The 75 Hard diet rule is the shortest rule in the programme and the one that ends most attempts. It says: follow a diet, no alcohol, no cheat meals. That's it. Andy Frisella deliberately never names a diet — you pick one, and the only thing being tested is whether you stick to the one you picked.
Which means the rule is stricter and looser than people expect at the same time. Looser, because keto, vegetarian, calorie counting, plate-portioning and "no ultra-processed food" are all legal choices. Stricter, because a single glass of wine on day 41 sends you back to day one, and there is no version of the programme where that's negotiable.
This post is only about the food side. The full set of daily tasks is in 75 Hard rules and how to track it, the printable-style daily list is in 75 Hard checklist, and if the no-alcohol clause is the part you're weighing, 75 Hard vs 75 Soft covers the version that allows a drink.
What the rule actually requires
Three things, in the order they cause problems:
- A diet. Any structured way of eating, chosen in advance and written down. "Eating healthier" is not a diet, because on day 30 at 11pm nobody can adjudicate it.
- No alcohol. Zero. Not one beer, not a glass at a wedding, not the champagne at your own birthday.
- No cheat meals. No planned exception, no refeed day, no "it's Sunday".
The official 75 Hard page frames the programme as a mental toughness challenge rather than a fitness plan, and the food rule is where that framing shows. The diet isn't there to change your body composition in 75 days. It's there to give you something that can be broken, so that keeping it means something.
What counts, what doesn't, and what quietly breaks it
The grey areas are always the same four. Decide them on day zero, not on day 34.
| Counts as following the diet | Breaks it | Why people get this wrong | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Alcohol | Nothing containing it | Any amount, including a sip | "One drink" is the single most common day-one restart |
| Cheat meals | Nothing outside your chosen plan | A planned takeaway, a birthday slice | A cheat meal is defined as planned, so intent doesn't excuse it |
| Diet slips | Depends on your written plan | Eating outside the rules you wrote | A vague plan can't be followed or broken cleanly |
| Coffee, sweeteners, supplements | Allowed unless your diet excludes them | Nothing inherently | Your diet decides, not the programme |
| Alcohol in cooking, kombucha, "0.0" beer | Your call, decided in advance | Changing your mind mid-challenge | Ambiguity is the failure, not the ingredient |
The last row is the real rule behind the rule. 75 Hard doesn't fail on a doughnut; it fails on an undecided edge case at a moment when you'd rather not decide. Every ambiguity you leave open is a future exit.
Pick a diet you can hold for 75 days
- Pick for sustainability, not for speed. The best diet here is the least impressive one you'll still be following on day 60. Aggressive cuts have a much higher restart rate, and a restart costs you every day you already did.
- Write it as rules, not intentions. Three to five lines: what you eat, what you don't, what happens when you're out. "No alcohol, no added sugar, protein at every meal, one takeaway-free rule" is enforceable. "Clean eating" isn't.
- Decide your social plan now. There will be a dinner, a wedding, a work thing. Choose the sparkling water in advance so the decision isn't made standing at a bar at 9pm.
- Sort out travel and long days. The 75 days will include a flight, a hangover-free hen do, and a Tuesday from hell. Have a default meal you can get almost anywhere.
- Write it down where you'll see it. Not because you'll forget the rules, but because a written rule is harder to quietly reinterpret than a remembered one.
Then don't change it. Switching diets mid-challenge is technically allowed — you're still following a diet — but it's usually how a slip gets laundered into a rule change, and you'll know if that's what happened.
The alcohol clause is the whole difficulty
For most people who fail 75 Hard, the diet wasn't the problem and alcohol was. It's the only rule that other people participate in: the workouts are yours, the reading is yours, the water is yours, but the drink is offered to you by someone who means well and doesn't know you're on day 52.
Two things help. First, a sentence you've already decided on — "not drinking at the moment" ends the conversation faster than an explanation of the programme. Second, going first: order before anyone offers.
It's also worth being honest about why the rule exists. Health bodies are lukewarm on 75 Hard as a fitness protocol — Cleveland Clinic's assessment is that the workload and rigidity make it risky for beginners — but the no-alcohol clause is the least controversial part of it. Nobody's health suffers from 75 dry days.
What tracking has to do with the food rule
Here's the practical asymmetry: the workouts, the water and the reading all announce themselves. You either did the 45 minutes or you didn't. The diet is a continuous rule with no completion moment, which is why it drifts. You can't tick "followed my diet" at 2pm and mean it.
So it gets ticked at the end of the day, honestly, as a single yes or no. That one habit — one box, logged at night — is the only reliable way the food rule stays real, because it forces a verdict instead of a vague sense that today was mostly fine.
If you break it
You start again from day one. That's the programme, and softening it turns it into something else — which is fine, but call it something else. 75 Hard vs 75 Medium exists precisely because plenty of people want the structure without the total-restart clause.
If you'd rather rebuild the eating habits without a 75-day binary attached to them, how to get back on track is the less punishing route, and it's the honest recommendation for most people on their third restart.
FAQ
What diet do you have to follow on 75 Hard?
Any diet you choose, as long as it's a real, written plan and you follow it for all 75 days. The programme deliberately doesn't prescribe one. What it prescribes is no alcohol and no cheat meals on top of whatever you picked.
Can you drink coffee on 75 Hard?
Yes, unless your chosen diet excludes it. Coffee isn't restricted by the programme itself. The same logic covers tea, sweeteners and supplements — your diet decides, not the rules.
Does one cheat meal really restart 75 Hard?
Yes. A cheat meal is a planned exception, and the programme has no allowance for one. If you eat outside your plan you're back to day one, which is why the plan you write on day zero matters more than the willpower you have on day 40.
How do you keep track of the diet rule every day?
Log it as one end-of-day yes or no, rather than trying to tick it during the day. A single habit with an evening reminder in a tracker like init.Habits forces an honest verdict each night, and the run of days is what tells you whether the plan you chose was actually followable.