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What is the best diet for ADHD, according to research?
How to best help yourself, per science.
Annika Angelo
March 24, 2025
For those of you on Instagram, you may have seen my post and reel about Dr. Mark Hyman’s gross misrepresentation of a 2011 ADHD study on elimination diets. If you didn’t, here is the link to watch.
Because of that, I want to make this clear: elimination diets are not the best approach for reducing ADHD symptoms according to the research. How do we know this? We had a study that compared following the dietary guidelines to an elimination diet.
Let’s talk about it.
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Elimination Diet vs Healthy Diet
Before I get too deep into this study, I want to make it known that elimination diets do have potential to be helpful for ADHD. However, they are often shared as the best way to reduce symptoms by a select group of people: those who also have something to sell. Taking Dr. Mark Hyman for example - what does he have to gain from bringing up a random study about ADHD and elimination diets and completely misrepresenting the findings? He gains more influence, piggy-backing off the current political climate in the States.
The thing is, no reputable person would have shared it in the way he did. It goes against the scientist, dietitian, and physician code of ethics: do no harm.
Why was it harmful? Beyond the fact that he said 78% of the kids reduced symptoms (in reality, it was only 46%), his influence would likely encourage parents to try an elimination diet unnecessarily, which could induce nutrient deficiencies, worsen their hormonal signaling, and induce eating disordered behavior - especially if it wasn’t done alongside a neurodivergent-informed dietitian. It also could encourage them against pursuing other ways of helping their child, such as medication.
Healthy diets, on the other hand, are less exciting to talk about in the media but more effective at helping ADHD.
The 2022 TRACE Study
In 2017, there was a meta-analysis that looked at the data on diets for ADHD, and it found that elimination diets were effective (aka, reduced symptom severity) for only 30% of kids. On the flip side, ADHD medication is effective for 70% of people with ADHD.
That being said, understanding how our diet impacts our symptoms is still important, especially if we either don’t have access to medication or if we are wanting to reduce the dosage. That is why this study happened: they wanted to make the first good study on diet and ADHD, comparing elimination diets to simply following the dietary guidelines. Here’s what they found.
Method | Outcomes | Interpretations |
|---|---|---|
N=165 kids They were randomly assigned to follow the elimination diet ED (N=84) or the healthy diet HD (N=81). | 35% of the ED group had a partial-full response and 51% of the HD had a partial-full response. | Following the dietary guidelines could reduce 30% of symptom severity for 50% of kids with ADHD. |
The ED group eliminated: dairy, egg, wheat, fish, soy, peanuts, nuts, gluten, excess added sugar, and histamine-releasing or containing products (including artificial food dyes and preservatives) for 5 weeks. | Parents were more likely to report that the ED helped their kid while the teachers thought the kid was performing worse | Parents expect that the elimination diet helps their kid when in reality it was likely making their kids’ ADHD worse |
The HD group was given instructions to follow the Netherland’s dietary guidelines. This included a diet high in fruits, vegetables, varied protein, nuts, dairy, and grains/seeds. It restricted soda and white bread. | Results showed that lower parental quality of life and higher parental stress at baseline predicted worse response to the dietary treatments | If having your kid do an elimination diet is stressful, your kid likely won’t benefit from it. This goes to the nurture aspect of ADHD: stress is one of the best predictors of ADHD severity at any given time. |
Success of the diet was determined by a reduction of ADHD symptom severity by 30%. Full response was improvements reported by both parents and teachers'; partial response was improvements by one and no change by the other. | The elimination diet helped the kids’ sleep problems whereas the healthy diet did not | If your kid has sleep issues along with ADHD, doing an elimination-style diet may be helpful. |
The cliff notes:
If you follow the dietary guidelines, you could reduce about 30% of your symptoms. This will only help about 50% of people with ADHD.
There is potential that following an elimination-style diet could help, but it is significantly less effective. If you do, consider only doing so after you maintain following the dietary guidelines for a minimum of 6-8 weeks.
If you have issues with sleep, trying an elimination diet may potentially help.
Stress makes nutritional approaches less effective.
You can find the dietary guidelines on your country's website (they are all nearly identical), otherwise if you take a look at the ADHD Eating Guide, I have it broken down for you in a way that might be a little easier to understand.
The biggest thing to note with the dietary guidelines is the ratios of the different types of foods to each other. This link here breaks down what I recommend a person follow ideally according to the research.
P.S. if you want to know what herbs and supplements are going to actually help your ADHD symptoms, don’t forget to join the Nutrimind Community to get access to the TOP Evidence-backed ADHD Supplements! It’s available in the higher tier at this time ($13/month).
Thanks for reading!
If you have any thoughts, questions, or comments, be sure to shoot me a DM on Instagram @Nutrimindcoach or simply reply to this email. I LOVE hearing from you!
Last week on the Nutritional Mental Health Podcast, my friend Steph and I chatted about the difficulties of eating with ADHD and some behavioral ways to help. If you want to learn How To Recognize Hunger and Fullness Cues If You're ADHD or Autistic, it’s available on podcast platforms + YouTube. Check out the links below!
