SubEx

Manage weight

29 findings · 9 substances · 14 well-evidenced

Large, lasting weight loss comes from one class of prescription drug; part of what it takes off is not fat, and much of it returns once the injections stop. Supplements and diet swaps moved weight little or not at all.

Substances, strongest evidence first

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Findings

Metabolic & weightSwitching to diet drinks takes off 0.73kg and nothing more

Fourteen trials put the loss at 0.73kg and 0.72% of body fat. Over years, diet drinks carried much the same raised risk of diabetes, heart disease and death.

★★★Well replicated — this finding’s sources average out to meta-analyses, systematic reviews or high-powered trials.The short trials and the long follow-ups measure different things, weight on one side and disease on the other, so neither one checks the other. The long-term half only watched what people already drank, and people already at higher risk switching to diet drinks would produce the same pattern. This is a joint position from the Korean Diabetes Association and Korean Nutrition Society rather than a new analysis.Click to keep this openSupport heart and blood flowAdded Sugar (Sucrose / HFCS)
Metabolic & weightAspartame by itself does not move your blood sugar

Two reviews, one of 12 randomised trials and one of 100 controlled experiments, found no meaningful difference in glucose or insulin against a dummy drink.

★★★Well replicated — this finding’s sources average out to meta-analyses, systematic reviews or high-powered trials.The 2025 review rated its own certainty very low on every outcome, because the experiments differed widely and most carried design weaknesses that could tilt a result either way. The older review's ranges were wide enough to hide a real effect: on body weight it ran from a 1.6kg loss to an 11.6kg gain. Not finding an effect is not the same as ruling one out.Click to keep this openManage weightAspartame
Physical & bodyYou gain about 1.14kg more lean mass lifting with creatine

Pooling 12 trials in adults under 50, about 7g of creatine a day alongside resistance training left 1.14kg more lean mass and 0.73kg less fat than placebo.

★★★Well replicated — this finding’s sources average out to meta-analyses, systematic reviews or high-powered trials.The lean-mass figure is the solid one; the fat-loss figure ran anywhere from 1.34kg down to 0.11kg, close enough to nothing at one end that the effect there is unsettled. Everyone pooled here was under 50. In a small share of the trials, how people were assigned or assessed left room for the result to tilt.Click to keep this openBuild strengthCreatine
Metabolic & weightWeight, insulin and blood sugar landed the same on either one

Eight randomised trials, 1,088 women: body mass index, fasting insulin, fasting blood sugar, insulin resistance and a ratio between two pituitary hormones all crossed zero.

★★★Well replicated — this finding’s sources average out to meta-analyses, systematic reviews or high-powered trials.A null result is not proof of equivalence. Eight small trials, with moderate inconsistency on three of the five outcomes, are underpowered to rule out a real difference between the two. No risk-of-bias assessment or certainty grading is reported.Click to keep this openBalance hormonesMyo-inositol
Metabolic & weightNMN moved no measure of blood sugar, blood fats or weight

Two meta-analyses looked at fasting glucose, insulin, HbA1c, the lipid panel, weight and BMI at 250 up to 2,000 mg a day. Not one moved against placebo.

★★★Well replicated — this finding’s sources average out to meta-analyses, systematic reviews or high-powered trials.Eight trials and 342 people in the metabolic pool, so a modest real effect could be missed. Participants were mostly healthy and not diabetic, which is the population least likely to show a metabolic improvement and leaves the question open in people who already have metabolic disease. Several pooled trials ran fourteen days, far too short for HbA1c, which reflects about three months of blood sugar, to move at all.Click to keep this openManage blood sugarNMN (Nicotinamide Mononucleotide)
Metabolic & weightA second heart attack or stroke became about a fifth less likely

In one trial of 17,604 adults with obesity who had already had a cardiac event, repeat events over a mean 39.8 months fell from 8.0% to 6.5%.

★★★Well replicated — this finding’s sources average out to meta-analyses, systematic reviews or high-powered trials.The trial cannot separate how much of the benefit came from the weight loss and how much from the drug's other effects, since the treated arm got both. Adverse events forced 16.6% off the drug permanently, against 8.2% on placebo, in a group with strong reason to persist. Novo Nordisk funded it and employed several of the authors.Click to keep this openSupport heart and blood flowSemaglutide
Metabolic & weightWith type 2 diabetes, the same dose takes off about a third less

STEP 2 gave 1,210 adults with obesity and type 2 diabetes 2.4 mg weekly for 68 weeks and weight fell 9.6%, against 14.9% in the sibling trial without diabetes.

★★★Well replicated — this finding’s sources average out to meta-analyses, systematic reviews or high-powered trials.Both trials were funded by Novo Nordisk. Participants stayed on varying background diabetes medication, which is part of what separates the two groups rather than diabetes on its own. Gastrointestinal side effects reached 63.5% here against 34.3% on placebo.Click to keep this openManage weightSemaglutide
Metabolic & weightFour years in, weight was still 10.2% below where it started

In 17,604 people with heart disease, weight fell for 65 weeks and then held: at week 208 it sat 10.2% below baseline, against 1.5% on placebo.

★★★Well replicated — this finding’s sources average out to meta-analyses, systematic reviews or high-powered trials.This was a prespecified secondary analysis, not what the trial was built to answer. The 10.2% is lower than the obesity trials' figures because this group was older, already had heart disease and started at a lower body mass index, not because the effect wears off. People came off the drug more often than off placebo.Click to keep this openManage weightSemaglutide
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OtherIn real use, far fewer last a year than finish a trial

Among commercially insured US adults without diabetes, one-year persistence rose from 33.2% of 2021 starters to 58.6% of those starting in early 2024. In its trial, 92.8% finished.

★★★Well replicated — this finding’s sources average out to meta-analyses, systematic reviews or high-powered trials.Persistence was inferred from gaps between prescription fills, which cannot tell someone who chose to stop from someone who lost their insurance or could not fill during the shortage. Only 53.6% of the initiators found met the continuous-enrolment rule, and people who keep coverage are probably the more persistent ones, so the real figures are likely lower still. The analysis was run by a pharmacy benefit manager. Commercially insured Americans only.Click to keep this openManage weightSemaglutide
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Metabolic & weightIn the trial the whole category was built on, weight fell 14.9%

In 1,961 adults with obesity and no diabetes, 68 weeks of once-weekly 2.4 mg took mean body weight down 14.9%, against 2.4% on placebo.

★★★Well replicated — this finding’s sources average out to meta-analyses, systematic reviews or high-powered trials.Novo Nordisk funded the trial and the drug is theirs. The cohort was largely female and largely white, so it says less about everyone else. Sixty-eight weeks is what was measured, and nothing here describes what happens after the last injection.Click to keep this openManage weightSemaglutide
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Metabolic & weightThe loss did not creep back over a second year

Across 104 weeks, 152 adults on 2.4 mg weekly sat 15.2% below their starting weight, against 2.6% on placebo. Nobody was followed after the last injection.

★★★Well replicated — this finding’s sources average out to meta-analyses, systematic reviews or high-powered trials.Three hundred and four people is small for a phase 3 trial, and 93% were white and 78% women. Gastrointestinal effects, mostly mild, reached 82.2% against 53.9% on placebo. Nobody was followed after the last injection, so this describes two years on the drug rather than two years of results.Click to keep this openManage weightSemaglutide
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Metabolic & weightSix drugs beat placebo; two of them by more than a tenth

Pooling 56 randomised trials and 60,307 patients, orlistat, liraglutide, naltrexone-bupropion and phentermine-topiramate all beat placebo. Only semaglutide and tirzepatide passed 10%.

★★★Well replicated — this finding’s sources average out to meta-analyses, systematic reviews or high-powered trials.A network meta-analysis compares drugs that were never tested against each other, so this ranking is inferred rather than measured. Fourteen of the 56 trials were semaglutide trials and most came from one company's own programme, which pooling does not correct for. Every figure describes people still taking the drug.Click to keep this openManage weightSemaglutide
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Metabolic & weightStopping put weight back on while staying on it took more off

After 20 weeks reaching the full 2.4 mg dose, 803 adults were split: over 48 weeks the placebo group put on 6.9% and the group still injecting lost another 7.9%.

★★★Well replicated — this finding’s sources average out to meta-analyses, systematic reviews or high-powered trials.Everyone had already tolerated 20 weeks of dose escalation before being randomised, so the people most likely to quit were gone before the clock started. Lifestyle support carried on in both arms, which is not the same as stopping everything. Four in five participants were women.Click to keep this openManage weightSemaglutide
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Physical & bodyTestosterone shifts about two kilos of fat and muscle

Over three years in men past 65 it cut 3.0 kg of fat and added 1.9 kg of lean mass against placebo. Pooled trials in men over 40 put the lean gain at 2.54 kg.

★★★Well replicated — this finding’s sources average out to meta-analyses, systematic reviews or high-powered trials.Most of these trials enrolled men by age rather than by a low testosterone reading, so many participants were not deficient. A gain in lean mass is not by itself a gain in anything a man would notice. In the 16-trial pooling, whose men averaged 77 years old, no musculoskeletal difference from placebo was left by 12 months, which could mean the effect fades or only that fewer trials reported that far out.Click to keep this openBuild strengthTestosterone
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Metabolic & weightTwelve weeks at 2,000 mg did not improve insulin sensitivity

Forty obese, insulin-resistant men took 2,000 mg a day for twelve weeks. Insulin sensitivity, glucose handling, liver fat and muscle mitochondria were unchanged.

★★☆Single study — solid evidence, such as one good trial or a large observational dataset, but not replicated at the top tier.Men only, all obese and insulin-resistant, so this does not describe healthy or older users, and twelve weeks is not years. The mitochondrial half is a sub-study of the same forty men rather than an independent replication, and the two count once. The trial did not report whether NAD actually rose in these participants, so a failure of delivery cannot be fully separated from a failure of the mechanism.Click to keep this openManage blood sugarNicotinamide Riboside (NR)
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Physical & bodyNausea is common and rarely the reason people stop

In the adult trials behind the US label, nausea reached 44% against 16% on placebo and vomiting 24% against 6%. Just 1.8% quit the drug over nausea.

★★☆Single study — solid evidence, such as one good trial or a large observational dataset, but not replicated at the top tier.A label is the manufacturer's own trial programme summarised by the regulator, not an independent analysis, and trial populations exclude many people who take the drug in practice. The label carries a separate table for children with different figures. The copy read here is dated March 2024 and the agency marks it as possibly not the current version.Click to keep this openManage weightSemaglutide
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OtherWhat is in a compounded vial may not be the approved ingredient

The US regulator says some compounders use semaglutide salts that are not the approved active ingredient, and that it has no information on whether they behave the same.

★★☆Single study — solid evidence, such as one good trial or a large observational dataset, but not replicated at the top tier.Report counts have no denominator, so 990 cannot be turned into a risk per patient and a bigger number does not by itself mean a higher rate. Most compounding pharmacies are not required by federal law to report at all, which both understates the true total and makes any comparison against the approved products unreliable in either direction. The salt concern is stated as missing equivalence information, not as evidence of harm. This is about specific products, not about compounding, which is lawful and often necessary.Click to keep this openManage weightSemaglutide
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OtherAlmost half who quit gave cost or insurance as the reason

Among 288 US adults who quit inside a year, 47.6% stopped over cost or insurance, 14.6% over side effects and 1.7% because the weight loss disappointed them.

★★☆Single study — solid evidence, such as one good trial or a large observational dataset, but not replicated at the top tier.Everyone counted here had already stopped, so these are shares of people who quit and not of people who started. The reason came from what a clinician typed into the record rather than from asking the patient, and 11.1% had no reason recorded at all. Semaglutide and tirzepatide were counted together. One US health system, over a period that included the shortage.Click to keep this openManage weightSemaglutide
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OtherThe drug is still in your blood weeks after the last dose

Semaglutide's half-life is about a week, and the label puts measurable drug in the blood for five to seven weeks after a final 2.4 mg dose.

★★☆Single study — solid evidence, such as one good trial or a large observational dataset, but not replicated at the top tier.These are label figures from the manufacturer's own pharmacokinetic studies, measured in trial participants rather than in general use. The label flags the interaction with oral medicines as something to watch rather than a quantified effect on any particular drug.Click to keep this openManage weightSemaglutide
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Physical & bodyThe thyroid cancer warning comes from rodents, not from people

In the adult trials, adjudicated acute pancreatitis occurred in four treated patients against one on placebo. The label says whether people get the rodent tumours is unknown.

★★☆Single study — solid evidence, such as one good trial or a large observational dataset, but not replicated at the top tier.Four cases against one is too few to size the risk; it gives the order of magnitude and nothing more. The rodent finding is why anyone with a personal or family history of medullary thyroid cancer, a rare tumour of the thyroid, is told not to take it. The label lists further warnings the trials were never built to quantify, among them gallbladder disease, acute kidney injury and suicidal thoughts.Click to keep this openManage weightSemaglutide

Contested here

The evidence disagrees with itself, or the finding carries a caution. Either way the marker shows one star, however strong the individual sources are.

Metabolic & weightEach extra daily soda tracked with more heart disease, diet ones too

Across 34 studies, each extra daily serving tracked with 9% more heart disease for sugary soda and 8% for diet. These follow what people already chose to drink.

★☆☆Contested — the evidence disagrees with itself, or the finding carries a caution. A caution or conflict always shows one star, however strong the sources are.CautionBoth pools followed what people already chose to drink, so these are links rather than proof that either drink causes anything. Someone told to watch their weight or blood sugar tends to switch to diet, which would draw this same pattern with no effect from the drink at all. The pooled studies varied widely in their results for several of these outcomes. And these are drink categories, not Coca-Cola and Coca-Cola Zero specifically.Click to keep this openSupport heart and blood flowAdded Sugar (Sucrose / HFCS)
Physical & bodyIn 55 trials, gallstones rose, reflux probably did, pancreatitis not

In 55 placebo-controlled trials of 106,395 people, gallstones rose by about half and reflux probably about doubled, with little or no effect on pancreatitis or a stalled stomach.

★☆☆Contested — the evidence disagrees with itself, or the finding carries a caution. A caution or conflict always shows one star, however strong the sources are.Conflicting evidenceThis pools the whole drug class rather than semaglutide alone. Randomised trials screen out higher-risk patients and are mostly too short to catch rare events, so finding no signal for pancreatitis is weaker than showing there is none. The subgroups on weight-loss doses did show larger effects, but not significantly so, which leaves the dose question open.Click to keep this openManage weightSemaglutide
Physical & bodyRoughly a quarter of what you lose is not fat

Across 22 randomised trials, total weight fell 3.55 kg, fat mass 2.95 kg and lean mass 0.86 kg. Not one trial in the pool measured strength, mobility or falls.

★☆☆Contested — the evidence disagrees with itself, or the finding carries a caution. A caution or conflict always shows one star, however strong the sources are.Conflicting evidenceThe pooled trials were short and produced only 3.55kg of loss, so those kilograms do not scale up to someone losing a seventh of their body weight; the proportion is what carries over. Lean mass as a share of body weight did not change. Not one trial in the pool measured strength, mobility or falls, so whether the loss costs anything a person would notice is untested.Click to keep this openManage weightSemaglutide
Metabolic & weightDiabetes rose with sweetener use, and the arrow may run both ways

Among 105,600 French adults followed about nine years, the heaviest sweetener users developed type 2 diabetes 69% more often than those who used none.

★☆☆Contested — the evidence disagrees with itself, or the finding carries a caution. A caution or conflict always shows one star, however strong the sources are.CautionThis followed what people already consumed rather than assigning it, so the arrow could run the other way: someone watching their blood sugar has good reason to switch to sweeteners well before a diagnosis arrives. Intake came from participants' own repeated diet diaries. And these are the same participants and the same diaries behind the cancer finding, so the two results are not independent of each other.Click to keep this openManage weightAspartame
Metabolic & weightIn 13 volunteers, fat-free mass rose a little and nothing else did

Thirteen overweight people took 1,000 mg a day for six weeks. Fat-free mass rose 1.34 percentage points; insulin sensitivity, organ fat and inflammation did not.

★☆☆Contested — the evidence disagrees with itself, or the finding carries a caution. A caution or conflict always shows one star, however strong the sources are.CautionThirteen people is very small even for a crossover design, which makes the two positive results the fragile half and the long list of nulls the sturdy one. The fat-free mass change was one of many outcomes tested, exactly the setup in which a chance finding appears. Six weeks, in healthy overweight and obese volunteers.Click to keep this openBuild strengthNicotinamide Riboside (NR)
OtherPreparation errors are far likelier to name a compounded version

Of 81,078 reports on semaglutide and its relatives, the 707 involving compounded products far more often mentioned preparation errors and contamination. Odds are not risks.

★☆☆Contested — the evidence disagrees with itself, or the finding carries a caution. A caution or conflict always shows one star, however strong the sources are.Conflicting evidenceSpontaneous reports have no denominator, so none of these ratios is a risk to a patient and none supports saying the products caused anything. Only 707 of the 81,078 reports involved compounded products, and some ratios rest on a handful of events, which is why the preparation-error interval runs from 12.63 to 189.6. State-licensed pharmacies mostly do not have to report at all, which biases the comparison in a direction the analysis cannot correct.Click to keep this openManage weightSemaglutide
Metabolic & weightA year after the last injection, most of the weight had returned

Among 327 people followed a year after the 68-week trial ended, weight went from 17.3% below baseline to 5.6% below. The coaching stopped with the injections.

★☆☆Contested — the evidence disagrees with itself, or the finding carries a caution. A caution or conflict always shows one star, however strong the sources are.CautionThe extension was exploratory and powered for nothing. Its 327 people came from high-recruiting sites rather than a random slice of the 1,961 randomised, and they had lost more than the trial average to begin with. Drug and lifestyle support were withdrawn together, so the regain cannot be pinned on the drug alone. Nobody was randomised after week 68, so there was no control arm left to compare against.Click to keep this openManage weightSemaglutide
Physical & bodyOne small cohort is behind most of the pancreatitis alarm

In 613 semaglutide users, the pancreatitis hazard ratio was 9.09, with a confidence interval running from 1.25 to 66. The same study recorded zero bowel obstructions.

★☆☆Contested — the evidence disagrees with itself, or the finding carries a caution. A caution or conflict always shows one star, however strong the sources are.Conflicting evidenceIt is observational, so people prescribed these drugs may already differ from the comparison group in ways no adjustment removes. It was published as a research letter, so the methods are described only briefly. The authors say they cannot be certain every prescription was for weight loss. Reported incidence in the semaglutide group was 4.6 pancreatitis cases per 1,000 person-years.Click to keep this openManage weightSemaglutide
Physical & bodyIn one uncontrolled study, lean mass fell 3 kg and then held

In 106 French adults on 2.4 mg semaglutide, lean mass fell 3 kg by month seven and then held steady while fat kept going. There was no comparison group.

★☆☆Contested — the evidence disagrees with itself, or the finding carries a caution. A caution or conflict always shows one star, however strong the sources are.Conflicting evidenceThere was no control group and no randomisation, so nothing separates the drug from the specialist nutrition care these patients also received, or from people simply moving more as they got lighter. Grip strength rising during weight loss is partly expected because a lighter body is easier to move, and the study did not adjust for that. Mean body mass index was 46.3, far heavier than the trial populations. Calling 3kg preserved is the authors' reading of a real loss.Click to keep this openManage weightSemaglutide
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