A few months ago, I started burping. Not in a funny, show-off-for-the-kids way, but in a constant, uncomfortable, what-is-happening-to-my-body kind of way. I started counting: 30, 40 times a day. And like any adult in 2026, I immediately turned to Google to ask whether that was a normal amount of belching. From the obvious offenders (sparkling water and speed-eating) to more serious underlying conditions like ulcers, small intestinal bacterial overgrowth (SIBO) or, in rare cases, cancer, I spoke with gastroenterologists to break down when burping is harmless, and when it’s a signal that something else is going on. What counts as ‘normal’ burping? “Burping is normal,” Dr. Samantha Nazareth, a board-certified gastroenterologist and chief medical officer at metaME in New York, reassured me. “It’s air moving up from the food pipe (oesophagus) or the stomach.” That said, “normal” isn’t exactly a fixed number. What feels like a lot to one person might barely register for someone else, and the range is wider than you’d think. “It is difficult to give a ‘normal’ cutoff,” shared Dr. …