Wellness trends have a way of moving at lightning speed. One week everyone is taking olive oil shots, the next we’re lining up for NAD infusions and testing our biological age. Sorting what’s actually worth incorporating into our routines from what’s simply very good marketing is the harder part.
Dr. Steven Gundry has spent decades looking at health through the lens of the microbiome, metabolism, and longevity. We’ve previously turned to him to unpack the connection between the gut and brain, explain why so many of us feel tired all the time, and make the case for polyphenols and plenty of olive oil.
This time, we asked him to weigh in on the wellness trends filling our feeds, clinics, and kitchen counters right now. Which deserve a place in our routines, and which are better left to the algorithm?
Below, Dr. Gundry takes it from here, sharing the seven health trends he thinks are worth the hype and the three he’d skip.
Dr. Gundry on 7 Health Trends Worth the Hype and 3 to Skip
After more than twenty-five years of treating patients with food and lifestyle changes alone, I’ve learned to be a little suspicious of anything labeled a “hack.” Most of the time, the so-called shortcut is just an expensive detour around something your body already knows how to do. But every so often, a trend comes along that our gut buddies, the trillions of bacteria living in your intestines, would genuinely appreciate. Here are seven I’m happy to endorse, and three to save your money on.
+ Olive Oil Shots
I’ve said for years that the only real purpose of eating any food is to get more olive oil into your mouth, so naturally, I’m thrilled people are finally drinking it straight. Here’s looking at you, Hailey Bieber!
High-quality extra-virgin olive oil is loaded with polyphenols, and your gut buddies convert those polyphenols into powerful anti-inflammatory compounds. It kick-starts autophagy, your cells’ recycling program, and even helps stimulate brain-derived neurotrophic factor, which supports the growth of new neurons.
In one Spanish study, folks who consumed the most olive oil had significantly better cognitive function five years later compared to those who didn’t drink up.
One buying tip, though: don’t shoot the bland table or cooking oil sitting in most pantries. Reach for a genuinely high-polyphenol olive oil. Look for 1,000 mg or more of polyphenols per serving. My own Gundry MD Polyphenol-Rich Olive Oil delivers over 1,200 mg of polyphenols per shot.
In fact, my team loved this ritual so much, they created National Polyphenol Day back in 2021, held every July 11 (yes, my birthday), a day to celebrate with an olive oil shot and spread the word about the remarkable power of dietary polyphenols.
+ Movement Throughout the Day
This one is dear to my heart. In my book The Energy Paradox, I coined the term “exercise snacks,” because doing little bursts of movement across your whole day beats one heroic slog at the gym.
Studies show three ten-minute sessions can match, or even beat, thirty minutes of continuous exercise. Do squats while you brush your teeth (I do, morning and night). Bang out a 60-second wall squat during the TV commercials. Take a ten-minute walk after dinner; it dramatically lowers your blood sugar. Even one minute of climbing stairs improves mitochondrial function.
Can’t climb the stairs? Ride up, then walk down. You’ll get the same benefit, as shown in an Austrian study.
+ NAD, With One Big Caveat
NAD is a real darling of the longevity world, and for good reason: your mitochondria need it to make energy, and raising your NAD+ levels helps activate the SIRT1 gene, which in turn quiets mTOR. Suppress mTOR and you tend to live better and longer.
The catch is that your NAD+ levels fall off a cliff as you age, and here’s where most people get fleeced. You can’t simply swallow or inject NAD itself and expect it to reach your cells. You have to give your body the right precursor, NMN or NR, so it can build NAD+ on its own.
The problem? NMN is famously fragile. It degrades on the shelf, and stomach acid finishes off much of what’s left before it ever gets absorbed. That’s exactly why I waited to make my own until I could do it right. Gundry MD Elevate NAD+ uses a patent-pending, acid-resistant beadlet system to keep the NMN intact all the way to your gut, paired with a second precursor (nicotinamide riboside), ergothioneine, and a few other longevity allies.
So those trendy NAD injections? Skip them. NAD without the right precursor, delivered intact, is money down the drain.
+ Red Light Therapy
Here’s a trend with real mitochondrial muscle behind it. The red and near-infrared wavelengths of light help break up the excess nitric oxide that would otherwise bog down your ATP production, and they actually influence how your mitochondria make energy.
It’s the same reason a walk on the beach at sunrise or sunset leaves you feeling so wonderful. Your mitochondria are quite literally being told what time it is. It’s also a great beauty secret for youthful-looking skin.
You can buy a red light mask or device like one from BON CHARGE, which I use personally, or simply get outside at sunrise or sunset and let the sun do its job for free.
+ Vibration Plates
Think of the vibration plate as a close cousin of the rebounder (mini-trampoline) I’ve long recommended. What I love about it is that it fits everything I preach: it’s low-impact and easy on the joints, it stresses your muscles and bones against gravity, exactly the kind of “good stress” that helps fend off the invisible muscle loss and bone thinning that creep up on us with age, and it gets your lymphatic system moving, which is how your body ferries nutrients around and carts toxins out.
But what most excites me about vibration therapy, and I use a Juvent plate myself, is how, according to a 2019 study, it can actually improve microbiome diversity. And when it comes to helpful bacteria in the gut, more variety is generally better.
Hop on for a few minutes here and there. It’s the perfect exercise snack for people who tell me they “don’t have time” to work out.
+ Fibermaxxing, But Please, Finish the Recipe
Loading up on fiber is a wonderful instinct because your gut buddies adore the right kind of fiber: prebiotic fiber.
But I have to share the latest science, because it’s a plot twist most people miss: it takes two. Researchers at Stanford found that a high-fiber diet alone didn’t improve microbiome diversity or reduce inflammation. Only when people also ate fermented foods with the fiber did diversity climb and inflammation drop.
Your gut buddies actually need that fiber “pre-fermented” before they can turn it into the short-chain fatty acids, like butyrate, that do you so much good. So by all means, maximize your prebiotic soluble fiber with foods like artichokes, basil seeds, seaweed, allulose sweetener, and asparagus. Just don’t forget the fermented half of the equation, or you’re throwing a party and forgetting to feed the guests.
And please, skip insoluble fiber like wheat bran. It may clear your colon out, but that’s because you swallowed razor blades (i.e., lectin-heavy foods)! Insoluble fiber, in general, does not feed your good gut buddies.
+ Apple Cider Vinegar (and Friends)
To continue the fermented-food theme, this conveniently brings me to vinegar. The more fermented foods you eat, the more you feed your good bacteria, and any vinegar, apple cider included, counts.
Even better, as I wrote in Gut Check, vinegars like aged balsamic are a terrific source of fermented polyphenols, meaning they’re already in their active, ready-to-use form.
Back in 2006, I came up with a little hack I call my “healthy coke” (see the recipe here) to help wean myself off my eight-can-per-day Diet Coke addiction. FYI: all aspartame-sweetened diet sodas quietly kill off your gut buddies.
My alternative is a shot of high-quality aged balsamic in a glass of San Pellegrino. It’s the color of cola, just as fizzy, and infinitely better for the inner you. Try it once and you may never go back.
Just please, as I’ve seen on social media, do not use salad dressing (true story) in place of straight vinegar in your healthy soda recipe!
3 Health Trends to Save Your Money On
Now for the part of biohacking where I’d gently steer you away from your wallet. Here are the biohacking trends to skip:
Vitamin IV Drips
Glutathione, high-dose vitamin C, B vitamins, methylene blue. They make a dramatic show, but the effect lasts about as long as the needle is in your arm.
Vitamin C is water-soluble; you simply pee it out in a few hours. And you can’t meaningfully swallow or infuse your way to lasting glutathione anyway, because your liver is built to manufacture it around the clock from NAC and the amino acid glycine.
The reason people swear they feel amazing afterward is largely the placebo effect, which is remarkably powerful when you’ve just paid a lot of money to be poked. I’ve never had one, and I’ve had a patient suffer a severe reaction to IV glutathione. Buyer beware.
Biological Age Tests
The Kardashians made these fashionable, and I understand the appeal, but they only capture a single snapshot in time.
My own Oura Ring once told me I’d lost a year of biological age while hiking eight to ten miles a day in France, then promptly added it back the week I rested an injured hamstring.
Methylation tests have the same problem: those methyl groups are constantly attaching and detaching from your DNA, so test again in two weeks and you may get an entirely different number.
These tools are interesting, but they’re not ready for prime time. My advice? Skip the test and just show people your hands (they ought to look very young!).
Stem Cell Treatments
This is my number one on the “save your money” list. I’ve had many patients spend a fortune flying to Mexico or Costa Rica for stem cell injections, and most do feel better for three months, six months, maybe a year.
But if you don’t change the underlying problem, heal your gut wall, restore your microbiome, and stop the damage, those benefits unravel because you never addressed what created the need in the first place.
Here’s the secret the industry won’t tell you: you already have enormous reserves of stem cells lining the wall of your gut, in your fat, and in your bone marrow, just waiting to be switched on. Two of the best ways to wake them up cost almost nothing: vitamin D and intermittent fasting.
The through-line in all of this is simple. The trends worth your money tend to be the ones that work with your biology, feeding your gut buddies, supporting your mitochondria, and gently stressing your body the way nature intended.
The ones to skip are usually the ones that try to buy a result your body would happily give you for free. Simply put: Take care of your gut buddies, and they will take care of you.
About Dr. Steven Gundry
Steven Gundry, MD, is a former cardiac surgeon turned restorative medicine practitioner, host of the chart-topping Dr. Gundry Podcast, founder of Gundry MD, and author of bestselling books including The Gut-Brain Paradox and The Plant Paradox. For over three decades, his research has focused on the microbiome’s role in chronic disease and longevity at his clinics in Palm Springs and Montecito, California. He received his degrees from Yale University and the Medical College of Georgia and completed his surgical residencies at the University of Michigan. Follow him on Instagram @drstevengundry.
