When you have diarrhea, you can eat most bland, low-fiber foods that are easy to digest. The classic go-to list includes bananas, white rice, applesauce, and plain white toast, but you have more options than that. The goal is to choose foods that won’t irritate your gut further while giving your body the calories and nutrients it needs to recover.
Foods That Are Safe To Eat
The well-known BRAT diet (bananas, rice, applesauce, toast) has been the standard advice for decades, and those four foods remain solid choices. They’re low in fiber, gentle on the stomach, and tend to firm up loose stools. But most experts now say the BRAT diet alone is too restrictive. You don’t need to limit yourself to just those four items.
Beyond the BRAT staples, other safe options include:
- Plain potatoes (boiled or baked, without butter or heavy toppings)
- Plain crackers or pretzels (the salt also helps replace lost electrolytes)
- Plain pasta (white, not whole wheat)
- Oatmeal (made with water rather than milk)
- Skinless chicken or turkey (baked or boiled, not fried)
- Broth-based soups (chicken broth, bone broth, clear vegetable soup)
- Eggs (scrambled or boiled)
The common thread is low fat, low fiber, and easy to chew. These foods are sometimes called “binding” because they tend to slow things down in your digestive tract rather than speed them up. Stick with white grains over whole grains, since the extra fiber in whole wheat bread or brown rice can make diarrhea worse.
Why These Foods Help
Soluble fiber, the type found in bananas, applesauce, and oatmeal, forms a gel-like substance in your intestines. Unlike insoluble fiber (the rough, scratchy kind in raw vegetables and bran), soluble fiber holds onto water and helps normalize stool consistency. It works in both directions: softening hard stool when you’re constipated and firming up loose stool during diarrhea. Pectin, a natural compound in apples and bananas, is one of the most effective forms of this type of fiber.
Starchy foods like white rice and plain potatoes also absorb excess water in the gut, which helps reduce the frequency and wateriness of bowel movements.
What To Avoid Until You Recover
Some foods and drinks actively make diarrhea worse. The biggest culprits:
- Greasy or fried foods. Fat is harder to digest and can speed up intestinal contractions.
- Raw vegetables and high-fiber foods. Salads, beans, whole grains, and raw fruit (other than bananas) can overwhelm an already irritated gut.
- Spicy foods. They can further inflame the lining of your digestive tract.
- Caffeine and alcohol. Both pull water into the intestines and can worsen dehydration.
- Sugar-free candy and gum. These contain sugar alcohols like sorbitol, mannitol, and xylitol, which are poorly absorbed in the small intestine. They accumulate in the colon and increase osmotic pressure, essentially pulling water in and preventing your body from absorbing it. Even in healthy people, excessive sorbitol from chewing gum can cause diarrhea, bloating, and weight loss.
- Fruit juice and sugary drinks. High sugar concentrations can have a similar water-pulling effect in the gut.
The Dairy Question
Dairy is tricky. A bout of gastroenteritis can temporarily strip your intestines of lactase, the enzyme that breaks down the sugar in milk. This means you may develop temporary lactose intolerance even if you normally handle dairy just fine. It typically resolves within a few weeks as the gut lining heals.
That doesn’t mean all dairy is off limits. Hard and aged cheeses like cheddar, Swiss, mozzarella, brie, and feta contain essentially no lactose and are well tolerated. Butter and cream have very low levels. Yogurt is generally safe because the bacteria in it consume lactose over time, reducing the amount you’d need to digest. Fresh soft cheeses like cottage cheese and ricotta are low in lactose and usually fine in small amounts.
The main thing to avoid is drinking glasses of milk or eating ice cream while your gut is still recovering. If you notice bloating or worsening symptoms after any dairy, back off for a week or two and try again.
Hydration Matters More Than Food
Replacing lost fluids is actually more important than what you eat. Diarrhea pulls water and electrolytes out of your body quickly, and dehydration is the main risk, especially in young children and older adults.
Water alone helps, but it doesn’t replace the sodium and potassium you’re losing. Broth, diluted sports drinks, and coconut water are all reasonable options. You can also make a simple oral rehydration solution at home: mix 4 cups of water with half a teaspoon of table salt and 2 tablespoons of sugar. The sugar isn’t just for taste. It helps your intestines absorb the sodium and water more efficiently.
Sip fluids steadily throughout the day rather than drinking large amounts at once, which can trigger more cramping.
Probiotics Can Shorten Recovery
Adding probiotics during a bout of diarrhea may help you recover faster. A large Cochrane review found that probiotics reduced the average duration of diarrhea by about 30 hours compared to no treatment. In children with rotavirus specifically, the reduction was closer to 38 hours.
The strains with the most evidence behind them are Lactobacillus rhamnosus GG and Saccharomyces boulardii (a beneficial yeast). You can find these in supplement form or in certain yogurts. Not all probiotic strains are equally effective. Some combinations, like the standard cultures in regular yogurt, showed little benefit for diarrhea in clinical trials.
How Quickly To Return To Normal Eating
You don’t need to follow a strict bland diet for days on end. Most experts, including the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases, say that once you feel like eating again, you can return to your normal diet. The American Academy of Pediatrics specifically advises against keeping children on a restricted BRAT diet, noting that continuing a child’s regular diet actually reduces the duration of diarrhea.
The practical approach: eat bland foods while your stomach is most upset (usually the first 24 to 48 hours), then gradually reintroduce your regular meals. If a particular food triggers a flare, set it aside and try again in a day or two. Pay attention to dairy, fatty foods, and high-fiber items, as these are the most common triggers during recovery. Most cases of acute diarrhea resolve on their own within two to three days, and your diet can return to normal on that same timeline.