Sugar-free coffee gives you taste and benefits of coffee with fewer calories. Green tea, on the other hand, is a healthy drink because it is a decent source of antioxidant polyphenols. A refreshing and calorie-safe beverage, green tea works as a good substitute for unhealthy beverages regularly consumed in today's lifestyles. So, now that both sugar-free coffee and green tea are healthy, we wonder which is healthier. Let's take a look...

Advantages of Green Tea

Green tea contains flavonoids (epigallocatechin ) gallate, or EGCG. New research published in the Journal of Nutrition reports that flavonoids EGCG extracts of green tea lower the harmful effects of high blood sugar. This EGCG can prevent damage to the major organs like the coronary arteries lining of the heart muscle. (via)

Some researches have found that green tea reduces the respiration quotient and increases your metabolic rate, albeit temporarily and to a marginal extent only. One study published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition in 1999, reports that those drinking green tea increased their total energy expenditure by 3.5 percent and a jump in the proportion of energy came from fat, which rose from 31 to 41 percent. (via)

Advantages of Sugar-Free Coffee

A longitudinal study in 2009 found that moderate coffee drinkers had a reduced risk of developing dementia in addition to Alzheimer's disease. Some preliminary research evidence shows that coffee acts against beta-amyloid plaque that may have a causative role in Alzheimer's. These findings were published in the January 2009 issue of the Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease. 

A moderate coffee drinker who drinks around 3-4 cups of coffee in a day had 65 % less chances of getting dementia later in life. This is a new study from the University Of Kuopio, Finland and the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm. 

Research has shown that a person who is a moderate coffee drinker has less chances of getting gallstones diseases. Two such studies were done by the Harvard School Of Public Health.

Caffeine is the most commonly consumed psychoactive drug in the world. If you take caffeine in the form of coffee, it will increase the effectiveness of the pain killers, especially in migraine and headache medications.

Some primarily studies has shown that coffee helps boost short term memory. The study in 2005 was presented at the annual meeting of the Radiological Society of North America (RSNA) In which they demonstrated that caffeine modulates short-term working memory. Some cognitive performance tests of simple reaction time, choice reaction time, incidental verbal memory, and visuo spatial reasoning, have shown that participants who regularly drank coffee were found to perform better on all tests.

Roasted coffee contains antioxidant, which in turn contain the anti-cancer compound methylpyridinium. Coffee also increases your energy level after you drink it. But it is a temporary hike. Caffeine can stimulates the central nervous system for a few hours. 

Bottom-line: Both, sugar-free coffee and green tea come with their own benefits. Each benefit kicks in only for a few hours, whether it is increased metabolism or migraine relief. Thus, both beverages are good - but in controlled measures. Research suggests that coffee and green tea are good in doses of maximum three cups a day. Therefore, if one uses them as substitutes for unhealthy beverages, they - each - benefit you. Remember, that no single beverage can keep you away from disease and weight gain. If you rely on green tea for weight management without eating healthy and exercising, even eight cups won't help you. Therefore, pick the beverage you prefer based on taste as this will help you develop a lifelong habit, and stick to overall healthy lfiestyle guidelines.

This post was complied with expert inputs from Delhi-based diet and lifestyle nutritionist, Munisha Bhanot. 

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