Caffeine Taper Calculator
Quitting cold turkey is how the headache wins. Log what you actually drink, pick a floor (zero or one keep-it cup), and get a week-by-week taper with a concrete ordering at every step — computed from the same 80-drink library behind every caffeine tool here.
Today's intake
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Your taper schedule
| Week | Daily target | An ordering that lands there |
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Common questions
How fast should I cut caffeine?
The evidence-backed pace is about 25% per week — slow enough that most people skip the withdrawal headache entirely. Going cold turkey works too, but headaches begin 12-24 hours in and peak somewhere around day two.
How long does caffeine withdrawal last?
For most people 2-9 days: headache, fatigue and irritability start 12-24 h after the last dose, peak within 20-51 h, and fade from there. Sleep gets genuinely better on the other side, and tolerance resets over a couple of weeks.
Do I have to quit completely?
No — the calculator lets you keep a floor (one morning cup is a common choice). The schedule targets whatever number you pick.
Method
Weekly targets cut intake by the chosen rate until the floor is reached (25%/week is the pace most cited from the withdrawal literature; Juliano & Griffiths' review sits behind the "timeline claims). The ordering column is a greedy fill from your own drinks, swapping each cup " "for the closest lower-caffeine drink of the same kind (coffee → half-caff → decaf; " "energy → tea) — a suggestion, not a prescription. Last cup of the day still obeys the " cutoff calculator.