This Is Hands Down The Best Liquid I.V. Flavor — You Don't Even Need Ice

When you're reaching for an electrolyte pack, flavor isn't necessarily the priority. Whether you've had a heavy workout or a long travel day, hydration is the goal in mind. The reality is, many of these convenient packs taste quite artificial, and while sure, you could make your own rehydrating drink and get a lot of the same health benefits, it's not always feasible to make it on the go. One of the better brands out there is Liquid I.V. — while it's not the cheapest, it has some of the most realistic flavors that closely resemble fruits.

However, the company has a ton of flavors (over 30), so which is the best? Chowhound tried 17 of the most popular Liquid I.V. flavors to take away some of the hard work, and our top choice was lemon lime. It may seem somewhat unexpected that this made the No. 1 flavor, considering there are more colorful options like rainbow sherbet and guava on the list, but it's a perfect example of how sometimes classics are just as good.

It wasn't too sweet or too tart, and the citrus helped balance the saltiness. It's an easy sipper that didn't taste artificial like many of the other citrus-flavored electrolyte drinks out there. Favorite flavors are, of course, quite subjective, although this one turned out to be the most balanced and agreeable flavor overall. And to be fair, we didn't hate any of the flavors — even the last flavor on the list, pear, wasn't awful, but simply too earthy for our liking.

One of the first things that stood out about the lemon lime Liquid I.V. was that this flavor didn't require ice. Often, electrolyte drinks require a few cubes to be more drinkable and to balance the saltiness, but this one didn't need it. You can certainly still add ice to make it more like the experience of drinking cold lemonade, of course. And you can even use this Liquid I.V. as a dive bar hack to mix into cocktails for added flavor and minerals. Lemon lime is also a flavor that you could drink every day and not get sick of. Rainbow sherbet and popsicle firecracker came second and third in the ranking — and as you can imagine, you might not always want to sip on something that tastes like a dessert all the time.

Liquid I.V. also offers a line of sugar-free packets, like the rainbow sherbet flavor, as well as mango pineapple and white peach. These are sweetened with allulose and stevia, but we didn't notice a strong artificial sugar flavor at all. In fact, it was quite the opposite — these didn't taste sweet enough to contrast against the saltiness. Although lemon lime too has a sugar-free variant, we tasted the one that contains cane sugar, and it provided a well-rounded flavor against the acidity and saltiness. And overall, with the exception of rainbow sherbet, the flavors with real sugar scored higher for us than the sugar-free ones, so you may want to stick to the cane sugar lemon lime flavor if given the choice.