White Tea
While green tea often gets all the attention for its health benefits, white tea is also worth considering. White tea is derived from the same plant as green tea, Camelia sinensis. However, white tea consists of the early spring leaf buds or young leaves that are air dried with minimal processing. Whereas green tea is the collection of more mature leaves that are pan fried or steamed to halt their oxidation.
While some claims have been put forward that white tea has more antioxidants than green tea, the actual results appear to be quite variable, with both forms of tea being somewhat comparable (Camargo 2016). While caffeine levels are often found to be lower in white tea, there are exceptions, as both antioxidants and caffeine can vary from variety to variety (Abazi 2021, Paiva 2021).
The benefits of white tea likely mirror the benefits of green tea. As the constituents are similar, they are likely to help prevent respiratory infections, heart disease, depression and dementia as I’ve previously discussed.
Studies specifically on white tea also help to potentially highlight its benefits.
Blood Sugar and Diabetes
A study in women with diabetes found that white tea was able to decrease blood sugar, insulin, LDL (bad) cholesterol and triglycerides while increasing HDL (good) cholesterol (Dardashti pour 2021). The effects were even more robust when combined with aerobic exercise, although white tea on its own still provided significant benefits.
Preventing Dental Plaque
A group of healthy individuals were instructed to refrain from brushing or flossing for four days and just rinse with white tea, distilled water or chlorhexidine—a type of antimicrobial mouthwash (Mitra 2016). White tea was superior to water at reducing bacteria and was able to inhibit a number of pathogenic bacterial organisms. While chlorhexidine was better than white tea at preventing plaque, the authors still recommended white tea as a viable herbal alternative.
A separate study performed a similar clinical trial that appeared to confirm the findings (Niveditha 2019). White tea was even found to have anti-inflammatory activity. Other studies also show that green tea and white tea are both helpful at preventing plaque (Tyagi 2018). In patients with active gum disease, white tea was also shown to reduce gum inflammation (Singh 2019).
A review of the research in 2023 found that gargling with white tea can be beneficial. White tea is able to decrease plaque, reduce gum inflammation and inhibit bacteria that contribute to dental problems (Hendiani 2023).
Heart Disease
Triglycerides are a type of fat that can circulate in the blood. When elevated, triglycerides can contribute to heart disease (Permanasari 2023). A study comparing green tea to white tea for reducing triglyceride levels after a meal found that white tea was more effective. Those that consumed green tea had average triglyceride levels after a meal of 274 mg/dL compared to just 231 mg/dL with white tea.
Conclusion
White tea has many similarities to green tea for providing a number of different health benefits. Arguably the strongest research suggests that white tea may be helpful for improving dental health as a mouthrinse. Other studies also suggest potential for helping improve blood sugar, cholesterol and triglycerides which could help to treat diabetes and heart disease.
