How to Increase Testosterone Naturally Without Pills

A lot of advice about how to increase testosterone naturally jumps straight to pills and powders. Supplements can play a supporting role, but your everyday habits do most of the heavy lifting.

Below, you will learn practical, research backed ways to support healthy testosterone levels without relying on pills first. You can add supplements later if you and your doctor decide they make sense, but you do not have to start there.

Understand what “low testosterone” really means

Before you try to boost testosterone, it helps to understand what you are working with.

Testosterone naturally declines with age. That does not automatically mean you have a medical problem. What matters is how you feel and whether your levels are low for your age.

Common signs that may point to low testosterone include:

Persistently low energy
Decreased sex drive
Difficulty building or maintaining muscle
Increased belly fat
Irritability, low mood, or trouble concentrating

Only a blood test can confirm your testosterone level. If you suspect a problem, talk with a healthcare professional before you make big changes. They can rule out other causes, check for conditions like diabetes or sleep apnea, and help you decide which lifestyle steps to prioritize.

Improve your diet for hormone health

Your body needs raw materials to produce hormones, including testosterone. A restrictive, ultra processed, or unbalanced diet makes that job harder.

Eat enough protein, carbs, and healthy fat

A nutritious, well rounded diet with a healthy balance of protein, fat, and carbohydrates supports optimal testosterone levels. Protein helps maintain healthy testosterone, while very low fat diets may actually decrease it (Healthline).

Build meals that include:

Protein, such as eggs, chicken, fish, tofu, lentils, or nuts
Complex carbohydrates, such as oats, brown rice, quinoa, beans, or sweet potatoes
Healthy fats, such as olive oil, avocado, nuts, seeds, or fatty fish

Eating too few calories or following an extreme low fat approach can signal to your body that it is under stress. Over time, that may work against your hormone balance rather than for it.

Choose a hormone friendly pattern, like the Mediterranean diet

A diet rich in whole, minimally processed foods supports healthy testosterone production. The Mediterranean style of eating is a strong example. It focuses on vegetables, fruits, whole grains, legumes, olive oil, nuts, seeds, and regular fish.

This pattern helps reduce inflammation markers such as C reactive protein and IL 6 that are often elevated in men with low testosterone. Lower inflammation supports healthy testicular function and overall hormone balance (Atlantic Urology Clinics).

In practical terms, you might:

Fill half your plate with colorful vegetables at most meals
Swap refined grains for whole grains most of the time
Use olive oil instead of butter for cooking
Include fish like salmon, tuna, or mackerel a couple of times per week

Prioritize key nutrients linked to testosterone

Certain nutrients have a more direct role in testosterone production.

Vitamin D. Low vitamin D is linked with lower testosterone, and supplementation has been associated with improvements in testosterone and erectile dysfunction in some research (Healthline). You can support vitamin D by getting sensible sun exposure, eating fatty fish and eggs, and discussing supplements with your doctor if needed.
Zinc. Zinc supports testosterone production and sperm quality. A review found that taking zinc sulfate for 1 to 4 months helped increase testosterone levels in some men, although it should complement, not replace, medical treatment (Healthline). Foods like beef, shellfish, pumpkin seeds, and chickpeas provide zinc.
Magnesium. Foods rich in magnesium, such as spinach, almonds, cashews, and peanuts, help support testosterone naturally (Vinmec).

Everyday foods also supply a mix of vitamins, minerals, and polyphenols that protect your cells from oxidative stress. These compounds support hormone balance and sperm quality, and they are abundant in plant based foods like berries, dark leafy greens, and nuts (Atlantic Urology Clinics).

Reach and maintain a healthy weight

Excess abdominal fat is closely linked with lower testosterone. Fat tissue in the belly area contains more of an enzyme called aromatase, which converts testosterone into estrogen.

According to guidance from the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, maintaining an ideal body weight is crucial for optimizing male hormones because increased belly fat raises aromatase activity and increases the risk of prostate enlargement and prostate cancer. Every one point drop in body mass index (BMI) can raise testosterone levels by roughly one point (U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs).

A Korean study involving men with erectile dysfunction found that higher body and abdominal fat percentages were significantly associated with lower testosterone. Improving cardiorespiratory fitness through aerobic exercise and reducing fat percentage naturally increased testosterone in this group (NCBI – PMC).

If you need to lose weight, you do not have to overhaul everything at once. You might start by:

Reducing sugary drinks and limiting alcohol
Cooking more meals at home
Filling half your plate with vegetables to increase volume and fiber
Walking daily to gently increase your calorie burn

Even modest, steady fat loss can improve both your hormone profile and your overall health.

Think of weight management as a foundation for your hormones. It makes every other strategy you use to increase testosterone naturally more effective.

Move your body in smarter ways

Regular physical activity is one of the most reliable lifestyle tools you have for supporting testosterone.

Harvard Health notes that both resistance training, such as squats and bench presses, and cardiovascular exercise, like running or swimming, help maintain healthy testosterone in aging men (Harvard Health).

Focus on strength training and big muscle groups

Strength training does more than build muscle and strength. It sends a signal to your body to produce more testosterone to support muscle repair and growth.

Exercises that use several large muscle groups at once are especially helpful. Northwestern Medicine highlights movements such as deadlifts, squats, and bench presses as key signals for testosterone production (Northwestern Medicine).

If you are new to strength training, you can start with:

Bodyweight squats and lunges
Pushups or incline pushups against a wall or bench
Rows with resistance bands

Aim for two or three sessions per week, with at least one day of rest between them.

Add aerobic exercise and some intervals

Aerobic exercise supports heart health and weight management, which indirectly protect testosterone levels. Moderate intensity activities such as jogging, hiking, and swimming help reduce excess belly fat that is linked to lower testosterone (Northwestern Medicine).

High intensity interval training, or HIIT, uses short bursts of intense effort followed by brief recovery periods. This style can cause a temporary surge in testosterone and is time efficient (Northwestern Medicine).

Research in men with erectile dysfunction suggests that aerobic programs exceeding 200 minutes per week over 12 to 24 weeks significantly increased testosterone and improved erectile function (NCBI – PMC). That may sound like a lot, but it breaks down to roughly 30 minutes per day.

Avoid overtraining

Too much intense exercise without enough rest can actually lower testosterone. Northwestern Medicine notes that overtraining without adequate recovery decreases testosterone levels, so you need a balance of intensity, duration, and frequency, plus time to recover (Northwestern Medicine).

Pay attention to persistent fatigue, irritability, or declining performance. These can be signs that you need more recovery, not more training.

Prioritize sleep and treat sleep apnea

Sleep is one of the most underrated tools for hormone health. Most testosterone is released during sleep, particularly during REM stages.

Harvard Health recommends aiming for seven to nine hours of quality sleep per night to support testosterone production (Harvard Health). The VA Whole Health program also emphasizes that disrupted sleep correlates with lower testosterone levels (U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs).

A 2019 study of over two thousand men found that impaired sleep is associated with lower testosterone levels (Healthline). Another report notes that sleeping less than 5 hours can reduce testosterone by about 15 percent compared with 7 to 8 hours (Vinmec).

You can improve your sleep by:

Keeping a consistent sleep and wake time, even on weekends
Limiting screens and bright light in the hour before bed
Avoiding heavy meals and large amounts of alcohol close to bedtime

If you snore loudly, stop breathing in your sleep, or wake up unrefreshed despite a full night in bed, ask your doctor about sleep apnea. Treating sleep apnea is specifically recommended to help maintain healthy testosterone levels (Harvard Health).

Manage stress and lifestyle toxins

Chronic stress and certain lifestyle habits can quietly chip away at your testosterone over time.

Control stress and cortisol

When you are under long term stress, your body produces more cortisol. Elevated cortisol can suppress testosterone and also promotes weight gain, especially around the middle, which further harms hormone balance (Healthline).

You cannot remove stress completely, but you can improve how you respond to it. Helpful tools include:

Regular physical activity, which reduces stress and improves mood
Brief daily relaxation practices, such as deep breathing or meditation
Setting realistic work boundaries and protecting downtime

Even five to ten minutes of a calming routine in the evening can help bring cortisol down and prepare your body for better sleep.

Reduce harmful substances and exposures

The VA Whole Health program highlights several factors that negatively affect testosterone. These include tobacco, excessive alcohol, opioid pain medications, environmental hormone mimicking toxins, excessive stress, and poor nutrition (U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs).

You can support your hormones by:

Quitting smoking or vaping, with professional help if needed
Keeping alcohol to no more than one to two drinks per day, and not every day
Reviewing long term medications, such as opioids, with your doctor
Minimizing unnecessary exposure to chemicals where you can, for example by choosing fragrance free cleaning and personal care products when possible

These steps also lower your risk for heart disease, cancer, and other conditions that often travel alongside low testosterone.

Be cautious with “natural” testosterone supplements

You will see many products marketed as “natural testosterone boosters.” Some ingredients have early evidence while others show little to no effect in human studies.

Research has found the following:

Ashwagandha. Several randomized controlled trials found that ashwagandha root or root and leaf extracts increased testosterone levels in men, and a 2022 study using 300 mg twice daily for 8 weeks improved testosterone and sexual wellbeing (Healthline, PMC – NCBI).
Fenugreek. Out of six controlled trials, four reported significant increases in total, free, or bioavailable testosterone in men aged 18 to 72 who took fenugreek seed extracts (PMC – NCBI).
Forskolin. In one 12 week trial, 500 mg of Coleus forskohlii root extract per day increased total testosterone by about 13.6 percent in overweight or obese men compared with placebo (PMC – NCBI).
Malaysian ginseng (Eurycoma longifolia). A 2022 review suggests it can increase total and free testosterone and improve muscle strength in men with and without low testosterone (Healthline).
Panax ginseng. Human results are mixed. Only one of seven controlled trials showed a modest increase in testosterone (PMC – NCBI).
Tribulus terrestris and maca. Multiple human trials have not shown meaningful effects on testosterone concentrations in men (PMC – NCBI).

Garlic and onions may support sexual health and sperm protection in animal and early human research, but current evidence for a direct testosterone boost in people is limited (Healthline, Vinmec).

If you decide to explore supplements:

Speak with your doctor first, especially if you take medications or have health conditions
View them as an add on, not a replacement, for changes in diet, exercise, sleep, and stress
Choose brands that test for purity and label accuracy

Your daily habits will always have the biggest impact on your hormone health over time.

Put it all together: your next steps

You do not have to address everything at once. To start increasing testosterone naturally without pills, you could:

Add one strength training session this week that includes squats, a pressing movement, and a pulling movement.
Go to bed 30 minutes earlier, and repeat that change every few nights until you reliably get 7 to 8 hours of sleep.
Replace one highly processed meal with a Mediterranean style plate that includes vegetables, whole grains, and a protein source.
Reduce sugary drinks or cut back by one alcoholic drink on days you drink.

From there, you can layer in additional changes, such as more aerobic exercise, stress management, or targeted nutrients. If you suspect medically low testosterone, combine these strategies with a conversation with your healthcare provider.

By focusing on how you eat, move, sleep, and manage stress, you create an internal environment where your body can produce and use testosterone more effectively, without depending on pills as your first solution.