Fact checked by Nick Blackmer

• A small study found that people performed more leg extensions after smelling chocolate, but the findings have important limitations.
• Chocolate’s aroma may temporarily reduce feelings of hunger or increase motivation.
• Experts say it’s too soon to recommend this strategy, and it’s important to eat enough to fuel your workout.

Could smelling chocolate before a workout help you squeeze out a few extra reps? A new study suggests it might—but the findings come with some important caveats.

What the Study Found

Previous research has found that certain scents can suppress hunger and enhance athletic performance in separate studies, but until now, no one has tested whether smelling food before strength training could affect hunger and performance at the same time.

In the new study, published in Frontiers in Physiology, researchers wanted to see whether smelling food could provide a zero-calorie boost to workouts on an empty stomach, said Mohamed Nashrudin bin Naharudin, PhD, a study co-author and assistant professor at the Faculty of Sports and Exercise Science at the University of Malaya.

To test this, researchers recruited 23 healthy men in their early 20s who regularly strength train. Across three separate lab visits, participants performed leg extensions after smelling liquefied dark chocolate, liquefied milk chocolate, or a water-based control. Throughout the session, they rated their appetite, desire to eat, and how pleasant the odor was.

Results showed that when participants smelled dark chocolate, they averaged about 18 more total leg extensions across all sets compared to the placebo. They also reported less hunger, greater fullness, and a reduced desire to eat.

When participants smelled milk chocolate, they completed about nine more leg extensions and rated the odor as more pleasant, but its effect on appetite was less consistent than with dark chocolate.

“These findings are crucial because they offer a brand-new, calorie-free strategy to help athletes power through tough workouts when food isn’t an option,” Naharudin told Health.

Why Chocolate’s Aroma Might Enhance Performance

Smells are closely linked to the parts of your brain involved in memory, emotion, reward, and appetite. Sniffing a rich, bitter aroma like dark chocolate triggers a learned memory of heavy, satisfying food, explained Naharudin.

That smell tricks your brain into thinking you’re about to eat, which lowers hunger hormones, decreases appetite, and allows your body to push harder in workouts, said Nicholas Mortensen, PhD, assistant professor in the department of Kinesiology at Michigan State University.

For the milk chocolate, increased athletic performance likely came from a “hedonic reward cue,” the study authors wrote.

Meaning, the smell likely triggered positive emotions and motivation in the brain that boosted training capacity—even though hunger didn’t decrease, Michael Fredericson, MD, a sports medicine physiatrist with Stanford Medicine, told Health.

Researchers now want to know whether other pleasant, distinct scents—like peppermint, citrus, or coffee—could trigger similar effects and provide a “new toolkit” for athletes, Naharudin said.

Should You Sniff Chocolate Before a Workout?

Before you start toting chocolate bars in your gym bag, experts said the evidence isn’t there yet.

For starters, the study only included a small group of healthy young men, Naharudin said. It’s unclear whether the results would apply to women, older adults, or fitness beginners.

Additionally, researchers tested only one strength exercise, Mortensen noted, so the findings may not extend to other movements and types of physical activity. Participants could also often tell when they were sniffing the placebo, which could’ve influenced performance.

And by relying on participants’ subjective ratings of hunger and pleasantness, the study can only infer what might be happening psychologically or biologically, Fredericson added.

His advice: Eat something nutritious before a workout, instead of relying on smells.

“One of the greatest concerns, especially in competitive athletes and younger women, is that they don’t take in enough calories to support their exercise needs, leading to an energy deficit,” Fredericson said, “which can lead to menstrual abnormalities, low bone density, and a higher risk of bone stress injuries.”

Smelling chocolate or other foods before a workout could also backfire by making it harder to control cravings, Mortensen added.

“I would treat smelling chocolate as a potential tool that could benefit some,” he said. “Although more research is needed to determine its true benefit.”

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