When you have the chills, the fastest relief comes from warming your body with layered clothing, blankets, and hot drinks while you figure out the underlying cause. Chills are your body’s way of generating heat through rapid muscle contractions, and they can be triggered by anything from cold exposure to an infection brewing beneath the surface. What you do next depends on whether a fever is involved.
Why Your Body Produces Chills
A region of your brain called the hypothalamus acts as your body’s thermostat. It constantly monitors your internal temperature through nerve cells spread throughout your body. When it detects that your temperature is too low, or when an infection tricks it into raising its target temperature, it activates your skeletal muscles to contract rapidly. That involuntary shivering is your body’s furnace kicking on, generating heat to close the gap between your current temperature and the one your brain is demanding.
This is why chills from a fever feel different from being cold outside. With a fever, your brain has literally reset its thermostat higher, so even a warm room feels freezing until your body catches up to the new set point. With cold exposure, the thermostat is normal but your body temperature has dropped below it. The sensation is similar, but the strategy for handling each one differs.
Immediate Steps for Relief
Layer up. Put on extra clothing, wrap yourself in blankets, and get to a warm room. Drinking something hot like tea, coffee, or hot chocolate raises your internal temperature and provides comfort. These steps work well for chills caused by cold environments, and they also ease the discomfort of fever-related chills while your body fights off whatever is causing the infection.
If you suspect a fever, take your temperature. An oral reading of 100°F (37.8°C) or higher confirms one. Knowing whether you have a fever changes your approach: cold-exposure chills just need warmth, while fever-related chills signal that your immune system is actively fighting something and may need additional support.
Managing Chills With a Fever
When chills come with a fever, your body is burning through fluids faster than normal. Drink water, broth, or electrolyte drinks steadily throughout the day. Dehydration makes everything worse and can prolong your recovery. Don’t wait until you feel thirsty.
Over-the-counter fever reducers containing acetaminophen or ibuprofen can bring your temperature down, which in turn stops the chills. Adults and children 12 and older should not exceed 4,000 milligrams of acetaminophen in 24 hours. Follow the dosing instructions on whatever product you use, and don’t combine multiple products that contain the same active ingredient, since many cold and flu medications already include a fever reducer.
Rest is genuinely productive here, not just comfort. Your immune system works harder during sleep, and staying active while feverish puts additional strain on your body. Lie down, stay warm, and let the fever do its job of making your body inhospitable to whatever pathogen triggered it.
Chills Without a Fever
Not all chills involve infection. Cold weather, being wet, or sitting in an air-conditioned room too long can all trigger shivering. Wearing layers is more effective than a single heavy coat because you can adjust as conditions change and avoid sweating, which makes you colder afterward. If you’re already chilled, change out of any damp clothing first, then layer dry clothes and blankets.
Other non-fever causes include low blood sugar, intense emotional stress, thyroid problems, and anemia. If you get chills regularly without an obvious explanation like cold exposure or illness, that pattern is worth investigating with a doctor. Repeated unexplained chills can point to an underlying condition that needs treatment on its own.
Handling Chills in Children
Children with fever-related chills need a different approach than adults. The instinct to pile on blankets when your child is shivering is understandable, but bundling a feverish child can trap heat and push the fever higher. Instead, dress them in one layer of lightweight clothing and use a single light blanket for sleep.
A lukewarm sponge bath can help bring a child’s fever down, but it works best when combined with a fever reducer. Without medication, the temperature often bounces right back up after the bath. Never use cold water, ice, or alcohol rubs on a child with a fever. These can trigger more intense shivering, which actually raises body temperature further.
Watch for signs of dehydration: no tears when crying, or no wet diapers for eight hours or more. These are signals that the child needs fluids urgently. For infants younger than 3 months, any rectal temperature of 100.4°F (38°C) or higher warrants a call to their pediatrician or a trip to the emergency room. For babies 3 to 12 months old, that threshold rises to 102.2°F (39°C). Children under 2 whose fever lasts more than 48 hours also need medical evaluation.
When Chills Signal Something Serious
Most chills resolve on their own or with basic home care. But there’s an important distinction between ordinary chills and what doctors call “shaking chills,” which are severe, uncontrollable episodes of shaking that can last several minutes. Shaking chills have a specificity of about 90% for a bacterial bloodstream infection, meaning they are a strong signal that bacteria may have entered the blood. Mild chills are far less predictive.
Seek emergency care if chills come with any of the following: a stiff neck that prevents you from touching your chin to your chest, sudden confusion or disorientation, difficulty breathing, or purple or blood-red spots on the skin that don’t fade when you press on them. These spots, especially alongside fever, can indicate a serious bloodstream infection. Confusion that lasts more than a few minutes, particularly in children, is also a red flag.
In children specifically, call emergency services if the child cannot be consoled, is difficult to wake, has blue lips or nails, refuses to move an arm or leg, or has a seizure. A brief moment of confusion during a high fever can be normal in young children, but anything beyond a few minutes needs immediate attention.
What Recovery Looks Like
For most people, chills tied to a common viral illness like the flu or a cold will come and go over two to four days as the fever rises and falls. Each episode of chills typically means the fever is climbing again. You may notice a pattern: chills, followed by fever, followed by sweating as the fever breaks, then a period of feeling relatively normal before the cycle repeats. This is your immune system working in waves.
During this period, keep fluids coming, rest as much as possible, and use fever reducers as needed for comfort. If the fever and chills persist beyond a week, or if they go away and then return after a period of feeling better, that’s a sign the infection may not be resolving on its own and likely needs medical evaluation.