A Dietitian Explains How Much More Water You Should Be Drinking in the Summer

Even if your canteen is already an extension of your arm, summer is here to test your commitment to hydration by adding to your daily water quota.

“You should definitely up your water intake during the hot summer months. When you’re sweating, you lose water and electrolytes, which can make you feel lousy, dizzy, or imbalanced,” Tracy Lockwood Beckerman, MS, CDN, RD, and author of The Better Period Food Solution, confirmed.

In her opinion, that means adding 12 ounces of water to your diet for every half hour you’re working up a sweat.

But, how much should you be consuming in the first place? Let’s remove summer from the conversation for a moment. Lori Zanini, RD, and creator of For the Love of Diabetes, previously explained to POPSUGAR that the average person should consume half of their bodyweight (in pounds), in fluid ounces, daily. So, if you’re 175 pounds, you should aim for 88 ounces of water (or 11 cups) per day.

Related: Don’t Drink Enough Water? Take Our 7-Day Hydration Challenge!

Once you add beach time, your rollerblading sessions, and a broken air conditioner (or whatever makes you schvitz from June to September) to the equation, it’s fair to assume your Brita will be working overtime.

Sure, there will be days when you lose track of your sips – that’s when Beckerman resorts to what she calls “the color method”: “If your urine is a pale light yellow to clear, you are well hydrated. If it’s not, drink up! Your water needs may go up or down based on age, activity level, [and] temperature, so tune into what your body needs in order to hydrate it properly.”

Practicing water-drinking discipline will be well worth your efforts, though, as water is the single largest component in the human body, Beckerman explained.

For that reason, proper hydration plays a major role in numerous metabolic functions such as digestion, muscle cramping, regulating body temperature, nausea, headaches, breathing, and all-around good health.

And since all roads to feeling good (well, most) seem to lead back to proper hydration, you can bet I’ll be beaching and blading with my water bottle in hand from now on.

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