Carrots won't give you better-than-normal night vision.

Carrots are rich in beta-carotene, which the body converts to vitamin A, a nutrient the retina genuinely needs to produce rhodopsin, the pigment that enables vision in low light. That real biology is where the myth stops being accurate: vitamin A only prevents vision problems caused by an actual deficiency, and someone who already gets enough vitamin A from their diet won’t see any further improvement in night vision by eating more carrots.

The specific idea that carrots help you see in the dark has a documented propaganda origin: during World War II, Britain’s Royal Air Force credited its pilots’ nighttime successes to carrot-eating, a story historians now generally agree was cover for classified radar technology the RAF didn’t want revealed. In parts of the world where vitamin A deficiency is common, correcting it does meaningfully protect eyesight, including preventing a specific condition called night blindness, but for someone already well-nourished, extra carrots are simply a healthy vegetable rather than an eyesight upgrade.