How Often Do Your Taste Preferences Change?

January 8, 2026 •

5 min read

While taste buds regenerate approximately every two weeks, this doesn't mean your food preferences shift just as frequently. Your evolving palate is actually influenced by a complex mix of biological, psychological, and environmental factors throughout your life, not just cellular turnover.

Quick Summary

Taste preferences evolve over time due to various factors, including cellular changes, hormones, health, and new environmental exposures. Understanding the science behind your shifting palate can explain why you crave different foods at different life stages.

Key Points

Taste Buds vs. Preferences: Taste buds regenerate every 1-2 weeks, but long-term food preferences are influenced by more complex factors over a lifetime, including environmental exposure and hormones.
Aging Affects Sensation: As you enter middle age and beyond, the number of taste buds declines and their sensitivity decreases, making formerly strong flavors seem milder.
Hormones Cause Temporary Changes: Fluctuations in hormones, particularly during pregnancy, can lead to significant but often temporary changes in taste perception and strong food aversions.
Illness Impacts Flavor: Many illnesses, especially respiratory infections like COVID-19, affect your sense of smell, which in turn drastically alters your perception of a food's overall flavor.
Palate Retraining is Possible: You can intentionally influence your taste preferences through repeated exposure to new foods, mindful eating practices, and reducing your intake of excessive salt and sugar.
Genetics Play a Role: Your genetic makeup can predetermine your sensitivity to certain tastes, with some people naturally having a stronger perception of flavors like bitterness (known as 'supertasters').
Psychology Shapes Preference: Learned associations, social influences, and emotional experiences with food are all processed by the brain and play a major role in developing and changing food likes and dislikes.

The Surprising Science Behind Your Changing Palate

Many people believe the myth that taste buds regenerate every seven years, causing a complete overhaul of our food preferences. The reality is both more frequent and more complex. Our sensory cells, including taste buds, do regenerate on a rapid cycle—roughly every one to two weeks. However, this cellular turnover is just one small part of the story. The brain's interpretation of these signals, combined with a lifetime of experience, biology, and environment, truly dictates our shifting likes and dislikes.

The Lifespan of Your Sense of Taste

Your relationship with food begins long before your first solid meal. Studies suggest that an infant's taste and food preferences can begin developing in the womb, influenced by the mother's diet. The journey of your palate continues through distinct life stages:

Childhood: As young children, we have more taste buds than adults, and they are more sensitive to flavors. This heightened sensitivity is one reason many children are picky eaters; strong flavors are often overwhelming.
Adolescence and Young Adulthood: As we grow, our sensitivity to different tastes, particularly bitter ones, can change. This period is often a time of experimentation, where new cultural experiences, social influences, and cognitive choices play a powerful role in broadening our palate.
Middle Age and Beyond: After about age 40 or 50, the number of taste buds begins to decrease, and the remaining ones may become less sensitive. This can make food taste blander, leading some older adults to prefer stronger-flavored foods or lose interest in eating entirely.

Key Drivers of Evolving Preferences

Beyond the natural aging process, many other factors contribute to how often your taste preferences change:

Hormonal Shifts: Pregnancy is a prime example of hormones dramatically altering taste. High levels of human chorionic gonadotropin (hCG) can cause dysgeusia, a distorted sense of taste, or intense aversions to formerly favorite foods like coffee or meat. Hormonal changes can also influence cravings and sensitivity to specific flavors at other points in life.
Illness and Medical Conditions: Temporary or permanent shifts in taste can be caused by a wide range of health issues. Respiratory infections like the flu or COVID-19 are well-known culprits, as a large portion of what we perceive as taste is actually smell. Neurological conditions, dental problems, and cancer treatments like chemotherapy can also disrupt taste perception.
Psychological and Environmental Factors: The brain's reward system and learning processes are major players. Consistent exposure to certain flavors, emotional associations with food, and cultural norms can all shape our preferences. Our environment, from the availability of processed foods to social dining habits, continuously molds our choices.

Comparison of Factors Changing Taste


Factor	How it Changes Taste	Duration	Example
Aging	Reduces the number and sensitivity of taste buds over time.	Gradual, long-term	Preferring more heavily seasoned food in old age.
Hormones (e.g., Pregnancy)	Causes a temporary distortion (dysgeusia) or heightened sensitivity to tastes.	Temporary, short-to-medium term	Developing an intense aversion to coffee or specific meats.
Illness (e.g., COVID-19)	Interferes with the sense of smell, which heavily influences flavor perception.	Temporary, short-term	Finding foods bland or having a phantom metallic taste.
Genetics	Can influence the number of taste buds and how certain compounds are perceived.	Lifelong, intrinsic	Being a 'supertaster' who is highly sensitive to bitter flavors.
Exposure/Habit	Repeating consumption can create or reverse a preference.	Variable, can be long or short-term	Retraining your palate to enjoy less sweet foods by reducing sugar intake.

Can You Retrain Your Taste Buds? Yes, Here's How

Since preferences are largely learned, you can actively change your relationship with food. It requires conscious effort and patience but is very achievable. Here are some techniques:

Reduce Sugar and Salt Intake: The more you eat highly processed, sugary, or salty foods, the more you crave them. By gradually reducing your intake, your palate can recalibrate to appreciate the natural flavors in whole foods. Cooking from scratch and using herbs and spices instead of salt can help reset your baseline.
Practice Mindful Eating: Focus on the flavors, textures, and aromas of your food. This can enhance the experience and make wholesome foods more satisfying, weakening the pull of unhealthy cravings.
Introduce New Foods Gradually: Repeated exposure is key to developing a liking for new or disliked foods. Start by incorporating a small amount of a new vegetable, for example, into a favorite dish and gradually increase the amount over time. Research shows that pairing disliked foods with familiar, well-liked flavors can help establish a positive association.
Leverage Your Sense of Smell: Flavor is a combination of taste and smell. Adding aromatic herbs, spices, and other fragrant ingredients to dishes can make them more appealing, especially if your sense of taste is dulled due to age or illness. For example, adding fresh basil to a tomato dish can significantly boost its perceived flavor. The National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders provides further information on the connection between smell and taste.
Address Dry Mouth: A lack of saliva can inhibit taste perception. Staying hydrated by drinking plenty of water or sucking on ice can help saliva production and improve how you taste food.

Conclusion

Your taste preferences are not static, predetermined traits but dynamic characteristics that shift and evolve throughout your lifetime. While taste bud regeneration happens frequently, the true evolution of your palate is a much more complex process involving age, hormones, health, and a lifetime of environmental and psychological experiences. By understanding these powerful influences, you can proactively guide your taste preferences toward healthier habits and continue to enjoy a varied and fulfilling diet, regardless of your life stage.

Key Takeaways

Taste buds vs. preferences: While taste buds regenerate every 1-2 weeks, your actual food preferences change much more slowly over your lifetime, influenced by more than cellular turnover.
Aging dulls sensitivity: The number of taste buds decreases with age, typically starting around middle age, which can make food seem blander and alter preferences.
Hormones cause temporary shifts: Hormonal changes, such as those during pregnancy, can cause temporary but significant taste alterations and food aversions.
Illness and injury impact taste: Infections like COVID-19, nerve damage, and medical treatments can all distort or temporarily eliminate taste sensation, which is heavily linked to smell.
Your palate can be retrained: Through consistent exposure to new foods, mindful eating, and reducing sugar/salt, you can gradually change your preferences over time.

Frequently Asked Questions

Yes, absolutely. Since taste preferences are largely learned, you can actively influence them over time through repeated exposure to new foods and gradually reducing your intake of very sweet or salty items.

As you age, the number of taste buds on your tongue decreases, and the remaining ones become less sensitive. Your sense of smell can also decline. These factors combine to make flavors seem less intense, leading to a shift in preferences.

No, pregnancy-related taste changes (dysgeusia) are usually temporary. They are caused by hormonal fluctuations and most often subside after the first trimester or completely disappear after childbirth.

Your sense of smell is responsible for about 80% of what you perceive as flavor. Infections like COVID-19 can damage the olfactory nerves, leading to a distorted or absent sense of smell and, consequently, a change in how food tastes.

Taste buds regenerate every 1-2 weeks at a cellular level, but your brain's interpretation of those taste signals, based on experience and other factors, defines your preference. Preferences change over longer periods due to a variety of internal and external factors.

The time it takes varies from person to person. However, by consistently introducing new flavors and reducing old habits over several weeks to a few months, you can successfully recalibrate your taste perception.

Smell is a critical component of flavor perception. Your taste buds detect the five basic tastes (sweet, salty, sour, bitter, umami), but it is your sense of smell, or olfaction, that allows you to distinguish complex flavors, like apple from pear.

Genetics play a role in taste perception. Some people, known as 'supertasters,' have more taste buds and are more sensitive to bitter compounds, making them more likely to avoid foods like broccoli or coffee.