Silver Fern Brand is a dietary supplement brand that sells gut health products. The company suggests their product line is beneficial for individuals "suffering from gas, bloating, diarrhea, constipation, heartburn, indigestion, or other more serious digestive issues."
But does Silver Fern Brand use research-backed ingredients for gut health? Does the brand use any unhealthy ingredients? Why do we take issue with some of their marketing claims? And is Silver Fern Brand better or worse than popular gut health supplements like Supergut?
In this article we'll answer all of these questions and more, as we analyze the ingredients in Silver Fern Brand's probiotic to give our take on whether or not it's likely to support gut health, and whether or not it's healthy.
We'll also share some concerns we have with health claims on the brand's website, and compare Silver Fern Brand to other popular gut health supplements to pick our winners (and losers).
Key takeaways:
- Probiotic supplement is effectively formulated
- Questionable health claims on brand's website
- We do not currently recommend Silver Fern Brand
Ingredient Analysis — Ultimate Probiotic
The active ingredients in Silver Fern Brand Ultimate Probiotic Supplement are shown below:
image source: https://www.silverfernbrand.com/
The probiotics in this supplement are clinically shown to support gut health.
Saccharomyces boulardii is a probiotic yeast that was shown to improve gut barrier function in a medical review published in the Journal of Fungi.
Pediococcus acidilactici was shown to improve constipation symptoms and regulate the microbiome in a 2021 clinical trial.
Bacillus coagulans SC-208 is clinically shown to support gut health during a course of antibiotics when combined with another probiotic strain (though not a strain in Ultimate Probiotic Supplement).
We consider it to be a sign of a high-quality probiotic brand when the probiotic strain is listed, rather than just the probiotic species, as we discussed in our Bio X4 review article.
Because the strains are listed where appropriate in this supplement, we consider Silver Fern Brand's formulators to be high-quality.
The inactive ingredients in this supplement, shown below, should be safe and non-toxic:
image source: https://www.silverfernbrand.com/
Overall, we consider Silver Fern Brand Ultimate Probiotic Supplement likely to support optimal gut health.
This is a better-than-average probiotic formulation.
Questionable Health Claims
There are a number of highly questionable and uncited health claims on Silver Fern Brand's website at the time of publishing this article.
As shown in the graphic below, the brand claims that their probiotic supplement has 100% survivability, but competitors (including yogurt brands) have less than 1% survivability:
image source: https://www.silverfernbrand.com/
There is zero proof provided to support this claim.
The brand also claims that their probiotic is "clinically proven" to work:
image source: https://www.silverfernbrand.com/
However, we haven't come across any clinical trials on this supplement published in peer-reviewed journals, nor can we find any trials published on Silver Fern Brand's website.
The citation associated with this claim is shown below:
image source: https://www.silverfernbrand.com/
We can't find the full Sun Genomics test result published anywhere on Silver Fern Brand's website.
More importantly, a probiotic strain having high survivability does not necessarily equate to it being proven to work in human trials.
For Silver Fern Brand to claim their supplement is "clinically proven" to work, they require clinical trials with human participants showing it to be effective.
We find it to be unfortunate that Silver Fern Brand is engaging in this type of marketing that's typically associated with lower-quality products, because the supplement itself is very well-formulated and the brand could probably market it successfully on its merits.
Silver Fern Brand vs. Popular Gut Health Supps
Here's how Silver Fern Brand compares to other popular gut health supplements in terms of formulation quality, in our opinion:
Supergut
Some Supergut supplements contain ingredients we consider to be unhealthy.
One such example is folic acid, which is a synthetic form of vitamin B9 which is clinically shown to increase the risk of certain types of cancer.
We consider Silver Fern Brand to be a healthier choice.
Winner: Silver Fern Brand
Armra
Armra is a colostrum supplement that's proposed to support both gut health and immune health.
Clinical studies shown that colostrum supplementation can repair the intestinal barrier, and Armra sells an unflavored version of their formulation without any unhealthy additives.
Both products should be effective for their stated purpose, and both are free of unhealthy ingredients, so we consider them equivalent for the purpose of supporting gut health (and could even be cycled).
Winner: Tie
Seed
Seed is a probiotic supplement with patented, novel, capsule technology.
It also has been clinically proven to be effective, and is free of any unhealthy additives.
Seed is the winner from a potential efficacy perspective.
Winner: Seed
Our Clean Gut Health Picks
MBG Organic Fiber Potency+ is our top gut health supplement.
MBG Organic Fiber Potency+ contains 100% soluble fiber, which was described as "one of the most important nutrients for the gut microbiota" in a clinical review published in the Molecules journal.
Manukora MGO 850+ is our top whole food gut health pick.
A 2024 clinical trial reported that manuka honey ingestion "correlates with beneficial modulation of gut microbiota composition."
Both of the products recommended in this section are free of ingredients that we consider to be unhealthy.
Silver Fern Brand Pros and Cons
Pros:
- Effectively-formulated supplement
- Effective total probiotic dose
- Probiotic strains listed
- Research-backed probiotic strains
- Should support optimal gut health
- No unhealthy additive ingredients
Cons:
- Questionable health claims
- Doesn't appear to be clinically tested in humans
