Mini-Course Lessons
People always ask us “What supplements should I take?”, expecting a list of must-have supplements.
Spoiler alert: There are no supplements that everyone should take.
Supplements are all about context. Choose the right supplement for your job, not the supplement that’s touted for everyone’s jobs.
Think of it like this: A cast-iron pan might be a great cooking tool if you want an amazing sear. But if you’re lightly sautéing, there are better options. It’s also heavy, so you wouldn’t use it if you have a wrist injury, and it might also be a bad option if you have iron overload. Nutrition and supplements are also like this — what’s good in one scenario isn’t necessarily good in another.
With that said, here are five supplements that are supported by research and have an above-average chance of efficacy (side note: It’s a good thing we don’t sell supplements, as we’d be terrible at it —“Buy our supplement! You may possibly find a positive cost:benefit ratio!”).
1. Creatine
Creatine is wildly popular with fitness enthusiasts, and for good reason. While you still need to train consistently to make strength gains, creatine can provide a good power boost by helping your cells make energy, which in turn helps you grow more muscle. There are some people who don’t respond to it, but most do.
Creatine has had a controversial history: health concerns, misinformation about what it is, and notable sports scandals, such as when Mark McGwire’s creatine use was scrutinized for providing an unfair advantage. These days, it’s not controversial in sports, and research suggests that it’s safe. The International Olympic Committee even gave it the go-ahead in 1998, noting that it’s a food component and not at all comparable to steroids and other substances that provide an unfair advantage.
The body makes its own creatine, but not at levels that maximize muscle growth, so using a supplement makes sense for some people.
You can get creatine from meat, but it’s difficult to get as much through food as you would from a supplement. And if you don’t eat a lot of meat, or don’t eat meat at all, supplementing with creatine can be even more beneficial. Perhaps the most interesting research on creatine these days involves potential benefits for cognition and depression.
In summary, creatine definitely isn’t a ‘can’t-miss’ supplement (like we said, these don’t exist!), but it is a tool that can get you a little closer to maximal performance. And if you buy some, just go with simple creatine monohydrate. It works just as well as any of the fancier, more expensive types.
Bottom line: Creatine works. It is especially powerful if you are vegetarian.
2. Garlic
Sometimes, supplement research unveils different benefits than you’d expect. For example, let’s look at garlic.
The most common belief about garlic is that it boosts the immune system and helps prevent us from getting sick—and it might, but the research isn’t clear. What is more clear is garlic’s positive effect on blood pressure and cholesterol.
Garlic isn’t going to make people immune to heart disease nor dramatically slash risk, and its effects are only reliably seen in people with elevated blood pressure and cholesterol. But it can be a useful tool in your arsenal to potentially help improve lipid panels.
You can read more about it in our article on garlic and other helpful foods.
Bottom line: While garlic could possibly improve immune health, it may be even more useful for cardiovascular health.
3. Melatonin
Getting a good night’s sleep is essential to living a healthy life. Good news: Melatonin can actually help.
Melatonin is a hormone that regulates the sleep-wake cycle. Taking it can reduce the time it takes to fall asleep when lying in bed at night, helping you avoid the dreaded “tired but wide awake” time. It may also modestly improve the quality of your sleep. Results may vary, but enough people benefit from taking melatonin that it’s worth mentioning.
Even if you don’t personally find benefit from melatonin supplements, it can still pay dividends to focus on melatonin. How’s that? Well, you can manipulate melatonin levels in your body without taking a supplement. The reason why camping can reset your circadian rhythm, for example, is by forcing you to avoid the blue part of the visible light spectrum at night, then forcing you to see that light in the morning. Blue light is what suppresses your body’s own melatonin production. You can approximate the camping effect at home by avoiding too much TV, computer, and smartphone light in the evening.
By the way, before looking to supplements to fix your sleep issues, consider reading our ten tips for better sleep.
Bottom line: There’s nothing more important than sleep, and it pays to focus on the master sleep regulator: melatonin.
4. Turmeric (curcumin)
As I’ve said before, there is no panacea in the supplement aisle. But every now and again, a supplement comes along that seems to be useful for multiple things. Curcumin looks to be one of those. Turmeric is a popular spice, and curcumin is a compound in turmeric that has been widely studied. The hype may actually be eclipsing the research at this point (curcumin is touted as a wonder-supplement by thousands of gurus and supplement companies; while research findings are generally positive, they’re sometimes mixed or of poor methodological quality), but curcumin looks promising for lowering cholesterol, improving blood sugar control, lessening symptoms of depression, and reducing osteoarthritis pain.
Most of these things have a common element: excessive inflammation. Curcumin appears to be a powerful anti-inflammatory compound, with the ability to increase the amount of antioxidants our bodies make. So while curcumin may eventually turn out to be overrated for some things, it does make sense to try it for potential inflammation reduction.
Note that curcumin is poorly absorbed if it’s not formulated correctly, so check out our Dosage Information section.
Bottom line: Few supplements live up to their hype. Curcumin might, due to unique effects on inflammation
5. Zinc
As I mentioned in the previous email, while multivitamins don’t make a lot of sense for most people, taking individual nutrients is sometimes a good idea. Zinc is an interesting one, because it’s plentiful in diets that include beef and fortified cereals, but low in some diets or disease states. For example, lower levels of zinc become more common when people are insulin resistant or have type 2 diabetes.
According to available research, this creates a vicious cycle: Zinc levels go down, which then leads to further insulin resistance. Zinc also seems to have a beneficial effect on HDL and LDL cholesterol levels for people with blood sugar issues, but that benefit doesn’t extend to people with normal blood sugar control.
This is a great example of what I’ve been harping on: In certain contexts, it makes sense to take a supplement. Otherwise, getting all your zinc from food is just fine for non-insulin resistant people.
Bottom line: It’s easier than you’d think to become low in zinc (rhyme not intended), so targeted supplementation is sometimes warranted.
BONUS: What constitutes a good reason to take a nutrient supplement, versus a bad reason?
Here are a couple of examples. “I don’t want to eat healthily, I just like snacks and dessert too much” is a bad reason to take multivitamins, while a confirmed deficiency in multiple nutrients is a good reason. Being low on sleep and hoping that extra B-vitamins will boost your energy? Bad reason (especially because they won’t).
Do you live in a dark hole during winter? Vitamin D may be wise.
Are you a vegan? Vitamin B12 is your friend.
In addition to zinc, magnesium levels tend to be low in people with type 2 diabetes, and supplementation can help.
To repeat our mantra: everyone is unique, and there is no one supplement that every person should take. But some specific supplements may be helpful to some people with nutrient deficiencies.
And what about some popular supplements that don’t actually work?
The following five supplements are so popular that no one would suspect them of being little more than being clearly marketed pills. You may even be taking them yourself!
1. Multivitamins
We totally understand why people take multis. After all, without these nutrients, none of us would be alive. But a lot of people take them as “insurance” against deficiency, even though studies don’t suggest a benefit for lifespan or quality of life.
By far the best form of insurance is a healthy and nutritious diet. There are far more aspects to food than vitamins and minerals. Some are potentially helpful compounds, such as fiber, nitrates, and phytochemicals. Some are potentially harmful compounds, such as oxidized fats or high levels of certain plant toxins. How likely is it that a multivitamin pill outweighs all these myriad dietary factors? Pretty much nill.
So here’s a strategy that will net you greater benefits than popping a multi every day:
1) Improve your diet at least a little bit
Start by committing to remove at least one or two unhealthy foods or habits from your daily diet (like late night dessert binges). Then, add in one or two foods that are healthy, or at least healthier.
2) Figure out which nutrients you’re still low in
Now that you’ve leveled up your diet, you can start to check where holes might still exist. Record your micronutrient intake for a couple of test days, using an app, website, spreadsheet, or whichever method you find easiest.
3) Fill in any cracks with targeted single-nutrient supplements
Most diets that are rich in unprocessed or less-processed foods will also be rich in nutrients. For remaining nutrient deficiencies, you can delve into our supplement pages to find out more about the best dosages and forms.
Targeted supplementation will save you both time and money, but more importantly, may be better for your long-term health. That’s because multivitamins often provide too much of some nutrients and not enough of others. Like those kitchen-sink multis that have several thousand percent of a bunch of nutrients, plus other randomly added ingredients. If you already get enough nutrients in your diet, then suddenly pile on more from a supplement, you put yourself at risk for toxicity (like, for example, exceeding the Tolerable Upper Intake Level for zinc).
For more information on these issues, you can read our detailed article on multivitamins here.
Bottom line: Rather than starting with a multivitamin, start with a good hard look at your diet. Fill in the gaps using targeted supplementation, which is cheaper and better for your health.
2. Fat burners
This one also seems to make sense at first glance.
Maybe you’re already hard at work changing your diet and exercise routine. Fat burners can seem like a good adjunct, enabling quicker changes, or great physique improvements instead of merely good ones. Most fat burners also appear to cite evidence as part of their sales pitch, complete with graphics displaying quantitative improvements in fat loss.
Unfortunately, these enticing sales pitches are, almost without exception, misleading. Fat burners became popular due to endorsements from famous people, media advertising, and word of mouth, not good research. The major types of fat burners fall into the categories of ineffective, marginally effective, or even potentially harmful.
There’s a reason for this: Metabolism usually stays at the same rate. Supplements may increase it slightly, but the overall effect on body fat is negligible most of the time. Supplements that reduce fat storage or release fat from fat cells don’t make it vanish; if it’s not burned for energy, it builds up in other cells, which can be harmful. Certain stimulants that make you jittery and increase NEAT (Non-Exercise Activity Thermogenesis, aka fidgeting and other habitual activity) can cause sleep issues and potentially even damage the cardiovascular system.
It’s always best to see what you can accomplish on your own before trying out supplements. The effects of fat burners are dwarfed by even small dietary and activity changes, so why play with fire?
You can read more about “slow metabolism” myths here.
Bottom line: most fat burners are a kitchen sink equation, full of things that have little proof they work (and may actually set you back by messing up your sleep).
3. BCAAs (branched-chain amino acids)
While these amino acids play a role in muscle growth, they’re nearly always a waste of money to supplement with.
Why? Two reasons. First, they’re among the most expensive protein-related supplements. So to reach a level of benefit that matches their monetary cost, the evidence should be quite strong for unique benefits. That evidence is not there.
Second, there are better options out there, namely whey protein. Whey protein is already high in BCAAs, and it also gives you other important amino acids at the same time, all for a lower cost. Plus, if you’re eating to maximize muscle growth, you’re getting a lot of BCAAs from your diet already. Because guess what else is a good source of BCAAs? Food! Namely the protein-rich foods that most lifters make sure to get.
Bottom line: People interested in building muscle will experience more benefits from eating a high protein meal instead of supplementing leucine. Protein contains BCAAs anyway, so unless you are specifically training fasted, whey protein is a far more effective supplement than BCAAs.
4. Testosterone boosters
File another one under the “if only it were that easy” category.
Legal supplements that improve testosterone levels actually do exist; it’s just that they’re common nutrients which work by correcting a nutritional deficiency linked to low testosterone. Some percentage of those with low testosterone can boost their nutrient status, and thereby bring low T levels closer to normal.
So how about the dozens of non-nutrient testosterone boosters being advertised everywhere? Most of these products use combinations of highly speculative ingredients, meaning research is in its early stages or hasn’t yet been done on humans. Some people swear that these supplements work, but their minds could be playing tricks on them. It’s also possible that some of the ingredients have an effect on libido, independent of testosterone levels. So you may feel friskier than usual, yet not be addressing the root problems behind your low T. This is important, because low T can harm health in other ways.
It’s high time to pour everything-but-the-kitchen-sink supplements down the drain, and start exploring root causes of low testosterone.
You can read more about root causes of low testosterone, and potential solutions, here and here.
Bottom line: To maintain healthy testosterone levels, stick to what’s shown to work: steady doses of sleep and weight-lifting, and enough food and fat to support hormone levels.
5. Echinacea
For those who get sick multiple times a year, the desire to fight back with any weapon available is understandable. When the leaves start to fall and winter rears its head, it’s common to stock up on anything that promises to help with the upcoming specter of cold and flu season.
Research on echinacea suggests that it might have a tiny effect on the frequency and duration of colds, but it’s fairly likely that the average person who sporadically takes it won’t derive any substantial benefit. Once you count up how much you spend on supplements in a year, echinacea is more likely to make you sick of wasting money than it is to prevent sickness.
You can read more about echinacea and immunity here.
Bottom line: Echinacea is a mainstay of cold prevention mostly due to historical use, rather than evidence of efficacy. Stick to consistently health sleep and food intake to help ward off colds.
Bonus: Cinnamon
We like to look at many different angles in our Supplement Guides to clear up conflicting information. One example is from our Blood Sugar Guide, where we evaluated cinnamon. Some people claim that it’s great for blood sugar, and others don’t think that it works very well. We looked at all of the studies and found that there was evidence for a notable effect when taken in high doses, but it was less impressive at lower doses. So just take high doses, right?
Hold up. There’s a catch. Common cassia cinnamon contains a lot of coumarin, which is toxic to the liver and kidneys. While having some in your tea won’t hurt you, trying to use it as a supplement to get the most potent effect can easily put you over the safe level. Ceylon cinnamon has a lot less coumarin, but it hasn’t been studied much and has different levels of the chemicals that likely lead to its blood sugar-lowering effect. Hopefully more research takes a look at low coumarin extracts and Ceylon cinnamon, but for now, cinnamon is overrated, not because it doesn’t work, but because the safe amount probably only has a tiny effect, if that.
Bottom line: Natural doesn’t mean safe. Cinnamon may seem like a good alternative treatment for high blood sugar, but taking it as a supplement can expose you to high levels of a toxic chemical.
In the next lesson, we’ll delve deeper into what to look out for when buying supplements.
Your homework for this lesson: What supplements did you take before you found Examine that you no longer take? Are there any supplements you take now that you didn’t before? Are there any nutrients which you know (or suspect) you are low in?
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