When temperatures climb, many people reach for ice-cold beverages to cool down. But others put the kettle on: Hot tea is a go-to beverage year-round in countries such as Bangladesh, India, Japan and Saudi Arabia. Many people find hot tea refreshing on hot days — and in traditional Chinese medicine, specific teas are said to have cooling properties even when consumed hot. But can hot drinks really cool you down on a hot day?
It turns out, hot drinks can indeed have a cooling effect on the body, but it depends on the context, experts told Live Science.
According to Peter McNaughton, a professor of pharmacology at King’s College London who studies thermoregulation, hot drinks really can cool you down. “It seems totally counterintuitive,” McNaughton told Live Science. Still, “Drinking a hot drink really does make you drop your temperature” if it’s not too humid out, he said.
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