A urine pH dipstick is the obvious way to put a number on an "alkaline" diet. A 2013 clinic study lists what makes the sticks appealing: low cost, ease of use, and the chance for people to measure their own values outside the clinic (PubMed 23435644). This article asks what that strip can show, what it can't, and where a plate of fruit, dates included, comes into it. The short answer from the research below is that the body keeps blood pH steady on its own, so alkaline food is not required for that. The case for fruit and vegetables, dates among them, rests on other advice such as the NHS 5 A Day.
The strip reads your urine, not your blood
Gerry Schwalfenberg's 2012 review of the alkaline diet notes that human life needs a tightly controlled serum pH of about 7.4, in a slightly alkaline range of 7.35 to 7.45 (PubMed 22013455). The body holds blood at that level mainly through the kidneys and the lungs. Urine is different. The same review says it "may have a variable pH from acid to alkaline depending on the need for balancing the internal environment."
So a strip dipped in urine is reading the output of that balancing act. It does not read the pH of your blood, and a change in colour is not a change in your blood.
What urine pH does follow
Urine pH does follow the plate. In 1995 Remer and Manz worked out a potential renal acid load (PRAL) score for common foods (PubMed 7797810). Certain hard cheeses reached an average high of 23.6 mEq per 100g, fats and oils sat at 0, and fruits, juices and vegetables averaged about -3. They found a close link between net acid excretion and urine pH (r = .83), and wrote that the method allows an appropriate prediction of the effects of diet on the acidity of urine.
A 2008 study of 22,034 men and women aged 39 to 78 in Norfolk, England, looked at the same link against everyday diets, using casual urine samples (Welch and colleagues, PubMed 18042305). A more alkaline diet, more fruit and vegetables and less meat were each linked with more alkaline urine. The authors say using urine pH to track fruit and vegetable intake in individuals "warrants further investigation". That falls well short of a recommendation.
How accurate the strips are
Even as a reading of urine, a dipstick is rough. The 2013 study, run in a specialist clinic, compared dipsticks with a pH electrode on paired samples of fresh urine (Kwong and colleagues, PubMed 23435644). The two agreed well overall, with a correlation of 0.89, but about 1 in 4 dipstick readings was off by more than half a pH unit. The sticks also tended to read too high when urine pH was high and too low when it was low. The authors concluded dipstick pH was not reliable enough for clinical decisions.
A 2026 review pooled 13 studies with 2,801 participants (Galán and colleagues, PubMed 41914229). It puts dipstick resolution at 0.5 pH units against 0.1 for a portable digital meter. A strip that reads in half-unit steps can't show a shift smaller than that step.
A reading that predicts nothing about bones
One line in Schwalfenberg's review is about urine pH and bone directly. A study he cites took two morning urine samples over a five-year span, and urine pH did not predict bone fractures or loss of bone mineral density. He adds that this may not reflect whether people kept to an alkaline or acid diet the whole time. His conclusion is that alkaline diets result in a more alkaline urine pH, and that there is no substantial evidence this improves bone health.
Where dates come in
Schwalfenberg lists fruits, vegetables and fruit juices among the foods with a negative acid load, while grain products, meats, dairy and fish carry relatively high acid loads. Among the minerals in dates, potassium is by far the largest. USDA FoodData Central gives Deglet Noor, a Tunisian and Algerian variety, 656 mg of potassium per 100g against 2 mg of sodium (record 171726). Medjool has 696 mg of potassium and 1 mg of sodium (record 168191). A 30g portion of Deglet Noor works out to about 197 mg of potassium.
The NHS counts 30g of dried fruit, dates among them, as one of your 5 A Day and asks that it be eaten at mealtimes, not as a snack between meals, to reduce the impact on teeth. That is a sensible way to add dates to a plate. Whether a strip turns a shade greener afterwards tells you little, for the reasons above.
Iran's soft Mazafati date comes from Bam in Kerman province and is cold-stored, so it is sold all year. For more on that variety, see Kurma Mazafati Malaysia. The video below, posted by AbuAyyash Farms, is titled as a look at Medjool date farming and a date processing factory.
None of this is medical advice. If you have been told to watch your urine pH for a health reason, follow your GP's guidance and the equipment they recommend. For questions about dates or a price quote, the Kurma Nabi about page explains the retail and wholesale side, and the contact page gives the WhatsApp number. Other articles are on the blog.