Peptides
One word, four completely different things
A peptide is a short chain of amino acids — shorter than a protein, and that is the whole definition. It covers the collagen powder in your cupboard and an unapproved injectable bought from a website that calls it a research chemical. Those are not the same purchase, and the word does not distinguish them.
Read this before the list
The FDA keeps two lists here, and sellers quote the wrong one. The first names substances it judges to carry significant safety risks. The second — where BPC-157, TB-500, CJC-1295 and most of the rest sit — is headed “nominated but withdrawn”: the nominations to allow compounding were pulled by whoever made them.
Nobody is pursuing eligibility for those substances any more. That is the absence of a verdict, not a verdict in their favour, and the difference is the same one this site draws everywhere else: not tested is not the same sentence as tested and found safe.
Peptides people inject
The ones the marketing is about. Almost all are sold as "research chemicals, not for human consumption" — a label that exists to move an unapproved drug, not to describe how anyone uses it. Several are on the FDA’s significant-safety-risk list; the rest had their nominations withdrawn, which is not the same as being cleared.
Sold for: Tendon, ligament and gut healing.
Sold for: Injury recovery, flexibility, inflammation.
Sold for: Growth hormone release, fat loss, muscle.
Sold for: Growth hormone release, recovery, body composition.
Sold for: Growth hormone release, appetite, muscle.
Sold for: Growth hormone release, appetite, muscle.
Sold for: Growth hormone and IGF-1, muscle, sleep.
Sold for: Reproductive hormones, libido.
Sold for: Longevity, telomeres, sleep.
Sold for: Metabolic health, insulin sensitivity, endurance.
Sold for: Focus, memory, neuroprotection.
Sold for: Anxiety, stress.
Sold for: Tanning without sun, libido.
Sold for: Fat loss without the growth hormone effects.
Sold for: Gut inflammation, skin conditions.
Sold for: Cognition, synapse formation.
Sold for: Muscle repair and growth.
Sold for: Antimicrobial, chronic infection, biofilm.
Sold for: Immune function.
Sold for: Sleep.
Peptides you swallow
Food proteins cut into shorter fragments — collagen, whey, milk casein. These are ordinary supplements, sold in tubs, and some of them have genuine human evidence. They are also the reason the word "peptide" sounds harmless.
Sold for: Skin elasticity, joint comfort, hair and nails.
Sold for: Faster absorption and recovery than whole whey.
Sold for: Lowering blood pressure.
Sold for: Muscle buffering, anti-glycation, ageing.
Sold for: Antioxidant, detoxification, skin brightening.
Peptides you put on your skin
Cosmetic ingredients. Whether a peptide crosses the skin barrier at all is the live question for most of these, and it is a different question from whether the peptide does anything once it is through.
Sold for: Skin firmness, wrinkles, wound healing, hair growth.
Sold for: Collagen stimulation, fine lines.
Sold for: Expression lines, marketed as a topical alternative to botulinum toxin.
Peptides that are approved medicines
Prescription drugs that happen to be peptides. They went through trials and approval, they are not supplements, and no part of this site is a substitute for the prescriber who would give you one.
Sold for: Type 2 diabetes and weight loss — prescription only.
Sold for: Type 2 diabetes and weight loss — prescription only.
Sold for: Type 2 diabetes and weight loss — prescription only.
Sold for: Osteoporosis — prescription only.
Sold for: Diabetes — prescription only.
Why nothing here has a rating yet
A rating on this site is computed from papers we have read, one by one, with the design, the participant count and the conclusion recorded for each. 3 of the 34 below have been through that; the rest have not, and we are not going to guess in the meantime. Listing something is not endorsing it — the point of the inventory is that the category gets discussed as one thing when it is four.
The research pass comes next, and it will link each of these to the symptoms and goals people actually take them for — including the ones that turn out to have no human trial at all, which we will say plainly rather than leaving the page out.
FDA statuses read from Certain Bulk Drug Substances for Use in Compounding that May Present Significant Safety Risks (FDA, page content current as of 22 April 2026), checked 18 August 2026. Peptide hormones, growth factors and their mimetics are also prohibited in sport at all times under section S2 of the WADA Prohibited List.