• Posted August 4, 2026

Breathing Exercises Can Curb Addiction Cravings, Review Finds

Controlled breathing might help people who are trying to kick an addiction to alcohol, tobacco or drugs, a new evidence review says.

Breathing techniques appeared to help people reduce their cravings, researchers reported July 29 in the journal Addiction.

Controlled breathing techniques were effective against cravings for nicotine, alcohol, opioids and stimulants. The exercises also worked when people were using more than one substance at a time, researchers said.

“Our review suggests that breathing interventions can be an effective and low-cost add-on to addiction treatment,” lead researcher Ariel Roxburgh said in a news release. He is a research fellow in psychology at Monash University in Australia. 

For the review, researchers pooled results from 20 previous studies involving more than 1,200 people, looking at a wide range of breathing exercises that included:

• Heart-rate variability biofeedback —  real-time feedback to help people pace their breathing to their heart rhythm

• Resonant breathing — a slower pace of breathing without biofeedback, usually six breaths per minute

• Yogic breathing —  controlled patterns of inhalation, exhalation and breath retention

• Rhemercise — slow-paced breathing that includes coordinating physical behaviors, like smiling, yawning and positive verbalizations 

• Mimicking smoking — a breathing method that mimics the action of smoking through controlled deep breaths at set intervals

• Three-part breathing — a technique focused on separately expanding three different portions of the body (abdomen, lower chest and upper chest)

The breathing exercises were initially taught by a trained clinician, and then self-directed. Evidence suggested that biofeedback breathing was more effective for longer-term control of cravings, while other breathing styles helped curb immediate cravings. 

Based on this data, smartphone apps could be designed that help people breathe through a craving, researchers said.

“With more than three-quarters of the world’s population owning a mobile phone, the potential benefits of low-cost smartphone-assisted breathing interventions are substantial,” Roxburgh said.

The next step may involve a larger study to verify how effective breathing exercises are against addiction, and how they can best be used, Roxburgh added.

More information

The Society of Addiction Recovery Residences has more on breathing exercises.

SOURCE: Society for the Study of Addiction, news release, July 29, 2026