Coconut oil: superfood, or just saturated fat?
Coconut oil is marketed as a superfood, but chemically it sits much closer to a solid block of saturated fat than to olive oil. It is roughly 80 to 90 percent saturated fat, more than butter and well above lard, and the best controlled trials show it raises LDL cholesterol compared with unsaturated oils. This guide separates the marketing from the evidence, explains the lauric acid and MCT claims honestly, and sets out where a modest amount in cooking is still perfectly reasonable.
Key facts
- Coconut oil is about 80 to 90 percent saturated fat, higher than butter (around 63 percent) and well above lard (around 40 percent, which is mostly monounsaturated).28
- A 2020 meta-analysis of 16 trials (Neelakantan and colleagues, Circulation) found coconut oil raised LDL cholesterol by about 10.5 mg/dL, roughly 0.27 mmol/L, versus non-tropical vegetable oils, while also raising HDL by about 4 mg/dL.1
- Coconut oil is mostly lauric acid. Despite the "medium-chain triglyceride" label, lauric acid behaves in the body more like a long-chain saturated fat than the rapidly burned C8 and C10 fats sold as MCT oil.7
- The American Heart Association's 2017 advisory explicitly advised against coconut oil, because it raises LDL with no offsetting cardiovascular benefit.2
- UK guidance (SACN and the NHS) is to keep saturated fat under about 10 percent of energy, and to swap saturated fats such as coconut oil and butter for unsaturated oils.56
On this page
What coconut oil actually is
The single most important fact about coconut oil is the one the packaging rarely leads with: it is one of the most saturated fats in the kitchen. Depending on the source and how it is measured, coconut oil is roughly 80 to 90 percent saturated fat. The American Heart Association puts the figure at about 82 percent.2 That is higher than butter, which is around 63 percent saturated, and far higher than lard, which is only about 40 percent saturated and is actually dominated by oleic acid, the same monounsaturated fat found in olive oil.8
So the popular framing of coconut oil as a wholesome alternative to "unhealthy" animal fats gets the chemistry backwards: by saturated fat content it is more extreme than the butter and lard it is sold as an upgrade from. The table below compares the common cooking fats.
| Fat | Saturated fat (approx) | Dominant fatty acids | Overall type |
|---|---|---|---|
| Coconut oil | 82 to 90 percent | Lauric acid (about half), myristic, palmitic | Mostly saturated |
| Butter | About 63 percent | Palmitic, myristic, some oleic | Mostly saturated |
| Lard | About 40 percent | Oleic (monounsaturated), palmitic | Mixed, mostly unsaturated |
| Olive oil | About 14 percent | Oleic (monounsaturated) | Mostly monounsaturated |
| Rapeseed oil | About 7 percent | Oleic, linoleic, alpha-linolenic | Mostly unsaturated |
Coconut oil does have one genuinely unusual feature: a large share of its saturated fat is lauric acid, a 12-carbon fatty acid. That fact is the seed of most of the superfood marketing, and is examined next.
What the trials actually show
The headline evidence is a 2020 systematic review and meta-analysis of clinical trials by Neelakantan and colleagues, published in Circulation.1 Pooling 16 trials, 15 of them randomised, it found that compared with non-tropical vegetable oils, coconut oil significantly raised LDL cholesterol by 10.47 mg/dL (about 0.27 mmol/L) and total cholesterol, while also raising HDL cholesterol by 4.00 mg/dL (about 0.10 mmol/L). It did not significantly change triglycerides, body weight, body fat, fasting glucose or the inflammatory marker C-reactive protein. The LDL effect held up in the higher-quality trials and after excluding non-randomised studies.
The honest nuance is that individual short trials are sometimes more flattering. In a four-week randomised trial in 94 healthy UK adults, Khaw and colleagues had people eat 50 grams a day of coconut oil, butter or extra virgin olive oil.3 Butter raised LDL more than either coconut oil (by 0.42 mmol/L) or olive oil (by 0.38 mmol/L), and coconut oil did not raise LDL significantly more than olive oil over those four weeks. Coconut oil also raised HDL more than the other two. Taken alone, that single trial looks kind to coconut oil. The larger pooled evidence is the better guide, and it points the other way: across the body of trials, coconut oil raises the atherogenic LDL number relative to unsaturated oils.
| Comparison (study) | Effect on LDL | Effect on HDL |
|---|---|---|
| Coconut oil vs non-tropical vegetable oils (meta-analysis of 16 trials)1 | Higher with coconut oil, by about 10.5 mg/dL (0.27 mmol/L) | Higher with coconut oil, by about 4 mg/dL (0.10 mmol/L) |
| Coconut oil vs butter (4-week RCT)3 | Lower with coconut oil (butter raised LDL by 0.42 mmol/L) | Higher with coconut oil |
| Coconut oil vs olive oil (4-week RCT)3 | No significant difference | Higher with coconut oil |
What about the HDL rise, the part the marketing seizes on? It is real, but it does not rescue coconut oil. Raising HDL with diet or drugs has repeatedly failed to cut cardiovascular events, which is why HDL is now treated as a marker of risk rather than a lever to pull. What tracks cause most reliably is the number of cholesterol-carrying particles in the blood, captured by LDL and more precisely by ApoB, and coconut oil pushes that number in the wrong direction. For why particle count matters more than the cholesterol inside, see our guide to ApoB and reading a lipid panel.
Evidence strength: the LDL-raising effect rests on a meta-analysis of 16 mostly randomised feeding trials,1 the strongest tier of dietary evidence short of long-term outcome trials. What these trials measure is a risk marker (LDL), not heart attacks directly. No trial has shown coconut oil prevents cardiovascular disease, and the marker it moves, LDL, is a well-established causal driver of it.2
Lauric acid, MCTs and the marketing gap
Here is where evidence and marketing part company. Coconut oil is often promoted as a source of medium-chain triglycerides, or MCTs, the fats in MCT oil that the body burns quickly for energy and partly converts to ketones. The implication is that coconut oil shares those metabolic perks. It mostly does not.
About half of coconut oil's fatty acids are lauric acid (C12). Lauric acid is technically classed as a medium-chain fatty acid, but it behaves in the body far more like a long-chain saturated fat. Where the shorter C8 (caprylic) and C10 (capric) fats are absorbed straight to the liver and rapidly oxidised, a large share of lauric acid is packaged and transported like ordinary dietary fat, and it raises cholesterol as saturated fats do. Reviews of the ketogenic effect of these fats find C8 produces by far the most ketones, with C10 much weaker and lauric acid weaker still, so many of the metabolic claims made for "MCTs" simply do not transfer to coconut oil.7
The practical point: MCT oil and coconut oil are not the same product. Commercial MCT oil is concentrated C8 and C10 with the lauric acid stripped out. Coconut oil is mostly lauric acid with only a modest amount of true fast-burning MCTs. Studies on purified MCT oil therefore cannot be used to sell coconut oil, yet that is exactly how the two are routinely blurred together in marketing.
The AHA verdict and UK guidance
Official bodies have looked at this and reached a consistent view. The American Heart Association's 2017 Presidential Advisory on dietary fats, led by Frank Sacks, reviewed the evidence and advised against coconut oil, noting it raised LDL much as butter, beef fat and palm oil do, and that there was no good reason to use it given LDL's causal role in cardiovascular disease.2 That advisory also set out the positive case for the alternative: randomised trials that replaced saturated fat with polyunsaturated vegetable oil cut cardiovascular events by around 30 percent, an effect comparable to statins. In an editorial accompanying the 2020 meta-analysis, Sacks put it bluntly, that there is no reason to use coconut oil rather than unsaturated oils for cooking or as an ingredient.4
UK guidance lands in the same place by a different route. The Scientific Advisory Committee on Nutrition (SACN) reviewed saturated fats in 2019 and upheld the recommendation that saturated fat should provide no more than about 10 percent of total dietary energy, with the surplus replaced by unsaturated fats.5 The NHS translates this into everyday limits: no more than 30 grams of saturated fat a day for men and 20 grams for women, and it names coconut oil among the saturated fats to swap for unsaturated options such as olive or rapeseed oil.6 None of this is anti-coconut zealotry. It is the same advice applied to butter, palm oil and lard, and coconut oil simply does not earn an exemption.
Where coconut oil is genuinely fine
Calm reading cuts both ways, so it is worth being clear about what the evidence does not say. It does not say a spoonful of coconut oil is dangerous. The trials measured large daily doses, often 40 to 50 grams, eaten for weeks. A small amount used occasionally, for the flavour it brings to a curry, a stir-fry or a tray of roast vegetables, is a minor part of most people's saturated fat budget and not worth agonising over.
Coconut oil also has real practical virtues in the kitchen. It is stable at high temperatures, keeps well, is solid at room temperature, which suits some baking, and is a useful plant-based fat for people avoiding dairy. The honest position is about proportion: enjoy it as one flavourful fat among many, count it within your saturated fat allowance, and do not promote it from occasional treat to daily health tonic on the strength of marketing. If your everyday cooking fat is already olive or rapeseed oil, the occasional use of coconut oil changes very little.
Worth knowing: this matters most for people with raised LDL or ApoB, existing heart disease, familial hypercholesterolaemia or high overall cardiovascular risk. If that is you, coconut oil is not the fat to build your cooking around, and switching to unsaturated oils is one of the simpler dietary levers available. This article is general information, not medical advice.
The honest bottom line
Coconut oil is not a poison and it is not a superfood. It is a very saturated fat with one unusual ingredient, lauric acid, that has been over-sold by borrowing the reputation of a different product, MCT oil. The controlled trials are consistent: against unsaturated oils, coconut oil raises LDL cholesterol, the marker most tightly linked to heart disease, and the HDL rise it also produces does not offset that. Both US and UK authorities therefore treat it like other saturated fats, to be limited rather than featured.
If you like the taste, use it in modest amounts and keep your saturated fat within the roughly 10 percent of energy that UK guidance suggests. If your goal is heart health, the better default is an unsaturated oil. The deeper driver behind most of this, your particle count and your wider metabolic picture, is where the real signal lies, and we explore that in our work on insulin resistance and metabolic health.
What to ask your GP
What to ask your GP
- My LDL or non-HDL cholesterol is raised: should I be swapping saturated fats such as coconut oil and butter for unsaturated oils?
- Given my overall cardiovascular risk (QRISK), how much does the type of cooking fat I use actually matter for me?
- Is my saturated fat intake likely to be over the recommended 10 percent of energy, and would a review with a dietitian help?
- Are there reasons in my case (for example familial hypercholesterolaemia) to be stricter about saturated fat than the general advice?
What to do next
References
- Neelakantan N, Seah JYH, van Dam RM, 2020. The Effect of Coconut Oil Consumption on Cardiovascular Risk Factors: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis of Clinical Trials. Circulation, 141(10):803-814. link
- Sacks FM, Lichtenstein AH, Wu JHY, et al., 2017. Dietary Fats and Cardiovascular Disease: A Presidential Advisory From the American Heart Association. Circulation, 136(3):e1-e23. link
- Khaw KT, Sharp SJ, Finikarides L, et al., 2018. Randomised trial of coconut oil, olive oil or butter on blood lipids and other cardiovascular risk factors in healthy men and women. BMJ Open, 8(3):e020167. link
- Sacks FM, 2020. Coconut Oil and Heart Health: Fact or Fiction? Circulation, 141(10):815-817. link
- Scientific Advisory Committee on Nutrition (SACN), 2019. Saturated fats and health: SACN report. GOV.UK. link
- NHS, 2023. Eat less saturated fat. National Health Service. link
- Lemarié F, et al. / Frontiers review, 2021. The Ketogenic Effect of Medium-Chain Triacylglycerides: differences between C8, C10 and lauric acid. Frontiers in Nutrition, 8:747284. link
- British Nutrition Foundation, 2023. Fat: nutritional information (saturated fat content of fats and oils). link
This article is educational and does not constitute medical advice, diagnosis, or a treatment recommendation. Medication uses described as “off-label” are not licensed for that purpose in the UK and should only be considered under qualified clinical supervision. Always speak to your GP, pharmacist, or a registered specialist before starting, stopping, or changing any treatment. If you have severe or alarm symptoms - unintentional weight loss, blood in your stool, difficulty swallowing, persistent vomiting, a fever, or severe pain - seek urgent medical care.