--- title: Red Wine: Do Resveratrol Benefits Make Wine Healthy? description: Is red wine healthy and worth the calories? We asked our experts to dish on red wine calories and resveratrol benefits. canonical: https://time.com/3734538/red-wine-health/ author: Mandy Oaklander article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-03-12T14:30:40.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-05-11T05:05:11.770Z article:section: Health og:title: Should I Drink Red Wine? og:description: Is red wine healthy and worth the calories? We asked our experts to dish on red wine calories and resveratrol benefits. og:url: https://time.com/3734538/red-wine-health/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltfe84a7f9bd2b2822/69878301a988ca9a266acdf4/screen-shot-2015-03-10-at-1-39-39-pm.png?branch=production&width=555&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 555 og:image:height: 312 og:image:alt: red wine og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Should I Drink Red Wine? twitter:description: Is red wine healthy and worth the calories? We asked our experts to dish on red wine calories and resveratrol benefits. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltfe84a7f9bd2b2822/69878301a988ca9a266acdf4/screen-shot-2015-03-10-at-1-39-39-pm.png?branch=production&width=555&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Should I Drink Red Wine? > Sponsored content. Supplied in partnership with TIME. 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Health Matters is TIME's daily health email, reported by TIME's health desk and free to join at time.com/newsletters. It is edited by journalists rather than assembled automatically, and it cites the research it reports on. #### Is Health Matters free? Yes. Health Matters is a free daily newsletter from TIME, available at time.com/newsletters. #### Who reads TIME's Health Matters newsletter? Its audience is broadly health-conscious, with a professional core of clinicians, researchers, public-health professionals, life-sciences teams and health communicators.  by [Mandy Oaklander](https://time.com/author/mandy-oaklander/)  ## Mandy Oaklander Oaklander is a senior editor at TIME. Mar 12, 2015 2:30 PM UTC  Illustration by Lon Tweeten for TIME  by [Mandy Oaklander](https://time.com/author/mandy-oaklander/)  ## Mandy Oaklander Oaklander is a senior editor at TIME. Mar 12, 2015 2:30 PM UTC **5/5 say yes.** Cheers to your health! All five of our experts give red wine a purple-stained smile. At 125 calories for a five-ounce pour, it’s a lighter choice than beer and mixed drinks, says **Julia Zumpano**, a dietitian at Cleveland Clinic’s Heart & Vascular Institute. And yes, it’s got more antioxidants, too—including resveratrol, that famous compound billed as the miracle in chocolate and vino. But recent research has given resveratrol the side eye as the reason for wine’s healthy glow. The aptly-named inCHIANTI study, a 16-year-long look at the blood, urine and dietary questionnaires of hundreds of people living in the Italian wine-making region of Chianti, recently found that resveratrol wasn’t associated with disease or lifespan, to the shock and dismay of wine lovers everywhere. But that doesn’t mean red wine does nothing for you—just that resveratrol might not be compound that deserves all the credit. “Many studies have shown that moderate alcohol consumption, especially wine, is associated with lower cardiovascular disease and mortality compared with both no alcohol consumption or consumption above moderate,” says **Luigi** **Ferrucci**, founder of the inCHIANTI study and now scientific director of the National Institute on Aging. “The mechanism of this association is not clear, and does not appear to be related to resveratrol.” And even if it does have a positive effect, some experts say there’s likely not enough in a glass to make a difference. “Despite the common belief, resveratrol content in wine is very low, highly variable and thus unpredictable,” says **Juan Carlos Espín**, a research professor in the department of food science and technology at the Spanish National Research Council who [studies](http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23448440) the compound. Red wine’s wide spectrum of polyphenols is the more important part, and you’ll probably have to commit to the habit (moderately!) to get lasting health benefits, he says. What we do know, says **David Katz**, MD, director of the Yale University Prevention Research Center, is that drinking habitually but moderately prevails in the Mediterranean diet. “So whatever the mechanisms, moderate alcohol intake—perhaps red wine especially—is associated with health and long life,” Katz says. Light drinking in general—up to a drink a day for women, and two for men—is known to be good for you, says **James O’Keefe,** MD, chief of preventive cardiology at Mid America Heart Institute in Kansas City. It’s [associated](http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24582196) with lower risk for coronary artery disease, diabetes, congestive heart failure and stroke. And all of our experts agreed that red wine takes the ribbon. “Red wine is clearly the drink of choice if you are doing light to moderate drinking for your health, and daily consumption just before or with the evening meal may be the most protective pattern,” O’Keefe says. In fact, O’Keefe says his grandma Dorothy used to enjoy a happy hour drink every night, and she lived to be 103\. “She used to joke, ‘The key to a long healthy life is to not drink too much…but then again, don’t drink too little either.’”  Illustration by Lon Tweeten for TIME _Read next:_[ _Should I Eat Pizza?_](http://time.com/3701678/should-i-eat-pizza/?iid=time%5Freadnext) [_Listen to the most important stories of the day._](http://time.com/newsletter/the-brief/?sl%5Fautoplay=true&xid=spl-fullbrief-article) ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3734538/red-wine-health/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3734538/red-wine-health/"},"headline":"Should I Drink Red Wine?","datePublished":"2015-03-12T14:30:40.000Z","dateModified":"2026-05-11T05:05:11.770Z","description":"Is red wine healthy and worth the calories? 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