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Are liquid vitamins better?
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Are Liquid Vitamins Better?
Are liquid vitamins better than pills?
Answer:
There are pros to liquid vitamins.
Pros:
A benefit of a liquid is that you avoid the risk that an improperly made pill will not break apart and fully release its ingredients. ConsumerLab subjects the tablets and caplets it reviews to a disintegration test for this reason and has come across many pills that don't break apart at all or, more often, only partially break apart. For example, in 2017, multivitamins from two different companies failed to break apart fully after 30 minutes (the required time as per the U.S. Pharmacopeia) and still had not fully disintegrated after another 30 minutes.
Another issue avoided with liquids is the trouble some people (particularly young children and older adults) have with swallowing tablets or capsules.
Liquids may be preferable for people who have trouble with digestion due to gastric surgery or other reasons.
Having a supplement in liquid form also makes it easier to modify the dose. For example, if a supplement, like vitamin D liquid drops or a fish oil liquid, is being shared among family members, it is very easy to give each person their specific dose by changing the number of drops or fraction of a teaspoon that you administer.
Some ingredients in supplements are hygroscopic, i.e., they attract water, and pills containing them can quickly become "wet" from moisture in the air. Magnesium chloride a good example of this, but it is also the preferred form if you need to take high-dose magnesium as it is less likely to cause diarrhea than other forms. It is therefore better to take magnesium chloride as a liquid than as a pill. See our Magnesium Supplements Review for our Top Picks for magnesium supplements, including magnesium chloride.
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