Can People with Diabetes Eat Rice?

People with diabetes are often told to give up rice entirely. That is rarely necessary, and it is rarely the change that helps most.

White rice has a mean glycaemic index of 64 and brown rice 55 — a real difference, but a smaller one than most people assume.

The more useful evidence comes from trials that compared the two head to head. A meta-analysis of randomised and controlled trials in people with prediabetes and Type 2 diabetes found that a brown-rice diet made no significant difference to HbA1c compared with a white-rice diet, and no significant difference to fasting glucose. It did show other benefits: about 2.2 kg lower body weight, and slightly higher HDL cholesterol.

So switching to brown rice is worth doing — but on its own it will not fix your numbers, and it is not the decision that matters most.

What actually changes the reading

• How much. Rice as a quarter of the plate, not the middle of it.
• What is beside it. Rice eaten alone behaves very differently from rice eaten with dal, curd and two katoris of sabzi.
• What comes after. A short walk after the meal you eat most rice at is one of the cheapest things available to you.

If you are weighing rice against roti rather than white against brown, we have looked at that honestly here.