By Sebastian Madlangbayan, founder of Cleonse: the world's cleanest 3-ingredient organic electrolyte.
An oral rehydration solution (ORS) is a precise mix of water, glucose, and salts — mainly sodium, plus potassium, chloride, and citrate — designed to replace the fluid and electrolytes your body loses during illness like diarrhea or vomiting. It works because glucose and sodium are absorbed together in the gut, and they pull water back into the body with them.
I'm Sebastian Madlangbayan. I played competitive tennis, won a state title, and spent years sweating through long matches in the heat. I built Cleonse because I wanted a clean way to hydrate every day. But the more I learned about hydration, the more I kept running into one term: the oral rehydration solution. It's one of the most important medical tools of the last century, and almost nobody outside of medicine can tell you what it actually is. So let me lay it out plainly, and then I'll be honest about where Cleonse fits — and where it doesn't.
What an ORS actually is
An oral rehydration solution is a medical rehydration tool. Its job is narrow and specific: to replace fluid and electrolytes lost when someone is sick — think diarrhea, vomiting, or the kind of dehydration that comes with illness.
What makes an ORS special isn't that it puts water in your body. Anyone can drink water. The problem with severe dehydration is that plain water often doesn't get absorbed fast enough, and it doesn't replace the salts you're losing. An ORS is engineered to fix both problems at once, using a specific ratio of glucose to sodium that your gut is built to absorb quickly.
This is not a sports drink and not a wellness product. It's a formula that health workers use around the world, often to save lives in places where dehydration from diarrheal illness is a genuine danger. That context matters, and I'll come back to it.
Why the ORS was such a big deal
Before oral rehydration therapy became widespread, severe dehydration from diarrheal illness was frequently treated with intravenous fluids — which requires a clinic, sterile equipment, and trained staff. In much of the world, that simply isn't available.
The breakthrough was realizing you could rehydrate someone through the gut, by mouth, using a cheap packet of sugar and salts mixed into clean water. The World Health Organization and UNICEF have promoted refined versions of this formula for decades. It's simple, it's inexpensive, and it works. That combination is why it's considered one of the most important public-health advances of the last hundred years.
The WHO ORS formula
The current standard is the WHO/UNICEF reduced-osmolarity formula, introduced in 2002. "Reduced-osmolarity" just means it's a bit more dilute than the older recipe, which turned out to be gentler and more effective. Here's what one liter of it contains:
| Component | Amount per liter |
|---|---|
| Sodium | 75 mmol/L (about 1,725 mg) |
| Glucose | 75 mmol/L (about 13.5 g) |
| Potassium | 20 mmol/L |
| Chloride | 65 mmol/L |
| Citrate | 10 mmol/L |
| Total osmolarity | 245 mOsm/L |
A few things worth noticing. The sodium and glucose are present in roughly equal amounts — that's not an accident. Potassium is in there too, because illness-related fluid loss depletes potassium, and a real ORS is built to replace it. Citrate helps correct the acid balance that can go sideways during dehydration. Every number in that table is there for a medical reason.
The science: glucose and sodium travel together
Here's the part that made everything click for me, and it's the same principle Cleonse is built on.
In the wall of your small intestine, there's a transporter called SGLT1. Think of it as a doorway that only opens when glucose and sodium show up together. When they do, both get carried across the gut wall into your bloodstream — and water follows them by osmosis. Sodium alone moves slowly. Glucose alone doesn't do the job. Together, they open the door and pull water through.
That's why the ratio matters. The gut absorbs glucose and sodium most efficiently at roughly a 1:1 ratio, which is exactly what the WHO formula is tuned to. This co-transport mechanism is the whole reason an ORS can rehydrate someone faster than plain water. It's elegant, and it's the biology behind why sugar isn't the enemy in a hydration drink — in the right amount, it's the delivery system.
ORS vs. sports drink vs. a clean electrolyte mix
People lump all of these together as "electrolyte drinks," but they're built for different jobs. Here's a rough comparison so you can see the difference.
| Medical ORS (WHO) | Typical sports drink | Clean electrolyte mix (like Cleonse) | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Primary purpose | Rehydration during illness | Sports performance / marketing | Daily and sports hydration |
| Sodium | High, precisely dosed (~1,725 mg/L) | Often low | 500 mg per stick (in 16 oz) |
| Sugar | Measured, matched to sodium | Often high | 24 g organic cane sugar per stick |
| Potassium | Yes — by design | Sometimes small amount | Not added — honestly, no |
| Extra additives | None — medical formula | Dyes, flavors, preservatives common | None — three ingredients |
The short version: a medical ORS is a precisely balanced tool with a lot of sodium relative to sugar, plus potassium and citrate. A lot of mainstream sports drinks flip that around — more sugar, less sodium — and add colors and flavors on top. A clean electrolyte mix sits in a different lane again: built for everyday and training hydration, using the same absorption principle, without the medical dosing and without the junk.
Where the sugar conversation gets misleading
There's a trend right now to treat all sugar in a hydration drink as a mistake. But the ORS science shows why that's too simple. Glucose isn't only fuel — it's the thing that helps drive sodium and water into your body. Strip it out entirely and you lose part of the mechanism that makes hydration efficient. The honest question isn't "sugar or no sugar," it's "how much, from what, and why."
When to use a real ORS vs. a daily electrolyte drink
This is the most important section, so I'm going to be direct.
Use a proper ORS — and talk to a healthcare professional — when you're dealing with actual illness: ongoing diarrhea, vomiting, a fever that's draining you, or signs of real dehydration. That's a medical situation, and it calls for a medical tool that's dosed for it, potassium and all. A daily electrolyte drink is not a substitute for that, and neither is Cleonse. If someone is seriously dehydrated — especially a child or an older adult — that's a doctor conversation, not a wellness-product conversation.
Reach for a daily or sports electrolyte drink when you're a generally healthy person who is sweating and losing sodium through normal activity: a long training session, a hot day, a match, heavy labor, or just a body that runs through sodium fast. That's the everyday hydration lane, and it's the lane I built Cleonse for.
Two different jobs. Don't use one where the other belongs.
How Cleonse relates to all of this
Let me be clear about what Cleonse is and isn't, because I never want to blur this line.
Cleonse is a clean daily and sports hydration drink built on the same glucose-sodium absorption principle behind ORS. Real organic cane sugar in Cleonse isn't there to make it taste like candy — it's intentional training fuel, and the glucose also helps drive sodium and water absorption, the same co-transport idea I explained above. That's the science I fell in love with, and it's the reason Cleonse has sugar in it on purpose.
Here's what's in a stick, and nothing else: organic lemon or organic strawberry powder, organic cane sugar, and French grey sea salt. That's three ingredients. Each 30g stick, mixed into 16 oz (473 ml) of water, gives you 500 mg of sodium, 100 calories, 26g of carbohydrate, and 24g of sugar. The French grey sea salt brings 85+ trace minerals — in trace amounts, so I won't oversell them. No stevia, no artificial sweeteners, no artificial flavors, no dyes, no preservatives, no gums, no fillers, no anti-caking agents. Vegan and gluten-free. If you want the deeper breakdown of what "clean" should actually mean, I wrote about what the cleanest electrolyte actually means, and you can always check the full Cleonse facts.
And now the honest part: Cleonse is not an ORS. It does not add potassium, and a true medical ORS does. It doesn't include citrate, and it isn't dosed to the WHO formula. I'm not going to dress it up as a rehydration solution for illness, because it isn't one, and pretending otherwise would be exactly the kind of hype I started Cleonse to avoid.
What Cleonse shares with an ORS is the underlying mechanism — glucose and sodium working together to support hydration. What it doesn't share is the medical purpose. Different tool, different job.
If you're a healthy person who trains, sweats, and wants something clean and simple to drink every day, that's exactly who I made this for. You can try the Cleonse electrolyte drink mix at cleonse.com — Organic Lemonade, Organic Strawberry, or the Duo Assortment, with free shipping and a 30-day guarantee. It's the drink I reach for after a match, not the one I'd hand someone who's sick. Keep those straight and you'll use both correctly.
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Shop CleonseFrequently Asked Questions
Is Cleonse an ORS?
No. Cleonse is a clean daily and sports hydration drink built on the same glucose-sodium absorption principle as an ORS, but it is not a medical rehydration solution. It doesn't add potassium, doesn't include citrate, and isn't dosed to the WHO formula. For illness-related dehydration, use a proper ORS and consult a healthcare professional.
What is an oral rehydration solution used for?
An ORS is used to replace fluid and electrolytes lost during illness — primarily dehydration from diarrhea and vomiting. It's a medical rehydration tool, and it has been one of the most important public-health interventions of the last century for treating illness-related dehydration.
Why does an ORS contain sugar?
The glucose isn't just for taste or energy — it's essential to how the solution works. Glucose and sodium are absorbed together across the gut wall through a transporter called SGLT1, and water follows them. Without glucose, the sodium and water don't get pulled in as efficiently. The WHO formula uses roughly a 1:1 ratio of sodium to glucose for that reason.
How is an ORS different from a sports drink?
A medical ORS is precisely balanced for rehydration: relatively high sodium, matched glucose, plus potassium and citrate, and no additives. Many sports drinks flip that ratio — more sugar, less sodium — and add dyes, flavors, and preservatives. They're built for different purposes: medical rehydration versus performance and everyday hydration.
Can I use a sports or daily electrolyte drink instead of an ORS when I'm sick?
You shouldn't treat them as interchangeable. If you're genuinely ill or dehydrated from vomiting or diarrhea, use a proper ORS and consult a healthcare professional — the potassium and precise dosing matter. A daily or sports electrolyte drink is for healthy people replacing sodium and fluid lost through normal sweating and activity.
Does Cleonse contain potassium or magnesium?
No. Cleonse is intentionally three ingredients — organic lemon or strawberry powder, organic cane sugar, and French grey sea salt — and it does not add potassium or magnesium. The sea salt contributes 85+ trace minerals, but only in trace amounts. If potassium is a priority for you, especially for medical rehydration, an ORS is the right tool.
Editor's note: This article is educational and draws on WHO/UNICEF oral rehydration solution guidance (reduced-osmolarity ORS, 2002) and the Merck Manual's guidance on oral rehydration therapy. An oral rehydration solution is a medical rehydration tool. For illness-related dehydration — vomiting, diarrhea, or severe dehydration — use a proper ORS and consult a healthcare professional. Cleonse is a clean daily and sports hydration drink, not a medical product, and it is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease.