If you eat a little more nitrate-rich food like spinach or beets each day, the amount of nitrate in your blood goes up by a predictable amount, which might help your heart by turning that nitrate into a substance that relaxes your blood vessels.

Eating vegetables high in natural nitrates might help lower your blood pressure and make your blood vessels more flexible, because your body turns those nitrates into a substance that helps relax your blood vessels and reduce swelling.

If you eat more foods rich in nitrate—like spinach or beets—your blood pressure might drop a little bit each day, and this effect is even stronger if you already have high blood pressure. It could be a natural way to help manage blood pressure without pills.

Taking nitrate supplements for 16 weeks doesn’t seem to change cholesterol, good/bad fats in the blood, or inflammation markers in people with early high blood pressure—so it doesn’t help those things in this group.

Eating more nitrate-rich vegetables for 16 weeks doesn’t lower blood pressure or make arteries stiffer in people with early high blood pressure—so it doesn’t help these heart health markers in the short term.

Taking nitrate supplements makes more nitrite in your blood, and the more you take, the more nitrite you get.