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6 Min
09/01/2026
Both detox water and fruit juices have their rightful place, but they're completely different drinks. Detox water is water with added flavour, minimal calories, and barely any nutrients. Fruit juice packs vitamins and minerals, but also comes with sugar and calories. Your liver already handles detoxing – neither drink does that for you, but both drinks, depending on what and when you add them to your diet, can be quite beneficial.
Engage with any health-obsessed individual, and you will find them swearing by their detox water and juices. And if you visit them, you will find bottles filled with lemon and mint water and plenty of fruits lying around, along with a juicer or blender nearby. As dramatic as they might sound, there is a reason why such people egg you to join their brigade. Both detox water and fruit juices promise to make you healthier, but they work in completely different ways. This isn't about joining the bandwagon of Instagram trends or copying what celebrities drink. It's about understanding what you're actually putting in your body and which option helps you reach your health goals.
Here’s a simple breakdown in case the marketing fads and online scams got to you before this article did.
Detox water is just water infused with natural ingredients like fruits, vegetables, herbs, and spices, with ingredients left to steep in water, infusing it with flavour and nutrients. This is a great idea for those who really ‘forget’ or don’t like drinking water but like flavoured water.
Common combinations include nimbu-pudina (lemon-mint), kheera-pudina (cucumber-mint), adrak-nimbu (ginger-lemon), or even haldi water. Turmeric, honey, cumin, ginger, triphala, and haritaki are popularly used detox ingredients. So what's in it? Mostly water with barely any calories – 5-10 calories per glass, if at all. The nutritional content is minimal and varies based on how long you steep it.
Fruit juice comes from crushing or pressing fruits to extract their liquid. This is 100% fruit juice here, not packaged juices that come with a good heap of sugar and only 10% actual fruit and colour.
While lower in fibre than whole fruits, pure fruit juices contain key micronutrients, including vitamin C, potassium, and vitamin A, and important bioactive compounds such as flavonoids and carotenoids. Popular choices include mosambi juice, orange juice, pomegranate juice, and amla juice.
To compare numbers, take orange juice, for instance. A typical glass of fresh orange juice contains around 110-120 calories and 20-25 grams of natural sugar. That's the juice of about 3-4 oranges in one glass.
One of the popular trends to improve overall well-being is detox water, said to help cleanse the body, improve digestion, and promote healthy skin. If you're someone who struggles to finish your daily water intake, adding lemon slices or mint leaves to your water might be exactly what you need. This is because plain things like water bore people, and infusing water with fruits and vegetables might just get you to drink the recommended amount of water each day and fewer sugary drinks. Fruit juice hydrates, too, but you will struggle to sip it throughout the day like water.
The amount of nutrients that you'd get from an infusion like detox water is likely to be minimal and highly variable. Those lemon slices floating in your water give you maybe a tiny bit of vitamin C, but nothing significant. Fruit juice, however, delivers concentrated vitamins and minerals. Fruit juice is a rich source of essential vitamins and minerals, such as vitamin C, vitamin A, folate, potassium, and magnesium, that are essential for maintaining good health. Amla juice is a natural immune-booster, rich in vitamin C and antioxidants that fortify your white blood cells and fight infections and viruses.
Detox water is a healthier alternative to juices or other drinks because it doesn't have added sugar or artificial sweeteners, but it still fulfils our need for sweetness because of the infused sweetness from fruits. If you're watching your weight or trying to reduce calories, detox water is the clear winner. It adds almost nothing to your daily calorie count. Fruit juice can add 100-150 calories per glass, which needs to be accounted for in your diet.
Detox water is ridiculously simple. Chuck some nimbu slices and pudina in a bottle, add water, wait, done. It requires minimal fruit, so your grocery budget stays low.
Juice requires way more produce – remember those 3-4 oranges for one glass? Plus, if you're making it at home, you need a juicer and time for cleanup. Packaged 100% juice is convenient but expensive (and calorie-dense) compared to home-made infused water.
Time to pop this bubble. The human body is naturally equipped to detoxify itself through organs like the liver and kidneys, and adding fruits or herbs to water does not enhance the body's natural detoxification process.
You cannot speed up and improve your body's detox pathways by drinking detox water. The same applies to juice. Both drinks support your body through hydration and nutrients, but they're not performing any magical cleanse. There is no substantial evidence that so-called detox water directly reduces weight; hence, more clinical trials are needed to establish this logic.
For most Indians in 2026, the winning strategy is simple: make detox water your daily hydration buddy, enjoy fresh juice occasionally in small amounts for nutritional benefits, and remember that whole fruits beat both options for overall nutrition. Your body doesn't need a liquid detox – it already has a liver and kidneys working 24/7. What it needs is proper hydration, balanced nutrition, and common sense. Stay hydrated, make smart choices, and pick based on what your body actually needs and not what is trending online.
