If your blood pressure consistently reads below 90/60 mmHg, you’re in the range considered low blood pressure, or hypotension. The good news is that several straightforward strategies can help bring it up, from what you eat and drink to how you move and sleep. Some work within minutes, others build over days and weeks.
Drink More Fluids
Dehydration is one of the most common and easily fixable causes of low blood pressure. When your body is low on fluids, your total blood volume drops, and there’s simply less pressure pushing against your artery walls. Drinking more water restores that volume. Public health agencies generally recommend 2.7 to 3.7 liters of water per day for people with healthy hearts and kidneys, though your needs vary with activity level, climate, and body size.
If you notice your blood pressure drops when you stand up (orthostatic hypotension), try drinking a full glass of water 10 to 15 minutes before getting out of bed or before standing for extended periods. This gives your body time to absorb the fluid and expand blood volume before gravity pulls blood toward your legs.
Increase Your Salt Intake
Salt helps your body retain water, which increases blood volume and raises blood pressure. This is the opposite of the advice given to people with high blood pressure, and it’s one of the primary dietary strategies for managing hypotension. Guidelines from major cardiology and neurology organizations recommend between 6 and 10 grams of sodium chloride per day for people with orthostatic hypotension or fainting episodes. The European Society of Cardiology suggests up to 10 grams daily alongside 2 to 3 liters of fluids.
For context, the average American already consumes about 3.4 grams of sodium per day (roughly 8.5 grams of salt). So depending on your current intake, you may only need a modest increase. Practical ways to add salt include salting your food more liberally, eating pickles or olives, drinking broth, or using electrolyte drinks. Some people find it easier to take salt tablets, which typically come in 1-gram doses.
Use Physical Counter-Pressure Maneuvers
When you feel lightheaded or dizzy from a sudden blood pressure drop, specific body movements can push blood back toward your heart and brain within seconds. The American Heart Association recommends several of these techniques:
- Leg crossing with muscle tensing: Cross your legs and squeeze your thigh, buttock, and abdominal muscles simultaneously. This works while standing or lying down.
- Squatting: Lower yourself into a squat, which compresses the blood vessels in your legs and forces blood upward. Stay there until symptoms pass, then stand slowly.
- Arm tensing: Grip your hands together, interlocking your fingers, and pull in opposite directions as hard as you can. This isometric tension raises blood pressure quickly.
- Fist clenching: Squeeze your fist at maximum strength, with or without a small object in your hand.
These are especially useful in situations where you can feel a drop coming on, like after standing up quickly or during a long period on your feet. They’re temporary fixes, not long-term solutions, but they can prevent fainting in the moment.
Wear Compression Garments
Compression stockings or abdominal binders prevent blood from pooling in your legs and abdomen, keeping more of it circulating through your core and brain. Johns Hopkins Medicine recommends starting with 20 to 30 mmHg compression stockings. If those feel too tight or hard to put on, you can try 15 to 20 mmHg. If they don’t feel like enough, 30 to 40 mmHg is the next step up.
Waist-high stockings work better than knee-high ones for blood pressure purposes because they compress a larger area. Abdominal binders add even more benefit. The key is wearing them during the day, especially when you’ll be upright for long stretches. You don’t need them while sleeping.
Have Caffeine Strategically
A cup of coffee can raise your blood pressure by up to 10 mmHg. The effect kicks in within about 30 minutes and peaks around one hour after drinking it. This makes caffeine a useful tool if your blood pressure tends to be lowest in the morning or after meals.
The catch is that regular caffeine drinkers build tolerance over time, so the blood pressure boost shrinks with daily use. If you rely on caffeine to manage hypotension, you may get better results by using it strategically, like before situations where you know your blood pressure drops, rather than sipping it all day long.
Adjust Your Meals
Blood pressure naturally dips after eating because your body redirects blood flow to your digestive system. This is called postprandial hypotension, and it’s particularly common in older adults. Large meals cause bigger drops.
Switching from three large meals to six smaller ones throughout the day helps keep your blood pressure more stable. Meals heavy in refined carbohydrates tend to cause the steepest drops, so pairing carbs with protein or healthy fats can blunt the effect. If you tend to feel dizzy after eating, sitting or reclining for 15 to 30 minutes after a meal gives your body time to adjust before you stand up.
Elevate the Head of Your Bed
Sleeping with your head slightly elevated, rather than lying flat, helps your body maintain better blood pressure regulation overnight. The recommended tilt is about 10 degrees, which translates to raising the head of your bed by roughly 9 inches. You can do this by placing blocks or risers under the legs at the head of the bed.
This works by training your body to retain more fluid and salt overnight, rather than flushing it out through the kidneys (which happens more aggressively when you’re lying completely flat). Over time, this helps reduce the dramatic blood pressure drop many people experience when they first stand up in the morning. Stacking pillows doesn’t achieve the same effect because it bends your body at the waist rather than tilting your whole frame.
Medications for Persistent Hypotension
When lifestyle changes aren’t enough, medications can help. One of the most commonly prescribed is midodrine, which works by narrowing your blood vessels to increase the pressure inside them. It’s taken multiple times a day and is specifically designed for people whose blood pressure drops when they stand. Another option is a medication that helps your body retain sodium and water, expanding blood volume from the inside.
These medications require careful dosing because the goal is to raise your blood pressure just enough, not tip it into the high range. Blood pressure that climbs too high causes its own serious problems over time, including artery damage, heart strain, and increased risk of heart attack and stroke. High blood pressure forces the heart to work harder, which can thicken and enlarge the left ventricle and eventually lead to heart failure. This is why raising blood pressure intentionally should be targeted and measured, not aggressive.
Combining Strategies for Best Results
Most people with chronic low blood pressure get the best results from stacking multiple approaches rather than relying on a single one. A typical combination might look like increasing fluid and salt intake, wearing compression stockings during the day, elevating the head of the bed at night, eating smaller meals, and using counter-pressure maneuvers when symptoms strike. Each strategy adds a modest boost, and together they can make a meaningful difference in how you feel day to day.
If you’re tracking your progress, a home blood pressure monitor lets you see which changes are actually moving the numbers. Take readings at the same time each day, ideally in the morning before eating or drinking, and note what you’ve changed. Patterns usually become clear within one to two weeks.