Sea Salt vs. Regular Salt: The Health Myth Explained

The marketing behind sea salt vs. regular salt has successfully convinced millions of consumers that they are buying a health supplement rather than a seasoning. By leaning on words like ‘natural’ and ‘unrefined,’ brands imply a nutritional superiority that simply doesn’t exist in the lab.

In reality, whether it comes from a pristine ocean shore or an underground mine, salt is sodium chloride. Period. To understand the truth about your health and your wallet, you have to look past the ‘trace mineral’ hype and look at the actual chemistry of what’s in the box, whether it’s labeled sea salt or not.

The Sea Salt Reality Check

Ordinary table salt, such as the Morton salt which we are all familiar with, is sodium chloride (NaCl), commonly derived from halite (rock salt) mined from underground deposits. Salt has long been of great importance, not only to provide sodium in our diets and flavor to our dishes but also for food preservation and chemical production.

Despite the gourmet branding, table salt and sea salt are both industrial commodities. Less than 1% of the world’s salt ends up on a dinner table; the rest is used for everything from de-icing roads to tanning leather. Whether it is evaporated from a modern pond or mined from an ancient seabed, the result is the same chemical compound: Sodium Chloride.

It is also mined, as mentioned, from underground deposits as rock salt, which accounts for about one-third of salt production in the United States. These halite deposits come from the seas of millions of years ago, which have dried up and left their salt behind in huge amounts. Besides the evaporation of seawater and rock salt, lake brines and the salt crust from dry lake beds constitute the rest of salt production.

Understand this one thing about salt and all the gourmet salt hype cannot affect you! The reason we use salt can be scientifically explained!

Read More: Why We Use Salt In Foods

All Salt is Sea Salt

The most successful trick in salt marketing is the implication that ‘regular’ salt is a synthetic chemical while sea salt is a natural gift from the ocean. In reality, all salt is sea salt. Whether it is harvested from a modern coastline or mined from an underground halite deposit in the Midwest, every grain of salt on earth originated in a sea. The ‘regular’ salt in your shaker is simply sea salt from an ancient ocean that dried up millions of years ago. Whether the water evaporated yesterday or during the Jurassic period, the resulting chemical is identical: Sodium Chloride.

While marketers want you to focus on the ‘natural’ label, the primary difference is whether you are using the salt as a seasoning or a flavoring.

The Chemistry of Evaporation

Whether it happens in a lab or a lagoon, the process of creating salt follows a strict chemical script:

• The Precipitation Chain: As seawater evaporates, minerals don’t all fall out at once. Other minerals precipitate out first, leaving a concentrated brine of Sodium Chloride (NaCl) behind.
• Crystal Formation: Once the brine reaches saturation, the salt crystals fall to the bottom.
• The Mineral Reality: While microscopic amounts of magnesium or iodide may remain in “natural” sea salt, the levels are so low that the composition is chemically near-identical to mined salt.
• The Iodine Factor: Most table salt is intentionally fortified with iodide for public health; any “natural” iodide in sea salt is too inconsistent to be considered a reliable source.

They are connected! The frequent instruction to “salt to taste” is down to physiology and preference. With several deep dives into salt, I’ve constructed a master class in the science of salt.

This helps you understand not only the two possible purposes of a salt in food, but the reason salt is used in the first place.

The “Same Salt, Different Label” Reality

The illusion of a difference between ‘natural’ sea salt and ‘regular’ salt is further shattered when you look at who actually produces it. Major producers like Cargill, Inc. and Morton Salt supply the vast majority of salt found in both health food stores and traditional supermarkets.

Often, the only difference between a ‘natural’ sea salt and a generic house brand is the choice of anti-caking agent. While grocery store salts might use silica aluminate to keep grains flowing, ‘natural’ brands may swap this for magnesium carbonate, or simply leave it out entirely so the salt clumps. In many cases, the salt itself comes from the same evaporation pans and bins. Whether it’s Morton salt from California (which is sea salt) or Morton salt from a Midwestern mine, the company often sells it as the same everyday product because, chemically, there is no distinction.

Even the common preference for Kosher salt among chefs is based on little more than preference and dogma. Unless the salt has a remarkably different flavor, like a very few expensive high mineral salts, the only question, again, is whether you are using it as finishing salt or a seasoning, so that the salt dissolves.

The Less Refined Myth

It is frequently reported that sea salt is “less refined” than ordinary salt, and while this is sometimes true, it is not always the case. In the U.S., all salt sold for human consumption must contain at least 97.5 percent sodium chloride, whether labeled sea salt or not (this pertains to products that can be named simply salt, kosher salt, or sea salt, etc. without any other designation added). It must be free from heavy metal contaminants as well.

This means that all salts sold in the U.S. MUST be refined to some extent. A few different trace minerals may be present, here or there, depending on the salt’s origin, and these may contribute to flavor, but there is no significant nutritional difference whatsoever.

Trace Minerals Do NOT Impact Your Health

Do not rely on sea salt as a way to ensure the consumption of trace minerals. This would contribute nothing measurable except excess sodium, at best. Table salt contains around 2100 to 2300 milligrams of sodium per teaspoon, depending on the brand and degree of refinement.

The flavors and odors from a particular salt may be important to cooks, and various sea salts can make a difference in this regard. Some salts have other minerals added to them as well, such as Hawaiian sea salt, which has Alaea, a volcanic red clay high in iron oxide, added to it. 

One type of sea salt is black salt, also known as kala namak and sanchal, which is not actually black but has a pink-gray color and a sulfurous odor. Another is French sel gris, produced alongside the more expensive and highly regarded salt known as fleur de sel, also called celtic salt or grey salt, which is gray to light purple because of its clay content. Although the clay and other impurities would certainly influence the taste of this salt, it is not nearly as clear whether fleur de sel itself tastes any different than common salt, as revealed in the article linked above.

While these impurities provide color and a localized flavor ‘pop,’ they don’t offer a nutritional shortcut. For a deeper look at whether these high-end salts are worth the price, see our guide on Fleur de Sel vs. Kosher Salt.

Don’t believe the claims you may read about the health benefits of sea salt versus “unnatural” table salt. These claims are imaginary, based on nothing but the typical concept that anything that sounds more natural must be better for you. Choose your salt based on its properties for your dishes, nothing else.

• Why Is Salt Used in Food? (The molecular science)
• Fleur de Sel vs. Kosher Salt (The culinary choice)
• What ‘Salt to Taste’ Actually Means (The practical application)