Daily Potassium Intake — 3,400 mg Men, 2,600 mg Women

The current US potassium target is 3,400 mg a day for men and 2,600 mg for women. It is an Adequate Intake, not an RDA, and it is not the 4,700 mg still printed on food labels — the National Academies lowered the figure in 2019 and the label rule has not caught up. Pick your life stage below.

Adequate Intake by life stage

Life stage	Potassium per day
Children 4 to 8	2,300 mg
Boys 9 to 13	2,500 mg
Girls 9 to 13	2,300 mg
Males 14 to 18	3,000 mg
Females 14 to 18	2,300 mg
Men 19 and older	3,400 mg
Women 19 and older	2,600 mg
Pregnancy 19 to 50	2,900 mg
Lactation 19 to 50	2,800 mg

There is no tolerable upper intake level for potassium. The National Academies were explicit about why: there was not enough evidence of a specific toxicological effect from food potassium in healthy people to set one. Absence of a UL is not a license to load up through supplements — it is a statement about missing data.

AI is a weaker claim than RDA, and here it changed

An RDA is calculated from a measured Estimated Average Requirement and covers 97 to 98 percent of a group. Potassium has no such calculation behind it. When the evidence will not support an EAR, the National Academies publish an Adequate Intake: a figure believed to be sufficient, with the uncertainty admitted in the definition itself.

That softness is exactly why the number moved. Potassium AIs were first set in the 2005 DRI report, on evidence about blood pressure and kidney stones, and the National Academies were asked to update them. The 2019 report did, landing on 3,400 mg for men and 2,600 mg for women — figures that are below the older reference the Nutrition Facts label still uses. Anything quoting 4,700 mg as “the recommendation” is running on the previous edition.

The label is running on the old number

The FDA Daily Value for potassium is 4,700 mg, a reference that predates the 2019 revision. This produces the widest gap between a %DV and a current target of any nutrient on the panel.

Work an example. A food listed at 20% DV carries 940 mg of potassium. Against the label’s 4,700 mg that is a fifth of the day. Against a woman’s 2,600 mg AI it is 36 percent. Reading the percentage instead of the milligrams understates potassium by nearly half.

Potassium and sodium move in opposite directions

The two minerals are reviewed together for a reason: potassium promotes sodium excretion by the kidney and blunts sodium’s effect on blood pressure. The practical advice that comes out of it is paired — raise potassium while lowering sodium — and the second half is on the daily sodium limit page. If you are tracking blood pressure numbers alongside it, the blood pressure units conversion page covers the readings themselves.

Food sources are broad, which is the useful part: potatoes and sweet potatoes, beans and lentils, avocado, leafy greens, tomato, orange, yogurt, coconut water. Bananas get the credit, and the rest of that list quietly does more of the work. Magnesium arrives in most of the same foods; see the daily magnesium intake numbers.

The exception: chronic kidney disease

For most people, more potassium from food is better. For someone with reduced kidney function it can be dangerous. NIDDK puts it plainly: chronic kidney disease can make it harder for the kidneys to remove potassium from the blood, levels can become very high, and both too little and too much cause heart and muscle problems.

NIDDK does not publish a general potassium number for CKD, and that omission is deliberate — the right amount depends on kidney function, medications and dialysis status, and it is set with a dietitian or clinician. Two specifics worth knowing: salt substitutes are frequently potassium chloride, and so are some “reduced sodium” packaged foods, which makes them a hidden load for anyone who is supposed to be limiting potassium.

This content is informational and does not replace evaluation by a physician or registered dietitian.