Supplements Simplified: What’s Actually Worth Taking
Forget the noise. Here’s a real-world guide to the few supplements that help and the ones that waste your money.
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Don’t Fall for the Hype: What the Supplement Industry Isn’t Telling You
The world of supplements is confusing, loud, and honestly, a bit of a scammy mess. You’ve probably seen all the ads, powders, pills, and drinks that claim to build muscle, burn fat, boost testosterone, or supercharge your energy overnight. It’s easy to feel like you're missing out on something essential if you’re not taking half a dozen products every morning. But here’s the truth. Most of it is nonsense.
Supplements are meant to “supplement” your diet. Not replace real food, good habits, or consistent effort. They’re there to fill in the gaps when something’s missing, not to carry the whole load. The problem is, companies don’t make money by reminding you of that. They make money by convincing you that this product is the missing key to all your progress.
The good news? A few supplements actually do what they claim. When used for the right reasons, in the right context. Most people don’t need much, and chasing every new thing can distract you from what really matters. I want to clear the air on which supplements are truly worth considering, which ones only matter in specific cases, and which ones are nothing more than expensive hype.
The Truth About Effective Supplements: What’s Worth Your Money
The supplement world is flooded with products promising to solve all your problems with a single pill or scoop of powder. But here’s the truth: that’s not how it works. Supplements are meant to fill in the gaps of a balanced diet, not replace real food. While there are countless supplements out there, only a few truly live up to their claims. The ones that do? These are the real supplements that work:
Protein
Creatine
Caffeine
Electrolytes
Now this isn’t just a blind recommendation saying buy these and all your problems will be solved. These supplements only help if your foundation is in place. They work best when they’re supporting an already decent diet and training plan. I think that this is important for me to run though each supplement and their use cases to make sure you can see if it applies to you before spending any of your money on something that doesn’t move the needle at all.
Protein is an effective supplement since our protein goal is so important, this is a calorie efficient and often times money efficient way of increasing the amount of protein for your daily. If you find yourself consistently low on protein or want to optimize muscle recovery, a protein powder or supplement can be a great option.. A protein powder or protein supplement in general can be a great way to bring that protein intake up for minimal calories. Another great place to use a protein supplement is on the go snacks. If you find yourself grabbing for chips or swinging by gas stations for a quick snack. You might want to consider grabbing a protein shake, it’ll help you feel more full for longer and it is going to be a far better option for hitting any goal, muscle gain or fat loss, than any other snack out there.
Another supplement that actually works is creatine. There is a large amount of research on creatine that highly supports its efficacy. The main problem is it is often pitched as something that is immediately going to grow you muscle. That is not the case, that isn’t how creatine interacts. For you to determine if you want to take a creatine supplement, then I think it is important for you to understand how it acts and what it does to your body. We have three primary energy systems. Our fastest acting and strongest energy system being our creatine phosphate system. This allows us to perform explosive movements and high effort output which typically lasts about 3-5 seconds. Supplementing your creatine intake can bring that high intense effort from 3-5 seconds to about 5-8 seconds. With this you can see how creatine creates the opportunity for us to grow more muscle. It can allow you to squeak out a few more higher intensity reps or allow you to maintain a sprint for just that little bit longer than you might have if you weren’t supplementing your creatine. The important thing with creatine, it has a loading phase and you need to take it daily for it to have any effect on our body at all. If you are missing days then supplementing creatine does nothing for our body.
The other two I mentioned are simpler to explain, but even then, they are effective supplements that are not required if you don’t need them. Electrolytes are essential when doing any long term aerobic activity that you’re sweating a lot. If you want to maintain a high level of performance while participating. It can be used after an intense workout to help rehydrate quicker. Those are the main use cases for electrolytes currently. There is some fringe research if you’re interested in diving deeper, but I won’t go into that here. This is the supported main use cases as of now. For caffeine, it will increase your heart rate which can increase your output during exercise by a small margin. It can also help wake you up and get you in the mental state for exercise, hence why many people use a preworkout before exercising. This is largely for those two reasons themselves.
Supplements You Probably Don’t Need If Your Diet Has Variety
Now I want to move into the supplements than can have fringe use cases but I think are largely pointless for the vast majority of people who have a slightly varied diet and aren’t worth spending money on. These supplements are:
Vitamins
Fish Oil
Green Powders
These supplements can be effective but are generally covered by your diet in most circumstances. If you find yourself eating the same meals for breakfast, lunch, and dinner every day without any variety then these can have some use. However, if you have a minimal amount of variety in your vegetables and protein sources these are likely not needed. You get a ton of micronutrients from eating different colors of vegetables that this largely doesn’t become an issue. If your diet lacks variety, vitamin supplements can help fill in the gaps. Green powders can help make up for diets that lack fiber. Fish oil can help with joint health and lubricity but if you are getting a little bit of variety then it becomes completely unnecessary. For all of these, take your time to truly think if this is worth your money or if you can just find another vegetable that you enjoy or maybe include a fish into your diet a couple times a month. If you are getting variety in the foods that you enjoy, then there are no need for these to be something you’re spending money on.
Overhyped Supplements to Avoid: What Isn’t Worth Buying
Now, after covering the essentials, let’s address the real issue in the supplement world. There are only four supplements that are strongly supported, with a few others having minor use cases. Now, we move on to everything else, supplements invented to make you feel progress is coming from an external source, encouraging you to continue buying them. I think that these supplements cause you to attach your hard earned success onto another area that isn’t within you. This is seen many times with “fat burners” or thermogenics. These target people who need to change very little to see progress. Movement drives their progress, but by taking a fat burner at the same time, they believe the supplement is the reason for their weight loss. Here are some other supplements that are nothing more than a cash grab by many companies. I recommend avoiding them entirely:
Thermogenics
Natural Test Boosters
Ashwagandha
Keratin
L-Carnitine
Many More
All of these supplements are completely unnecessary like Carnitine or Keratin since they are so plentiful in almost any food and the dosage that they often provide are several thousand percent over what our body can realistically use. Other ones like test boosters and ashwagandha have no perceivable difference in natural testosterone production or recovery. They also are something that can make you feel like you’re attaching your progress to another tool and make it feel like you need to continue buying it to make progress.
Many other supplements in supplement shops are just trying to sell you products that won’t benefit you. Oftentimes they also get a large commission on a lot of these supplements, especially thermogenics leading them to push these even more. Leading to the further belief that they are doing something beneficial for you when in fact, you are quite literally, peeing away all the money that you spent.
Consistency Beats Supplements Every Time
At the end of the day, the supplement industry is built to confuse you and convince you that progress comes from a bottle. It doesn’t. Real progress comes from consistent habits, balanced nutrition, quality sleep, and regular training. Supplements can support those things, but they’ll never replace them.
If your diet is mostly in check, your sleep is decent, and you’re moving regularly, there are only a few supplements that might give you a little extra edge, and even then, they’re just optional tools. Protein, creatine, electrolytes, and caffeine can be genuinely helpful if used with intention. Some others, like basic vitamins or fish oil, only matter if you’re lacking variety in your diet. And the rest? Honestly, they’re just expensive distractions dressed up in fancy labels and empty promises.
Before you spend another dollar, ask yourself: is this helping me achieve my goals, or is it just noise? Your body doesn’t need magic powder. It needs consistency. The rest is just marketing.
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