Perrier is a perfectly healthy drink for most people. It hydrates just as well as still water, contains meaningful amounts of calcium, and won’t damage your bones or teeth. For the average person looking to replace sugary drinks or just make water more interesting, Perrier is a solid choice with a few minor caveats worth knowing about.
Hydration: Equal to Still Water
The most basic question about any water is whether it actually hydrates you, and Perrier passes easily. Research using the beverage hydration index, which measures how much fluid your body retains after drinking different beverages, found that sparkling water scored identically to regular still water. The carbonation doesn’t cause you to urinate more or lose fluid faster. If you find yourself drinking more water because you enjoy the fizz, that’s a net positive.
What’s Actually in Perrier
Perrier comes from a spring in Vergèze, France, though its “naturally sparkling” reputation took a hit in 1990 when the FDA required the company to drop that label. Investigators found that the water and carbon dioxide are collected separately and recombined during bottling.
What makes Perrier different from plain seltzer is its mineral content. According to the company’s 2022 water analysis report, a liter contains 150 mg of calcium, 9 mg of sodium, and 3.5 mg of magnesium. That calcium number is notable. Since adults need around 1,000 mg of calcium daily, drinking a liter of Perrier covers about 15% of your daily needs without any calories. The sodium content is negligible, so it’s not a concern for people watching salt intake.
Effects on Digestion
This is where individual experience varies the most. Some people find that carbonated water settles their stomach and helps with indigestion. Others get the opposite effect: bloating, gas, and discomfort, especially when drinking large amounts quickly. Drinking through a straw tends to make the gas and bloating worse because you swallow extra air along with the bubbles.
If you have acid reflux or GERD, carbonated water may aggravate your symptoms. Gastroenterologists at UChicago Medicine recommend that people with these conditions switch to non-carbonated beverages. But for people without existing digestive issues, the carbonation in Perrier is unlikely to cause problems in moderate amounts.
One study tested whether carbonation affects how quickly your stomach empties after drinking. Researchers found that highly carbonated beverages temporarily expanded the stomach during the first 20 minutes, but this didn’t translate into any meaningful change in how fast the stomach processed the liquid.
Bone Health: Not a Concern
The idea that sparkling water weakens bones has been around for years, but the evidence doesn’t support it. The concern originally came from phosphoric acid, a chemical found in colas, which could theoretically interfere with calcium absorption. Perrier and other sparkling mineral waters don’t contain phosphoric acid.
Researchers at Tufts University examined data from 2,500 men and women in the Framingham Osteoporosis Study and found that non-cola carbonated drinks had no association with lower bone mineral density. Cola drinks did show a link to lower hip bone density in women, but that’s a cola-specific issue, not a carbonation issue. A separate clinical trial published in the British Journal of Nutrition compared postmenopausal women drinking carbonated versus non-carbonated mineral water for eight weeks and found no difference in markers of bone turnover. Sparkling water doesn’t contribute to osteoporosis.
Tooth Enamel: Minimal Risk
Carbonated water is slightly more acidic than still water because dissolved CO2 forms a weak acid. But according to research highlighted by the American Dental Association, sparkling water and regular water had roughly the same effect on tooth enamel in lab testing. The ADA’s conclusion: “it’s all just water to your teeth.”
The one exception is flavored varieties. Citrus-flavored sparkling waters, including Perrier’s lemon and lime options, have higher acid levels that do increase the risk of enamel erosion over time. If you drink flavored Perrier regularly, you can reduce the impact by not sipping it slowly over hours and rinsing with plain water afterward. Plain, unflavored Perrier is the safer bet for your teeth.
Appetite and Weight
You might expect that the fullness from carbonation would curb your appetite, but research on satiety found no significant effect. A study of 15 healthy adults showed that carbonation levels in a drink didn’t change subjective feelings of fullness.
There’s an interesting counterpoint, though. A study involving 20 healthy male students found that drinking carbonated beverages increased blood levels of ghrelin, a hormone that stimulates hunger, compared to non-carbonated drinks. The same pattern appeared in animal testing. This doesn’t mean Perrier will make you overeat, but it does suggest that the “fizz makes you feel full” idea may be more myth than reality. In practice, replacing sugary sodas or juices with Perrier is still a clear win for weight management simply because you’re cutting calories.
Who Should Limit Perrier
For most people, Perrier is a healthy, zero-calorie beverage that provides some useful minerals. The groups who should think twice are relatively small: people with GERD or chronic acid reflux, people who experience significant bloating from carbonation, and anyone who finds that fizzy water triggers digestive discomfort. If you fall into one of those categories, still water is the better default. For everyone else, drink as much as you enjoy.