Water makes up 70% of your body weight. All of this water is necessary for the optimal health of your body cells, tissues, and organs. The ‘liquid of life’ helps you maintain a safe body temperature, among many other body functions.

To stay hydrated and maintain a healthy body, you must replenish all the water you lose through sweating, breathing, and digestion. You can stay hydrated by drinking lots of fluids.

But, of all fluids, water remains the healthiest drink you can have. It is much healthier than diet soda drinks that marketers routinely promote as healthy thirst quenchers.

Sodas, in fact, alter your body metabolism than aid it as water does. While diet sodas are tastier than water and may even seem like a healthy way to quench your thirst, there are many reasons you should drink a glass of water instead. Below we discuss some of those reasons:

Reasons why water is healthier than diet soda

It is true that diet soda does not contain real sugar, which makes it a healthier drink than regular soda that has copious amounts of the sweet stuff. But the good likely ends there.

Diet soda contains many artificial additives, including the sweeteners themselves. The additives are full of chemicals that cause cravings for even sweeter, high-calorie foods. You get none of that from water. Among other benefits, cleaning drinking water:

• Mediates many chemical reactions in the body
• Helps to keep your skin hydrated, keeping it moist and elastic,
• Boosts energy by delivering important nutrients to your body’s organs,
• Regulates your body temperature
• Helps the body expel waste through urination, perspiration, and defecation
• Lubricates and cushions your joints, lessening the effects of conditions like arthritis, and help your enjoy physical exercises and sports
• Helps your body digest and get more out of the food you eat
• Helps with weight loss
• Prevents constipation

Why soda drinks are bad for your health

So are soda drinks really that bad for your health? Looking at the evidence, it appears so. And it’s because of all that sugar, including the artificial kind that’s lauded for minimal effect on your calorie count.

Diet soda is a carbonated drink that is loaded with artificial sweeteners. Though artificial sweeteners contain zero calories, they have their own harmful effects on your health. Here are some of the reasons why even diet soda isn’t good for your health:

• Artificial sweeteners in diet soda throw off body metabolism and cause cravings for sweeter junk food.
• Contribute to weight gain and lead to metabolic syndrome.
• Can lead to depression.
• Decrease bone mineral density and contribute to osteoporosis.
• Can trigger migraines and can cause headaches.

Even without calories, diet soda is not healthy. Certainly not healthier than water.  For the best hydration, you should drink water early in the mornings as well as before and after exercise.