What is the best supplement review site?

Almost every review site is a paid list, and the five tells are visible in a minute: the disclosure, the template, the shared product set, the commission-shaped ranking and the absence of a laboratory

What is the best supplement review site is a question whose honest answer begins with a fact about the sites a search returns, which is that almost all of them are affiliate sites, earning a percentage of each sale made through their links, so that their rankings follow commission before they follow evidence, and a reader who knows the five tells can read any such site for what it is in a minute. The first tell is the disclosure: UK advertising and consumer protection rules require a commercial relationship behind a recommendation or ranking to be made clear, so a review site either carries a line about earning from links, usually small and near the bottom, which means the list is paid, or does not carry one, which means the list is paid and non-compliant; neither case is a list to believe. The second tell is the template: best overall, best budget, best premium, best for women, best vegan, the same structure applied to every category whatever the evidence in it, so that a category with one good product and a category with none both get five winners, because the template is built to carry five links rather than to report a finding. The third tell is the shared product set: the same small group of brands appears across unrelated review sites in the same categories, not because the brands are best but because they run the affiliate programmes the sites have joined, and a reader who finds the same six products on four sites has found four members of the same programme. The fourth tell is the commission-shaped ranking: the product in first place is reliably the one with the highest payout per sale, which a reader can test by noticing that the ranking changes when a brand's programme changes and never when a trial is published. The fifth tell is the absence of a laboratory: the site reviewed the product without testing it, describes how it felt and what the label says, and has no result for what the tub actually contained, which is the only thing a review of a supplement could usefully report. Five tells, one minute, and the ranked list has been read for what it is before a single position on it is believed.

The tells are not an accusation against any site in particular; they are the shape that affiliate economics produces, and a reader who expects the shape is not misled by it. The two sources that do not have the shape are the subject of the next section, and neither of them calls itself a review site.

The two sources that report what was in the tub: the independent testing services that buy and test, and the regulators' registers and rulings that read the label; how to use each; the worked example; and the verdict

The first source worth reading is the independent testing service: a laboratory-based subscription service that buys supplements at retail, as a customer would, tests them for whether the label's amounts are actually present, for contaminants such as heavy metals, and for whether a tablet disintegrates, and publishes pass and fail results by product, with the products that failed named. These services earn their money from subscribers rather than from brands, they test the tub rather than describing it, and their results are the only kind of review that reports what was inside; their limits are that they test a sample at one time, that a brand can pass one year and fail the next, and that they are mostly American and test products on the American market, so a UK reader checks whether the product tested is the one sold here. The second source is the regulators, who publish three documents that together review every supplement in the UK without reviewing any of them: the nutrition and health claims register, which decides what any label may say and against which every claim on any listing is checked in a search; the advertising regulator's published rulings, searchable by advertiser, which show which brands were told to stop which claims and whether they did; and the food standards agency's alerts and recalls, which show what was withdrawn from the UK market and why. None of the three earns a commission, none has a template, and together they tell a reader whether a brand's marketing is lawful, whether it has been formally found otherwise, and whether its products have ever been pulled, which is more than any ranked list reports about anything. Used together, the two sources replace the review site: a product's label is checked against the register, its brand against the rulings and the alerts, and, where a testing service has bought it, its contents against the laboratory's result; and where no service has bought it, one message to the brand for the certificate of analysis for the lot number does what the service would have done for that batch.

The worked example is reviewed by the two sources that earn nothing: {FL}, with a certificate of analysis for the lot number on any tub from a laboratory accredited to the testing standard, testing for lead, mercury, arsenic and cadmium, sent on request, which is the testing service's method applied to the batch in hand; with four authorised magnesium claims and no others on its label and listing, which is the register's check; with no advertising rulings and no food standards alerts, which are the other two documents; 1500mg magnesium bisglycinate stated as 300mg elemental at 80% NRV, UK made under GMP and BRC, 180 capsules for £19.99 at 22p a day, and the reader is invited to run the three documents and the message rather than take the paragraph's word, since a paragraph on a brand's own site is the thing the five tells were written to catch. The verdict on the best supplement review site is that it is not a review site: the sites that call themselves one are affiliate lists with five tells a reader learns in a minute, and the two sources that actually review a supplement are a laboratory that bought it and tested it, and a regulator that reads every label, neither of which earns a commission, neither of which has a template, and both of which answer the question a ranked list only pretends to.

What to check on the label

Questions people also ask

Which supplement review site can I trust?

None that calls itself one, because almost every supplement review site a search returns is an affiliate list whose rankings follow commission, readable in a minute by five tells: a disclosure about earning from links or its absence, the best overall and best budget template in every category, the same small product set across unrelated sites, a ranking that tracks payout rather than evidence, and no laboratory testing; the two sources that actually review a supplement are an independent testing service that buys products at retail and tests them, and the regulators' own documents, the claims register, the advertising rulings and the food standards alerts, none of which earns a commission.

How can I tell if a supplement review is sponsored?

By the five tells, which take a minute: UK rules require a commercial relationship behind a ranking to be disclosed, so a line about earning from links means the list is paid and no line means it is paid and non-compliant; a template of best overall, best budget and best premium applied to every category means the structure exists to carry links; the same six brands across unrelated sites means shared affiliate programmes; a first place that changes when a brand's programme changes and never when a trial is published means the ranking is commission-shaped; and a review with no laboratory result has described the tub without testing it.

What are independent supplement testing services?

Laboratory-based subscription services that buy supplements at retail as a customer would, test them for whether the label's amounts are actually present, for contaminants such as heavy metals and for whether a tablet disintegrates, and publish pass and fail results by product with the failures named; they are paid by subscribers rather than by brands, which is the opposite incentive to a review site, and their limits are that they test a sample at one time, that a brand can pass one year and fail the next, and that most are American and test products on that market, so a UK reader checks whether the product tested is the one sold here.

How do regulators review supplements in the UK?

Not by ranking them but by publishing three documents that together review every supplement without reviewing any: the nutrition and health claims register, which decides what any label may say and against which every claim on a listing can be checked; the advertising regulator's published rulings, searchable by advertiser, which show which brands were told to stop which claims and whether they complied; and the food standards agency's alerts and recalls, which show what was withdrawn from the UK market and why; three searches tell a reader whether a brand's marketing is lawful, whether it has been formally found otherwise and whether its products have ever been pulled.

What should I read instead of a supplement review site?

The tub, the register and the laboratory: the label's elemental or protein figures against the claims register and the ingredient list read backwards, which is the review a reader does themselves; the advertising rulings and the food standards alerts for the brand, which take two searches; an independent testing service's result where it has bought the product; and, where none has, one message to the brand for the certificate of analysis for the lot number in hand, which does for that batch what the testing service would have done and reports the only thing a supplement review could usefully report, what was inside.

Sources

1. The UK advertising and consumer protection rules on affiliate marketing and paid rankings: commercial relationships behind a recommendation or ranking must be made clear, and presenting a paid or commission-earning list as independent editorial is a misleading practice. https://www.asa.org.uk/advice-online/affiliate-marketing.html
2. The independent supplement testing services: subscription laboratories that purchase products at retail and test them for label accuracy, contaminants and disintegration, publishing pass and fail results by product, the one kind of review that reports what was in the tub rather than how it felt. PubMed record
3. Retained Regulation (EC) No 1924/2006 on nutrition and health claims made on foods, and the Great Britain nutrition and health claims register. https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/great-britain-nutrition-and-health-claims-nhc-register
4. The online review integrity literature: fake and incentivised reviews are documented on retail and review platforms, with recency, clustering and specificity of complaints more informative than star averages. PubMed record

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