SeroVital is a brand targeted primarily to women that makes skincare products and dietary supplements that the brand claims can reverse visible signs of aging.
In this review we’ll analyze the ingredients in two of their most popular products, SeroVital and SeroVital Advanced, based on medical research to determine whether we consider them likely to be effective or not.
SeroVital Advanced Review
SeroVital Advanced consists of two separate supplements: an “Evening Blend” and a “Morning Blend.” The Supplement Facts Panel below is from the Evening Blend.
All of the active ingredients are in a proprietary (prop) blend with a total dose of 2.9 grams (g). Individuals who have read any of our previous reviews on supplements with prop blends, like our Golo review, will know that we generally recommend avoiding supplements that list ingredients like this, because it prevents consumers from accessing individual ingredient dosage information, which is important to evaluate efficacy and safety.
Prop blends allow companies to publish the dosage of the entire blend without publishing the dose of each individual ingredient.
The first two active ingredients, l-lysine and l-arginine, are amino acids. We can't locate any medical studies proving that either amino acid is effective for improving skin quality or reducing visible signs of aging when supplemented orally, so we'll consider both ingredients ineffective.
Oxo-proline is an amino acid derivative and we can’t find any research suggesting it’s effective for anti-aging or skin.
We consider fermented l-cysteine extract to be another strange choice for an aging formulation. We can’t locate any medical studies suggesting this would be effective for aging.
By this point you’re probably unsurprised to read that we didn’t find any research at all suggesting l-glutamine or schizonepeta powder are effective anti-aging ingredients.
SeroVital Advanced contains an additive ingredient called candurin silver fine which appears to be a colorant and which we cannot find safety data on. We would recommend avoiding this ingredient.
This blend also contains talc as a filler ingredient which we would consider highly questionable for an ingestible supplement. Medical research has shown that talc (even without asbestos) is associated with stomach cancer when ingested. Even if the talc dose in SeroVital is low, we do not believe this is healthy to consume.
Titanium dioxide is another additive ingredient in this formulation that we recommend avoiding. It's banned in the European Union (E.U.) for use as a food additive over concerns about genotoxicity.
SeroVital Evening Blend is one of the worst formulations we've ever reviewed on Illuminate Health. We cannot identify one single effective ingredient for anti-aging, and the blend contains three additive ingredients that we would recommend consumers avoid for health reasons.
Morning Blend Review
The Morning Blend from SeroVital Advanced contains a blend of vitamins and minerals including Vitamin C and Vitamin B2. We haven't come across any research suggesting that vitamin and mineral blends provide anti-aging benefits so we'll consider these ingredients ineffective.
We don’t understand why supplement companies so frequently add random blends of vitamins and minerals without explanation, but it’s a common practice. In our Umzu supplements review, we explained that taking vitamins and minerals without a documented deficiency serves no biological purpose and may be harmful. If an individual already has healthy levels of a vitamin or mineral, taking additive doses of that vitamin or mineral could push their blood levels above the healthy range.
SeroVital Morning Blend contains a prop blend with a total dosage of 1,016 milligrams (mg), which only equates to a 92 mg dose per ingredient.
Supplement companies often add small doses of exotic or impressive-sounding ingredients in prop blends to make their Supplement Facts label look more impressive, and that may be the case here.
Collagen does improve visible signs of aging, but the maximum effective dose of collagen for skin appears to be 10 g based on medical research, which is a 100x higher dose than the average ingredient dose in this blend.
Chorella, which is the first-listed active ingredient in this formulation, may be an effective anti-aging ingredient. A clinical trial published in the Journal of Food Biochemistry found that a drink containing chorella caused favorable metabolic changes such as reduced inflammation, reduced oxidative stress and improved immune response which the study authors suggested combined for an overall anti-aging effect.
Ingested hyaluronic acid was effective for improving skin moisture in a medical trial at a dose of 120 mg/day, so this may be effectively dosed in SeroVital Advanced, given that the average ingredient dose in the blend is 92 mg which is close to 120 mg.
These tablets also contain titanium dioxide and talc, which we recommended avoiding in the previous section.
Overall we consider this blend to be much superior in regard to efficacy than SeroVital Advanced Evening Blend. We would not recommend it due to the impossibility to establish effective doses given the prop blend, and due to the inclusion of questionable additive ingredients.
Our Anti-Aging Product Recommendation
We recommend Bulletproof collagen powder to consumers interested in improving facial skin appearance and reducing visible signs of aging.
As we referenced earlier in the article, collagen is one of the most well-studied supplements for reducing wrinkles. It's the core structural protein in skin, and medical research has established that its supplementation reduces wrinkles, improves skin elasticity and improves skin hydration status.
Bulletproof collagen contains no questionable additive ingredients like titanium dioxide or talc: its only ingredient is hydrolyzed collagen.
Bulletproof collagen costs $43.95 for a one-time purchase at the time of updating this article, and contains 50 servings of 10 g collagen. This equates to a price-per-effective-serving of $1.14.
SeroVital Advanced currently costs $119 for a one-time purchase and contains 30 servings. This is a $3.97 price per serving.
SeroVital HGH Review
SeroVital's regular supplement (simply titled "SeroVital") has the same active ingredients as the supplement in their Morning Blend. The brand claims that this product can improve human growth hormone (HGH) levels.
This product contains the exact same active ingredient formulation (down to the 2.9 g dose) as GF9, another supplement claiming to drastically improve growth hormone levels.
The one study that SeroVital cites to prove this product to be effective has significant methodological and conflict of interest issues in our opinion, which we explained in detail in our GF9 review (because that one study was cited to back that product too).
Basically, a company called Sierra Research Group LLC funded the study and exists in the same city as SeroVital and GF9 (which are both operated out of the exact same address according to Zoominfo).
Sierra Research Group claimed no conflict of interest in the study funding section, but we generally consider there to be a high level of bias in clinical research funded by for-profit research firms. This is not the same standard of evidence in our opinion as a clinical trial funded by a third-party source such as a governmental entity or research institution (or a medical journal themselves).
The clinical trial did prove that HGH levels improved significantly after participants consumed the supplement, but the trial had a relatively short timeframe (120 minutes total). We also know from medical studies that protein consumption alone can stimulate HGH release.
We have not come across any convincing medical evidence that SeroVital will improve HGH levels long-term, and we recommend avoiding this supplement. We would suggest that patients concerned about HGH levels speak with their doctor about blood tests. We do not believe it's appropriate or logical for consumers to be taking dietary supplements in an attempt to increase HGH levels.
Does SeroVital Cause Side Effects?
Consumers are often curious about whether products are likely to cause side effects, and the good news is that in this case we find it to be unlikely.
While we don't recommend any SeroVital products, their formulations don't contain any active ingredients that we consider harmful or allergenic. Of course any individual consumer could be allergic to any ingredient, but for the most part SeroVital's formulations have active ingredients that are either amino acids, vitamins and minerals, or botanical ingredients.
