Andrew Huberman· PhD
You don’t have to use the sauna, but if you do and you are a male who wants to conceive in the near future, I would suggest keeping testicles cool.
Loading…
The evidence is convergent. Multiple independent sources reach the same conclusion, the underlying mechanism is well-characterized, and even the field's most cautious voices treat it as worth doing.
You don’t have to use the sauna, but if you do and you are a male who wants to conceive in the near future, I would suggest keeping testicles cool.
Every Sunday: the week’s new conflicts and verdict changes — and nothing else.
Native comments, Twitter mentions, and Reddit threads about this claim — surfaced together so the conversation isn't fragmented across platforms.
Bookmarking — the dossier-vs-overview split is the right call. Most of the time I want overview; sometimes I want receipts.
Would love a "what would change this verdict" RSS feed. Sign me up if it exists.
if you want to maintain fertility as a male, you’ll need to put a ice pack at your groin in the sauna, but outside your shorts.
And if you do go in the sauna, you can bring an ice pack there and you can put it on the testicles in order to offset the heat of the sauna and keep the testicles cool while in the sauna.
so ice pack and in the sauna for 20 to 45 minutes and is the ice pack still cold afterwards yeah yeah they actually sell and by the way have no relationship to any of these companies but they actually sell cold packs that are designed to be worn in your short
Men out there, definitely ice your balls when you go into sauna
The boys suffered with no ice 15 sauna sessions with full heat on balls + total motile count ↓ 54% + motility ↓ 57% + normal morphology ↓ 55%
This is likely due to systemic sauna benefits, including improved blood flow and unparalleled detox effects, and possibly due to the direct effect of the daily cooling itself.
Sauna heat devastated my swimmers. Seems icing the balls is a good idea. No ice protection on the boys: + 54% drop in motile count + 57% drop in motility + 55% drop in normal morphology
Conversely, my fertility markers improved from my pre-sauna baseline after 27 sessions with ice on the boys: + total motile count ↑ 57% + concentration ↑ 26% + motility ↑ 16%, + morphology ↑ 15%
I put ice on my balls during sauna and my motile count went up 57%.
The ice on groin during sauna creates the localized protection while core temp hits 102.2F.
Icing the testicles is absolutely required to prevent heat from damaging fertility markers. Sperm quality is tightly coupled to testicular function, which governs testosterone production, metabolic health, and long term endocrine stability. When fertility parameters decline, the same upstream dysfunction often drives lower testosterone, higher inflammation, and increased cardiometabolic risk.
Most importantly, ice the balls. Icing the testicles is absolutely required to prevent heat from damaging fertility markers.
Protection: Ice pack applied to the groin area to safeguard testicular and sperm health.
Men, ice your balls when you go into sauna
+ total motile count ↑ 57% + motility ↑ 16%
And uh we were curious if we were able to maintain similar levels of uh fertility health while doing the sauna because there's a possibility that the heat would uh diminish my fertility. And so I've I've been using these ice packs that I have to keep the uh testicles cold during the sauna session.
And also I guess we'd pile on to that Kad there's the fertility has dropped by 50% over the past 50 years. So, not only are there fewer erections, there's less less fertility. And so, I'm not sure if we actually have shared this or not, but where my fertility markers dropped dramatically uh from not icing my boys in the sauna.
And men, be sure to cool the boys with non-toxic BPA free ice packs.
I use an ice pack on my boys that is BPA free because the heat destroys my fertility markers.
But there's a simple solution: ICE YOUR BOYS IN THE SAUNA.
Simple solution: ICE PACK down your pants in the sauna.
Icing the boys in the hot box could possibly also help mitigate both fertility impact and connected testosterone production.
You probably want to ice your balls in the sauna if you care about your fertility.
if you really want to protect your hormonal health, especially if you're over 40, ice your balls.
4–7 sauna sessions per week, 20 minutes at 80°C+, reduce cardiovascular mortality risk by 40% over a decade.
Regular sauna use raises BDNF and improves verbal memory in older adults.
Sauna protocols only generate the longevity effect when sessions exceed 30 minutes.
Hot-tub bathing yields cardiovascular benefits comparable to traditional Finnish sauna at matched core-temp dose.