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| My mother has atrial fibrillation (AFib), and she was advised years ago to cut out coffee to protect her health. Caffeine stimulates the nervous system, raises blood pressure, and increases heart rate, so avoiding anything that might trigger an irregular heartbeat appears to make sense.
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| However, a recent study suggests that this may not be the case, as it found that coffee drinkers with AFib had 40% fewer recurring episodes than those who abstained. Can we add AFib prevention to the growing list of coffee’s benefits? Let’s find out.
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Mine’s a flat white,
Tim Snaith
Newsletter Editor, Healthline
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Written by Tim Snaith
November 19, 2025 • 4 min read |
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| Why coffee might protect your heart rhythm
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| The DECAF (Does Eliminating Coffee Avoid Fibrillation?) trial studied 200 adults with persistent atrial fibrillation across hospitals in the United States, Australia, and Canada. All were regular coffee drinkers, averaging about one cup daily, who had undergone cardioversion, a treatment that uses electrical impulses to shock the heart back into a regular rhythm. |
| Half continued drinking coffee daily, while the other half quit completely, avoiding even decaf coffee and all other caffeinated products. Over a 6-month period, researchers tracked any AFib or atrial flutter episodes lasting at least 30 seconds, confirmed by ECG or cardiac monitoring devices. |
| The results showed that 47% of coffee drinkers experienced a recurrence of AFib, compared with 64% of abstainers. That translates to a 39% lower risk for the coffee group. And the benefit appeared to grow over time — the longer people drank coffee, the greater the gap between the groups. |
| Dr. Gregory Marcus, the cardiologist who led the study at UC San Francisco, put it plainly: “For people that enjoy drinking caffeinated coffee, they should not avoid it for fear that it's going to worsen their atrial fibrillation.” |
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