Does Coffee Make You Poop in the Morning?

We all know the feeling. Wake up, make a pot of coffee, and once you’re settling in for the 2nd cup you find yourself needing to have a sit-down in the bathroom. For some, it’s like clockwork. But why does it happen? And who does it impact? The below is a quick deep-dive into why coffee makes you poop in the morning and a few other factors that can influence our daily march to the toilet upon waking up and enjoying our first cup of coffee.

Coffee makes many folks need to poop with research indicating it impacts one-third of the population and affects women more than men1. The primary reason is drinking coffee can increase muscle contractions within your colon, triggering the urge to poop1. These contractions are tied to specific compounds within the coffee. At the same time, some other experts think the urge to go starts in the brain, particularly since some people poop within four minutes after consuming coffee (and before coffee hits the colon)2. The science and the ritual of morning pooping are real. Yet there are a few other ways coffee triggers the impulse to poop other and some nuances between hot vs iced, caffeinated vs decaffeinated, and time of day.

In the Morning

The impact of coffee on your bowels is typically strongest in the morning – and made even stronger when you consume higher caffeine blends like Cafely’sBanMe – which is the strongest coffee in the world. When you sleep, the process of emptying your stomach goes slower than when you are awake. While asleep those colon contractions are also slower. Upon getting out of bed, your colon also wakes up. The combination of waking up plus the addition of coffee can really get your colon moving and make the urge to poop stronger. If not for coffee, there are other factors which could contribute to our morning bathroom dash. In general, eating and drinking in the morning can trigger the need to poop in an effort to clear out space for other food and oftentimes people are drinking coffee along with breakfast or some water.

Addition of Dairy

Adding dairy to the mix could also impact the urge to go. Dairy can cause bloating, gas, or diarrhea and some folks might not realize they are intolerant to lactose. These natural effects of dairy coupled with drinking coffee could make the urge to go stronger but likely varies from person to person based on how they handle dairy.

What about Decaf?

It seems that both caffeinated and non-caffeinated coffee encourage bowel movements1. Caffeinated coffee, however, has a bit of a stronger impact on our colon as it triggers more of a gastrin release. While you can expect caffeinated coffee to contribute to the early morning poop, decaf also can have an impact on your wake up poops.

Summing it Up

There are slight nuances between the type of coffee you drink and certain compounds in coffee that stimulate the urge for a morning poop. This coupled with some natural factors in how our bodies act in the morning make for the perfect landscape to seek out the toilet after our first cup of coffee to start the day.