2025 best diet wins gold for wellness and disease prevention

By Sandee LaMotte, CNN

(CNN) — The award-winning Mediterranean diet has done it again, capturing 2025’s “best of the best” award from U.S. News & World Report, which puts out a yearly list of the most and least beneficial diets as ranked by nutrition professionals.

The Mediterranean diet — which is more of a lifestyle than a diet — has won top honors since 2019 for its focus on eating fruits, vegetables, grains, olive oil, and nuts and seeds while emphasizing the importance of meals with family and friends and daily exercise. The diet also slashes consumption of sweets and recommends small amounts of dairy and meat, especially red meat. Fish, however, is a staple, especially fatty fish such as sardines.

In past years, the report has ranked diets from No. 1 to No. 40 or so, with the top-ranked diet winning the proverbial gold medal, so to speak, while judges banned diets at the bottom of the list from any proximity to the award podium.

“There would be this long list of diets with a whole bunch at the bottom, which, frankly, no one should be really paying attention to for the most part,” said Gretel Schueller, managing editor of health for U.S. News & World Report, who oversees the annual diet rankings.

This year, however, the best diet report takes a different approach, asking nutritional judges to give diets up to five stars, much like the consumer rating systems on many commercial platforms such as Amazon.

“Pretty much any product or item you’re looking at these days seems to get rated on a five-star scale,” Schueller said. “We believe this new approach allows people more choice and a more personalized experience as they consider their health priorities and eating goals.”

Using this new system, the trio of Mediterranean, Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension, or DASH, and the flexitarian diets each received 4-plus stars as the best overall diets, the best healthy eating diets and the easiest diets to follow.

The DASH diet emphasizes limiting salt intake in its goal to reduce blood pressure, while the flexitarian diet, true to its name, allows an occasional indulgence of meat or poultry in its vegetarian approach. All are plant-based diets that suggest limiting refined, ultraprocessed foods, red meat and added sugars.

Ranking diets for health conditions

The 2025 report has also included new rankings for diets designed to help chronic conditions such as arthritis, diverticulitis, fatty liver disease and irritable bowel syndrome, or stages of life such as menopause.

Some medical associations do recommend specific diets — the American Heart Association ranks the DASH diet as highest for heart health, as it is 100% aligned with AHA goals for heart-healthy eating. In the new best diet report by U.S. News & World Report, the DASH diet won top ranking (4.9 stars) for both heart health and blood pressure control.

However, other professional medical groups do not promote specific diets, preferring to focus on a more personalized approach. Take the “menopause diet,” which earned 4.6 stars from the report’s judges.

“There is no such thing as a ‘menopause diet’ — the only diet shown to help with hot flashes is a whole food, plant-based diet low in oil and high in soy,” said Dr. Stephanie Faubion, director of the Mayo Clinic’s Center for Women’s Health in Jacksonville, Florida, and medical director for the Menopause Society.

While Faubion agreed with some of menopause diet’s recommendations — such as not eating close to bedtime — she took exception with U.S. News & World Report’s callout to Nutrisystem’s for-profit menopause diet.

“Personally, as a menopause doctor and a scientist, I would not suggest my patients rely on a paid diet for menopause,” Faubion said in an email. “It doesn’t help people understand what they should be doing long term but relies on someone to put it in front of them, which isn’t sustainable.”

Consult your doctor about diets

Many of the new diet categories in the report revolved around digestive health and diets that claim to reduce inflammation for conditions such as arthritis and gout.

“There is no single diet for arthritis or for gout,” Jill Tyrer, an editor at the Arthritis Foundation, told CNN in an email. “Plant-based diets that are low in sugar, unhealthy fats, salt and processed foods — like the Mediterranean and DASH diets — are the best options to help manage these diseases.

“However, most people with autoimmune, inflammatory forms of arthritis and many with gout require medications to slow or stop the disease from progressing.”

People with digestive issues should not use the U.S. News & World Report rankings to decide on their diet without first having a thorough discussion with their attending physician, said Dr. Jesús Luévano Jr., an assistant professor of gastroenterology at Morehouse School of Medicine in Atlanta.

“My concern is that people may look at these rankings and then assume that because it’s done by nutrition experts it’s the be-all, end-all, and therefore don’t have productive conversations with their physicians who can really help focus on the best foods for them,” said Luévano, who is also a spokesperson for the American Gastroenterological Association.

“You have to do the homework, such as keeping a food diary of what you’re eating, and then work with your doctor to decide what might be the best approach for your specific issue,” he said.

For fatty liver disease, inflammation and overall gut health, the Mediterranean diet received four-plus star ratings, according to the report. For diverticulitis, a disease in which large bulging pouches in the large intestine and colon create significant pain, judges gave the Mediterranean diet a 3.7 rating.

“For fatty liver and gallbladder disease, we do recommend low-fat diets and the Mediterranean diet, as a diet with leaner meats and healthier fats has been shown to be beneficial,” Luévano said.

For irritable bowel syndrome, judges gave the low FODMAP diet 4.8 stars. The diet, developed in Australia, focuses on reducing foods and carbs that ferment and create extra water in the bowels, which can cause cramping, pain and diarrhea.

The FODMAP acronym stands for foods that fermentable; oligosaccharides, which are sugar molecule chains; disaccharides, such as lactose; monosaccharides such as fructose; and polyols, which are sugar alcohols, such as sorbitol and erythritol.

“Because there are so many subtypes of (irritable bowel syndrome), that is probably the best example of where diet really should be individualized for each patient,” Luévano said. “If a patient tried to avoid every single item on the most comprehensive FODMAP list, they might eliminate common fruits such as apples and pears and certain grains that might actually be helpful.

“There needs to be careful discussion with their physician and a nutritionist because every patient has his or her unique food triggers,” he added. “We need to see if we remove this one, does it really help you with your symptoms?”

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