatelet effect from concentrated clove water could matter. A light cup of clove tea is unlikely to cause problems, but drinking it in large quantities or combining it with other blood-thinning agents (including high-dose fish oil or aspirin) deserves a conversation with your provider.

Liver Safety and Why Concentration Matters

The liver processes eugenol, and at high doses the compound can overwhelm the liver’s detoxification capacity. A case report described a 15-month-old child who developed fulminant liver failure after ingesting just 10 milliliters of clove oil, with liver enzyme levels spiking above 13,000 U/L and kidney function deteriorating sharply.⁸ That’s a small child swallowing concentrated oil, not an adult sipping spiced water, but the case demonstrates that eugenol is genuinely toxic at high doses.

Animal research has helped quantify the boundary. In rats, 10 milligrams per kilogram of body weight was found to be safe for long-term consumption, while doses of 20 milligrams per kilogram and above caused structural and functional liver damage.⁹ Translating animal doses to humans is imprecise, but the pattern is consistent: eugenol has a margin of safety at culinary levels, and that margin narrows quickly as the dose climbs.

Pregnancy adds a wrinkle because the liver is already working harder. It processes increased blood volume, metabolizes additional hormones, and handles the byproducts of fetal development. Loading it with a concentrated herbal preparation on top of that workload is a risk that has simply never been studied. This is another reason why dilute clove water is treated differently from clove oil or strong decoctions.

Clove Aromatherapy for Morning Sickness

Interestingly, one of the few studies that actually tested clove in pregnant women used it as aromatherapy rather than an oral preparation. Researchers at a community health center evaluated clove aromatherapy in pregnant women experiencing nausea and vomiting. Before the intervention, 70 percent of participants had moderate symptoms and 30 percent had mild symptoms. After the aromatherapy sessions, 75 percent shifted to mild nausea and only 25 percent remained at moderate levels, a statistically significant improvement.¹⁰

This is a single, small study and not grounds for strong clinical claims. But it does suggest that if you’re drawn to clove during pregnancy primarily because of nausea, inhaling the scent rather than drinking a concentrated water might give you some of the benefit with less concern about internal dose. Aromatherapy delivers trace amounts of volatile compounds through the nose and lungs, a fundamentally different exposure pathway than swallowing eugenol dissolved in water. That said, some pregnant women find strong scents make nausea worse rather than better, so this is very much an individual-response situation.

Why Your Doctor Will Probably Say “Just Be Cautious”

If you ask your obstetrician about clove water, the response will almost certainly be some version of “a little in your food is fine, but don’t go overboard.” This isn’t dismissiveness. It reflects the genuine state of the evidence. As one review in a major obstetrics journal put it, there are no rigorous scientific studies on the safety of dietary supplements during pregnancy, and it should not be assumed that they are safe for the developing fetus.¹¹

The absence of evidence of harm is not the same as evidence of safety. Cloves have been used in cooking for centuries, and populations that regularly consume clove-spiced food do not show obvious patterns of pregnancy complications. That long track record of culinary use is reassuring, but it only covers what amounts to a food-level dose. Nobody has run a randomized controlled trial giving pregnant women measured daily doses of clove water and tracking outcomes. Until that happens, the advice will stay general.

Providers tend to be especially cautious in the first trimester, when organ development is most sensitive to outside influences, and again in the weeks leading up to delivery, when the blood-thinning properties become a more pressing concern. If you enjoy clove water and want to continue drinking it during pregnancy, keeping the concentration low and the frequency moderate is the safest practical approach.

Common Misconceptions About Herbal Safety in Pregnancy

“Natural” and “safe” are not interchangeable, and this trips people up more often with spices than with anything else. The reasoning goes: cloves are a food, foods are safe, therefore clove water is safe. The problem is that steeping or extracting concentrates the active compounds far beyond what you’d get by sprinkling ground cloves on a dish. A pinch of clove in a curry versus a strong overnight infusion of fifteen cloves in a jar of water are not the same exposure, even though both start with the same plant.

Another common belief is that herbal remedies have been “used for centuries by pregnant women,” which is sometimes presented as proof of safety. Historical use does tell us something: widespread, obvious toxicity would probably have been noticed and avoided. But subtle effects on miscarriage rates, fetal development, or birth outcomes would have been invisible in pre-modern populations, where those outcomes had many competing causes. Traditional use is a starting point for safety assessment, not a conclusion.

A third misconception is that if clove oil is dangerous, clove water must be too. Clove essential oil is a concentrated product that can cause tissue burns if applied undiluted to the skin. Clove water made with whole cloves contains a fraction of the eugenol found in the oil. Lumping them together leads to unnecessary fear on one side and false confidence on the other. The relevant question is always about the dose and form of the preparation you’re actually consuming.

Practical Tips for Pregnant Women Who Want Clove Water

If you’ve weighed the information and want to continue with clove water during your pregnancy, a few practical habits can keep your exposure in the culinary range:

• Use whole cloves: One or two whole cloves per cup of hot water, steeped for five to ten minutes, produces a mildly flavored drink with low eugenol extraction compared to ground clove or essential oil preparations.
• Skip the oil: Never add clove essential oil to drinking water during pregnancy. The concentration jump is enormous, and the liver toxicity data make this a clear avoidance situation.
• Keep it occasional: Drinking clove water once or twice a week is different from drinking it daily in large mugs. Without dose-response data in pregnant women, moderation is the only available safety strategy.
• Watch for interactions: If you’re taking blood thinners, low-dose aspirin (sometimes prescribed in pregnancy for preeclampsia risk), or other herbal supplements, mention your clove water habit to your provider. The antiplatelet effects can stack.
• First trimester caution: Many obstetricians recommend extra caution with any herbal preparation during the first twelve weeks, when fetal organ development is most active.

When Clove Water Is Worth Avoiding Entirely

There are a handful of situations where even mild clove water is probably not worth the uncertainty. If you have a history of recurrent miscarriage, your provider may advise eliminating anything with hormonal activity from your diet, including concentrated herbal teas. If you have liver disease, the hepatotoxic potential of eugenol at any dose above trivial becomes a real concern. If you are within two to three weeks of your due date or have a scheduled cesarean, the antiplatelet effects are most relevant, because even mild interference with clotting matters during delivery and surgery.

Women with high-risk pregnancies, including those with gestational diabetes, preeclampsia, or placental abnormalities, are generally advised to stick to well-studied foods and beverages. Clove water is not well-studied enough to make it onto the “clearly fine” list for complicated pregnancies, even if it is almost certainly harmless for a low-risk pregnancy at food-level doses. The honest answer is that the data gap is real, and in situations where the stakes are higher, that gap matters more.