Can You Die From a Caffeine Overdose?

What happens if you drink 30 cups of coffee in one sitting?

Quick answer: you die.

Longer answer: it depends. If, if you would actually manage to drink a whopping 30 shots of espresso and keep them all in, chances are that you wouldn’t survive it. But the truth is, you would most likely throw them up long before the levels of caffeine toxicity would get anywhere near lethal.

The thing is that, in order to reach potentially deadly blood levels of caffeine, you would have to consume a huge amount of liquid (roughly 30 cups of coffee or at least 10 energy drinks) in rapid succession. First of all, your bladder would probably give up before you did. Secondly, at some point you would begin to feel the symptoms of caffeine overdose — typically one or several of the following:

• irritability
• headache
• abdominal pain
• nausea
• vomiting

These symptoms would play a protective role: you’d just get sick and vomit all the caffeine before it could cause fatal damage. That said, some of the listed symptoms may get severe and require immediate medical attention, so we recommend to avoid consuming excessive amounts of coffee in any case.

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