Your social media feed is likely covered with celebrities, influencers, and friends trying out this popular trend and spouting its praises. But are all the claims too good to be true? Can cold plunges really cause fat loss, boost energy, relieve sore muscles, and more?

The answers are both yes and no. Ice baths have some major health benefits backed by science, but a few of the commonly touted effects are still based more on anecdotes than facts.

Let's get into what the latest science has to say about the benefits of ice baths.

As with many other wellness trends, interest in ice baths surged once they became popular on social media. People all over the world are jumping into cold lakes, plunging into bathtubs full of ice, visiting Nordic spas, and capturing their experiences on video.

Though plunging yourself into teeth-chatteringly cold water doesn't sound too appealing at face value, the footage of countless people doing this and immediately feeling strikingly positive effects certainly makes it intriguing, even for the most skeptical. 

It might seem like ice baths are a modern invention based on this recent hype, but that couldn't be further from the truth. Cold therapy has been around for centuries in several cultures. 

Modern therapeutic uses stem from the idea that cold therapy can decrease bodily inflammation and promote healing. A similar concept is used in whole-body cryotherapy and the common tactic of applying ice to injuries.

At a basic level, cold exposure causes blood vessels to constrict which reduces blood flow, pain, and swelling. This also causes blood to move closer to the core where it becomes more oxygenated. After warming up, the blood vessels dilate and a flow of richly oxygenated blood can surge back into the tissues to promote healing. 

This sounds promising, but it still doesn't tell us the full story of what ice baths help with or if this trend is worth your while.

Perhaps the most sought-after benefits of cold therapy today are the mental health benefits of ice baths.

An important thing to note before examining these benefits is thatice baths are not an effective treatment for serious mental struggles. If you need help, you should always reach out to a doctor, psychiatrist, psychologist, or other mental health specialist.

That being said, recent research has begun to uncover several ways ice baths can noticeably improve mental health.

Many of the mental health benefits of ice baths stem from changes in hormone secretions. Cold therapy alters several hormones, but one particularly interesting one is the stress hormone cortisol.

In the short term, high cortisol levels can make you feel alert and focused. Caffeine increases cortisol levels, so this may give you an idea of what elevated cortisol feels like. Chronically high cortisol levels however have been linked to many mental health disorders including depression. 

Cold plunges provide a cortisol spike during and shortly after cold exposure, but in the long term, they've been shown to help reduce high cortisol levels which could have a positive impact on mental health. 

Another interesting physiological effect of ice baths relevant to mental health is how they improve something called vagal tone. The vagus nerve makes up a major component of the central nervous system which in its totality largely controls how we think, feel, and act. 

Low vagal tone is associated with depression and low-stress resilience, and it's thought to be an overall marker of poor nervous system health. Cold plunges have been shown to stimulate the vagus nerve, and evidence implies this can enhance stress resilience and nervous system health; two very significant contributors to mental well-being.

An important thing to note with the current body of research on cold plunges and mental health is that despite promising studies, research is still in the early days. There aren't yet enough large-scale studies specifically looking at mental health and cold plunges to make indisputable claims.  

What we have is knowledge of how cold plunges affect the body physiologically and the implications for how that can improve mental health. There are also mountains of anecdotal claims touting cold plunging's mental health benefits, so you may just have to try it out to see for yourself.

On top of mental benefits, ice baths have pretty substantial evidence for improving physical health. A few of the most reputable benefits are an increased metabolism, better blood sugar regulation, and most famously: better workout recovery.

Workout recovery is one of the main uses of ice baths. The theory behind its effectiveness lies in how cold exposure downregulates the inflammation response and alters blood flow to enhance tissue repair. 

As mentioned earlier, blood flows towards the core and becomes more oxygenated when the body is immersed in cold water. Once this blood flows back into the muscles, it can help clear away lactate buildup more effectively due to the increased oxygen. This has been shown in some small-scale studies, though it hasn't yet been tested thoroughly in many large-scale trials.

The health benefits of ice baths related to metabolism and blood sugar regulation are linked to the same bodily adaptation: brown fat thermogenesis. Studies on both animal and human subjects have shown that cold water exposure can increase the conversion of white fat cells to beige or brown fat cells. 

This is notable because brown fat is a metabolically active tissue, meaning it burns energy in the way lean muscle tissue does. White fat cells on the other hand don't alter metabolism and instead are essentially energy storage centers. 

This means cold water exposure can increase metabolism, and higher metabolisms make it much easier to achieve and maintain a lean body composition. However, the extent of this effect and what specific conditions create it remains to be seen. Cold plunging can indirectly help with weight loss, but to what degree is still up for debate.

Although ice baths have many benefits, they can do more harm than good if done incorrectly. For example, ice baths that are too cold or too long can cause frostbite or hypothermia. These side effects are rare, but it’s still worth being mindful of.

Even mild cold plunge temperatures can be dangerous for those with heart conditions since cold therapy causes heart rate and blood pressure to temporarily increase. Ice bathing is also not recommended for people with circulation issues since their blood vessels may not dilate well enough to warm up their tissues after cold exposure.

Essentially, if you have premedical conditions or other reasons to be unsure if cold plunging is beneficial for you, always check in with a healthcare practitioner first

If one thing is clear from the current body of evidence on cold plunging, it's that this therapeutic routine is not just for high-performance athletes. Everyday people to elite athletes and anyone in between can all benefit from the physical and mental benefits cold therapy offers.

Science has already shown that cold plunging can be a healthy tool, but personal experiences often tell an even more impressive story. Most people who try ice bathing will tell you about the improved mental resilience they've built and the boost in confidence they've felt as a result. Knowing the right time to cold plunge is important for maximizing these benefits.

Cold water therapy allows you to step out of your comfort zone in a controlled and safe environment, and as the wise old saying goes: change begins at the end of your comfort zone.

If you want to utilize cold water therapy to optimize your health and well-being, chances are you'd rather skip the complicated setup of buying, setting up, and maintaining your own cold plunge tub.

Instead, you can join the HomePlunge waitlist for exclusive access to an innovative way of bringing cold plunging to your home.