Gummy vs. Powder Multivitamins: What the Science Says

Why Format Changes How Fast a Nutrient is Absorbed

Before your body can absorb a nutrient, it first has to get into your gut in a usable form. A powder mixed into water is already there: the nutrients are dissolved before you even swallow it. A gummy is different. It's solid (made with pectin, or sometimes gelatin in other brands), so it has to break down first before it can release its nutrients. That adds an extra step between taking it and your body actually getting it.
This is an important fact about how supplements work: solid forms have to break apart and dissolve before your body can absorb them, and how fast that happens affects how quickly (and how much) the nutrient reaches your bloodstream. A powder that's already dissolved skips this step completely.¹ We have even tested this ourselves, and showed that the minerals in our AG1 powder were better absorbed when in powder form, as opposed to tablet form.²

What Research Says About Different Supplement Formats

Even at the same dose, different supplement forms (gummy, powder, tablet, capsule, liquid, etc.) can be absorbed differently by the body, and this applies to both water-soluble and fat-soluble vitamins. All this to say, gummy vitamins can be effective.
One study compared a multivitamin gummy to a tablet with the same amounts of nutrients. Researchers tracked blood levels of vitamin E, B12, and folate over 48 hours in healthy adults. For vitamin E and B12, there was no real difference between the gummy and the tablet. But folate was different: blood folate levels peaked faster in the gummy group (about 1.6 hours) than in the tablet group (about 4 hours).³ Another study compared vitamin D3 gummies to tablets and found they weren't the same: the oil in the gummy changed how the vitamin D was absorbed, and actually helped the body absorb more of it compared to the tablet.⁴
Overall, research shows that supplement format can affect both how fast and how much of a nutrient gets absorbed. At AG1, bioavailability has always been an important principle and one that continues to inform how we think about innovation.

Where Powder Might Be More Effective

In 2023, our research team at AG1 ran a study to see how well your body can actually use the minerals in AG1 powder compared to a tablet with the same minerals. We published the full results in the scientific journal Applied Biosciences.²
To test this, we used a lab model of the human stomach and small intestine. This let us track how much magnesium, zinc, calcium, and potassium broke down and became ready for the body to absorb, from both the AG1 powder and the tablet.
The powder beat the tablet for some important nutrients. Magnesium, calcium, and zinc all broke down and became available for the body far better from the AG1 powder than from the tablet, at almost every point we measured.²
Why could this be? A few reasons. Powder has more surface area, so it dissolves more easily. Tablets, on the other hand, are held together with binders and fillers like microcrystalline cellulose. These ingredients can soak up water that the tablet needs to break apart, which slows everything down.
The bottom line: minerals like magnesium, calcium, and zinc are harder for your body to use when they're packed into a tablet instead of a powder.^2,5

Where Powder Pulls Ahead of Gummies

1. How much fits, and in what form.
A powder can pack more nutrients into a small serving. A gummy can't be too big, or it's hard to chew. Most of the space in a gummy gets used up by things like pectin, sweetener, water, and acid, not the actual active ingredients. So when you compare the two, a powder can hold more nutrients, and a wider variety of them.
2. How gummies are made limits what can go in them.
Making a gummy requires heating it, cooling it, and using water. This process narrows down which forms of nutrients can be used. It also limits probiotics: the heat means only a few select probiotic species can survive the process and make it into a gummy.
3. Stability.
Nutrients in powder form tend to stay stable longer. Some nutrients or ingredients break down easily depending on the format (probiotics, for example), and they're especially at risk in a gummy, because gummies are made in a warm, moist environment and stay a bit damp and porous afterward.
4. How well your body absorbs it.
Nutrients that dissolve easily skip a whole step your body would otherwise need to do the work of breaking them down. Mix a powder into water, and it's ready to be absorbed right away. This doesn’t mean gummies don’t work. It just means powders can hold more, stay stable longer, and get absorbed more easily, which is exactly why we built AG1 as a powder in the first place.

Where Gummies Win: Convenience

The “best” nutrient delivery format means nothing if it sits in your cabinet unused. Research on adherence shows that ease of use and the overall experience of taking a product can meaningfully influence whether people continue using it. Product preference and formulation are important contributors to adherence, rather than secondary considerations.6 This is where gummies are most effective. We built AG1 Essentials Gummies for the person who wants foundational nutrition, including vitamins, minerals, fiber, and whole-food sourced fruit and vegetable powders, without needing to mix a drink or swallow a pill. No prep, no cleanup, no water required, chewable in seconds, and while on-the-go. For someone who has never been able to stick with a multivitamin because pills feel like a chore, that convenience isn't a lesser feature. It's the deciding factor between taking a supplement and not taking one at all.

Flavor Matters, Too

Taste is part of that same consistency equation. AG1 Essentials Gummies come in an Orchard Blend flavor designed by us (with 16 years of flavor expertise) to be genuinely pleasant to eat every day, and that's not a small design detail: a supplement you actively enjoy taking is one you're far more likely to reach day after day. AG1 Next Gen, being a powder you mix yourself, solves the same taste problem differently. We designed its own flavor profile and have iterated on it for daily drinkability. Neither approach is objectively better on taste, and now we’re offering more delicious options to help meet your daily nutritional needs.

So Which One Should You Take?

The best option, in the end, isn't the one with the theoretically perfect absorption curve. It's the one that is third-party tested, uses high-quality ingredients, fits your routine, and meets your desired benefits.

References:

1. Markl D, Zeitler JA. A review of disintegration mechanisms and measurement techniques. Pharm Res. 2017;34(5):890-917. doi:10.1007/s11095-017-2129-z
2. Sapp PA, Townsend JR, Kirby TO, Govaert M, Duysburgh C, Marzorati M, Marshall TM, Esposito R. AG1, a novel synbiotic, demonstrates superior mineral bioaccessibility and bioavailability compared to a tablet multivitamin and mineral supplement using an in vitro model of the upper gastrointestinal tract. Appl Biosci. 2023;2(4):656-667. doi:10.3390/applbiosci2040041
3. Wagner C, Shary J, Ebeling M, Wahlquist A, Nietert P. Bioequivalence pilot study of two multivitamin formulations in healthy adults. Curr Dev Nutr. 2020;4(suppl 2):nzaa067_073. doi:10.1093/cdn/nzaa067_073
4. Wagner CL, Shary JR, Nietert PJ, Ebeling MD, Wahlquist AE, Hollis BW. Bioequivalence studies of vitamin D gummies and tablets in healthy adults: results of a cross-over study. Nutrients. 2019;11(5):1023. doi:10.3390/nu11051023
5. Wang H, Bua P, Capodice J. A comparative study of calcium absorption following a single serving administration of calcium carbonate powder versus calcium citrate tablets in healthy premenopausal women. Food Nutr Res. 2014;58:23229. doi:10.3402/fnr.v58.23229
6. Stewart KD, Johnston JA, Matza LS, Curtis SE, Havel HA, Sweetana SA, Gelhorn HL. Preference for pharmaceutical formulation and treatment process attributes. Patient Prefer Adherence. 2016;10:1385-1399. doi:10.2147/PPA.S101821