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Nutrition & Health

Avocados are acclaimed as a superfood by nutritionists and health experts. But why? The answer is simple: Avocados are a uniquely nutritious superfood containing a wide range of nutrients that are essential to human health and the prevention of many diseases. As well as being the perfect food for anyone seeking to maintain a healthy diet, avocados are a fantastic alternative to many animal-based products as part of your daily diet.

THE MOST NUTRIENT-DENSE
OF ALL FRUITS

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EATING AVOCADOS KEEPS
YOUR BODY AND MIND HEALTHY

Eating avocados on a regular basis can have a positive impact on your physical and mental wellbeing. Here we explore how, from helping to lower your cholesterol to supporting healthy digestion.

HEART
WEIGHT
GUT
GUT
SKIN
SKIN
EYES AND BRAIN
DIABETES

AVOCADOS BOOST SPORTS PERFORMANCE

With such high nutritional values, avocados have a firm place in the sports diet. Across all sports, at all levels, the nutrition in avocados optimises performance through energy metabolism, muscle function and recovery.

Their healthy monounsaturated fats promote blood flow and deliver oxygen to muscles, which can help to reduce inflammation, during and after exercise. The B vitamins in avocados support food-to-energy conversion, while vitamin C is often linked to combating fatigue.

“The nutrient profile of avocados, including their useful contribution of B vitamins may support recovery and aid in stress management, making them a go-to choice for many athletes seeking sustained performance.  With one of the highest protein contents of all fruits, avocados make a useful addition to a  pre and post-workout meal or snack.”

Kerry Torrens, nutritionist and member of the British Association for Nutrition and Lifestyle Medicine

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THE MOST NUTRIENT-DENSE
OF ALL FRUITS

Packed with vitamins, minerals, and other micronutrients and antioxidants, regularly consuming avocados can have a hugely beneficial impact on your overall health and wellbeing. Even just one half of an avocado is so dense with nutrients, it can often offer the equivalent of several servings of other fruits and vegetables.

What makes avocados unique is their incredible combination of vitamins, minerals and micro-nutrients that no other single fruit or vegetable can offer.

Unlike most fruits, avocados are low in sugar but high in energy, meaning that they supply much more energy per kilogram than many fruits and vegetables. Eating 100g of avocado supplies you with almost double the energy of 100g of banana and eight times more energy than 100g of tomatoes.

Did you know that an avocado has…

  • 40 per cent more potassium than a banana, helping to maintain nerve functions and control blood pressure
  • Six times more vitamin B12 than brazil nuts, supporting your body to produce red blood cells
  • 36 times more biotin than spinach, converting carbohydrates, fats and proteins into energy
  • 40% less saturated fat than Greek yoghurt, supplying your body with a concentrated fuel source

Avocados help reduce cardiovascular disease and stroke risk

Avocados are essentially the only fruit that contains healthy monounsaturated fats. Unlike unhealthy saturated or trans fats, the monounsaturated fats in avocados help to reduce ‘bad’ LDL cholesterol levels in your blood and raise your ‘good’ HDL cholesterol levels, which helps to break down and maintain the cholesterol in your bloodstream. According to research from the American Heart Association, when examining the baseline average American diet, low-density lipoprotein (LDL), or so-called ‘bad cholesterol’, was 13.5 mg/dL lower after committing to a moderate fat diet that included avocados.

Health experts recommend replacing foods high in saturated fats such as meat, butter and cheese, with foods high in unsaturated fats, such as avocados. The American Heart Association recommends two servings of avocado a week to lower the risk of cardiovascular disease, including strokes.  

Avocados help you lose weight
and lower obesity risk

A combination of nutrients and bioactive compounds in avocados may help reduce the risk of metabolic syndrome developing. This cluster of conditions increases your risk of cardiovascular diseases and diabetes due to high blood pressure and obesity. Through several studies, reviewed by the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey in the USA, it was found that avocados can lower the risk of becoming obese, even redistributing intra-abdominal fat in overweight women.

Myth: ‘Avocados make you fat.’

Wrong. Avocados are rich in the “healthy” fats which we actually need in our daily diet. They contain healthy monounsaturated fats, which offer plenty of health benefits. 

Unlike unhealthy saturated or trans fats, the monounsaturated fats in avocados are associated with weight loss, not weight gain. They also help to reduce LDL cholesterol levels in the blood, which lowers the risk of diabetes and cardiovascular disease.

Avocados also have such a high concentration of healthy nutrients that you need less of them compared to other fruit and vegetables. And they have plenty of dietary fibre, which can leave your appetite feeling more sated, reducing the amount of food you need to eat.

Avocados are rich in fibre for healthy digestion

As a good source of dietary fibre, essential for regulating your appetite and maintaining your bowel health, the fibres in avocados can also act as probiotics. This gives a boost to the beneficial bacteria in the intestines, and also helps to aid digestion. In fact, avocados contain 6.7 g of dietary fibre per 100g, higher than many fruits and vegetables including pears (3.1 g), bananas and broccoli (2.6 g).

Avocados are good for your skin

Avocados can enhance the skin’s firmness thanks to the combination of monounsaturated fatty acids, carotenoids, vitamins (including vitamins C and E) and phenolic compounds. A study, published in the Journal of Cosmetic Dermatology in 2022, supports these findings.

Avocados are good for your eyes and brain

Whether it’s the carotenoid lutein that helps protect the human eye against the sun’s ultraviolet light, or the raft of B vitamins to support brain health, cell growth, communication capacity and even disease resistance, avocados have it all. Even the nutrition in half an avocado can offer a variety of amazing benefits in a balanced diet, containing 2.7 mg of B vitamins alone, many of which are linked to improving cognitive function.

Avocados help to reduce the risk of type 2 diabetes

Are avocados good for diabetes? Yes – containing very little sugar and with a low glycaemic index (GI), as well as healthy monounsaturated fats, avocados can help to improve insulin sensitivity and reduce type 2 diabetes risk. A 2023 study in the USA found a direct link between avocado intake and lower rates of incident type 2 diabetes amongst adults with Hispanic/Latino ancestry with an increased risk of the disease.

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