3 Natural Alternatives to Statins To Lower Your Cholesterol With Fewer Side Effects
Plus a doctor explains when other prescription options may be a better bet
High cholesterol doesn’t come with symptoms, but it can still be a serious risk to your health. Cholesterol-lowering drugs known as statins are commonly prescribed to bring your numbers back down into a healthy range and protect your heart. Still, many people pause before starting them, wondering whether alternatives to statins exist and what, if anything, can make a meaningful difference.
“I see patients all the time who don’t want to take statins to lower their cholesterol,” says Vanita Rahman, MD, an internal medicine and lifestyle medicine physician in Washington, DC. “They want to do it naturally, and that’s where we talk about diet and lifestyle changes.”
For some people, the concern is side effects, most commonly muscle pain. Others are hesitant about long-term medication or want to see how much improvement is possible through diet and lifestyle first.
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Why statins work and where alternatives fit in
When it comes to heart health, cholesterol levels matter because excess “bad” LDL cholesterol can gradually build up inside blood vessels, narrowing arteries and raising the risk of heart attack and stroke. That process typically happens quietly over time, which is why elevated “bad” cholesterol is taken seriously even when someone feels well, Dr. Rahman says.
Statins—medications that lower cholesterol by slowing the body’s own cholesterol production—are commonly prescribed because they’re very effective at interrupting that process. By lowering how much cholesterol the body produces, statins can reduce LDL levels by about 30 to 50 percent and lower the risk of death from cardiovascular disease by roughly 25 to 30 percent, she notes.
“What we’re really trying to prevent isn’t a high cholesterol number,” says Dr. Rahman. “It’s cardiovascular disease or death. Cholesterol is a surrogate.”
Age, blood pressure, blood sugar, smoking history, body weight and whether someone has already had heart disease all factor into how treatment decisions are made, she adds.
3 natural alternatives to statins
Whether lifestyle changes are enough to lower your cholesterol on their own depends on why statins are recommended in the first place, Dr. Rahman says. For people who have not had a heart attack or stroke, sustained changes in diet, activity and body weight can sometimes bring cholesterol into a safer range and off medication.
But that approach doesn’t apply to everyone. “For people who have already had cardiovascular disease, the recommendations are different,” she explains. “In those cases, statin therapy along with lifestyle changes is strongly recommended.”
If your doctor gives you the okay try to natural alternatives before (or in addition to) taking statins, consider these healthy, cholesterol-lowering lifestyle changes:
Eat more soluble fiber
Among food-based ways to lower cholesterol, soluble fiber stands out. It binds cholesterol in the digestive tract and helps remove it before it enters the bloodstream, an effect Dr. Rahman has seen firsthand in her own research. In a blood sugar study on people with diabetes, those who followed a plant-forward, high-fiber eating pattern also saw meaningful drops in their cholesterol levels.
“We actually saw that when people ate a plant-based diet, their cholesterol levels went down, even though cholesterol wasn’t the primary thing we were studying,” Dr. Rahman says.
She encourages making soluble fiber a daily priority. Her advice: Eat beans or lentils at least once daily, add oats or barley to your diet and enjoy more whole fruits and vegetables (eaten whole rather than juiced).
She also advises replacing foods high in saturated fat (such as red meat, butter, cheese and full-fat dairy) with unsaturated fats from olive oil, nuts, seeds and avocado. Even modest, consistent swaps can lower LDL cholesterol over time, she says.
Get active to shed unwanted pounds
Body weight and cholesterol levels tend to rise together, which is why weight loss can have such a powerful effect on heart health. “When we carry excess body fat, that leads to higher levels of cholesterol, higher blood sugar and higher blood pressure,” Dr. Rahman says. “All of these things trend together.”
That’s why regular movement matters. Physical activity helps lower cholesterol while also improving blood pressure and blood sugar even without intense workouts. Walking most days of the week and staying active throughout the day can make a meaningful difference over time, Dr. Rahman says.
Many of us are also hearing about GLP-1 weight-loss drugs—better known by brand names like Ozempic and Zepbound—and people improving their cholesterol after losing weight. But Dr. Rahman cautions that these medications don’t act on cholesterol directly.
“They work by suppressing appetite,” she explains. “When people eat less, they lose weight. And when they lose weight, cholesterol levels go down.”
Consider these two supplements
Two supplements that may help work as natural alternatives to statins are red yeast rice and omega-3 fatty acids. Red yeast rice, a fermented rice product taken as a capsule, can lower LDL cholesterol because it works in the body much like a statin. But that’s often not a great selling point.
“When something works the same way as a statin, it can behave like a statin,” says Dr. Rahman. “That includes the potential for muscle-related side effects.”
Omega-3 fatty acids, on the other hand, are often consumed as fish oil supplements, usually in daily capsules or liquid form. Omega-3s don’t lower LDL cholesterol directly, but they’re associated with heart health in other ways, including lowering triglycerides—another blood fat that can contribute to heart disease risk when levels are high, she notes.
Still, Dr. Rahman advises getting omega-3s from food rather than supplements whenever possible, pointing to walnuts, chia seeds and hemp as healthful sources.
Prescription alternatives to statins
Prescription alternatives to statins are typically considered for people who need cholesterol lowering but can’t tolerate statins or don’t get enough benefit from them.
One option is ezetimibe, which lowers cholesterol by reducing how much is absorbed. Newer PCSK9 inhibitors help the body clear LDL cholesterol more efficiently. Both are usually reserved for people at higher risk or with very high cholesterol, Dr. Rahman notes. A newer oral drug, bempedoic acid, may be used in select cases, sometimes alongside statins, but it isn’t typically prescribed first.
“These are options we look at when first-line treatment doesn’t work or isn’t tolerated,” says Dr. Rahman explains.
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