Creatine: The Loading Phase Myth and the Kidney Myth

Creatine is, by a wide margin, the most researched supplement in sports nutrition — hundreds of trials, decades of use, and a level of evidential support that almost nothing else on the shelf can claim. Which makes it strange that the two things most people believe about it are both wrong, and that the confusion costs them money and time.

01What creatine does

Your muscles store creatine as phosphocreatine, and its job is to regenerate ATP — the molecule cells spend for energy — during short, intense effort. In the first seconds of a heavy set or a sprint, phosphocreatine is what keeps ATP available.

Supplementing raises the amount of creatine stored in muscle, which supports that regeneration system. Your body also makes creatine, and you get some from meat and fish, but ordinary dietary intake leaves most people's muscle stores well below saturation. That gap is the entire opportunity.

It's studied for supporting exercise performance and lean muscle in the context of training — which is the honest framing. It supports work you are already doing rather than substituting for it.

02Myth one: you need a loading phase

Most people are told to start with a week of around 20 grams a day, split into four doses, before dropping to a maintenance amount. It's presented as a requirement.

It isn't. Loading saturates muscle stores faster — roughly a week rather than three to four. That's the only difference. A steady daily dose of around 3 to 5 grams reaches the same saturation point without the loading week, just more gradually.

So loading is a choice about speed, not about outcome. And it has a real cost: the digestive discomfort people associate with creatine is largely a loading-phase phenomenon, caused by taking large amounts at once. A great many people have tried creatine, felt unwell during the loading week, concluded it didn't agree with them, and abandoned a supplement that would have been perfectly comfortable at 5 grams a day.

If you're not in a hurry, skip it.

03Myth two: creatine is hard on your kidneys

This is the most persistent belief about creatine, and it comes from a genuine misunderstanding rather than nothing at all.

Creatine metabolism produces creatinine, and blood creatinine is one of the standard markers used to assess kidney function. Someone supplementing creatine can show a higher creatinine reading — not because their kidneys are struggling, but because they are consuming more of the substrate that produces it. The marker moves; the organ is fine.

Creatine has been studied extensively in healthy people, including over long periods, without evidence of kidney harm. The caveat that matters: anyone with existing kidney disease or taking medication affecting the kidneys should treat creatine as a conversation with their doctor. That's a real exception, not a reason for healthy people to worry.

And if you supplement creatine, mention it before a blood test — for the same reason as biotin. A clinician who knows can interpret the number correctly.

04Monohydrate is the answer

Creatine is one of the few categories where the cheapest form is also the best-evidenced one.

Creatine monohydrate is what the overwhelming majority of the research used. The alternatives — hydrochloride, ethyl ester, buffered forms, liquid creatine — are typically sold on claims of better absorption or less bloating, and none has displaced monohydrate on evidence. Some have performed worse in direct comparisons.

This is unusual and worth appreciating. In most of this journal the message is that a better form justifies a higher price. Here, the premium forms are mostly solving a problem monohydrate doesn't have, and paying more is close to pure loss.

The one detail worth paying for is purity and verification. Micronised monohydrate dissolves better, which is a comfort improvement rather than an efficacy one.

05Practical points

Timing barely matters. Creatine works by saturating muscle stores over time, so the relevant thing is taking it daily, not taking it in a particular window. Take it whenever you'll remember.

Take it on rest days too, for the same reason — you're maintaining a level, not fuelling a session.

The weight gain people notice early is largely water drawn into muscle cells, which is a normal consequence of the mechanism rather than fat.

And a note on response: a minority of people are non-responders, typically because their muscle stores are already near saturation from a diet high in meat and fish. That's not a product failure; there was simply less room to fill.

06How to buy it

Choose creatine monohydrate, ideally micronised. Check the amount per serving is around 3 to 5 grams. Ignore proprietary blends — creatine is cheap, so a blend hiding the amount is hiding something that costs almost nothing to disclose. And look for third-party testing, because creatine is a bulk commodity ingredient where purity varies between suppliers and where the certificate is the only thing separating one white powder from another.

07How we approach it

Where creatine appears in our range it's stated as monohydrate with the exact gram amount disclosed, no blend, and every batch is tested by an independent lab with the certificate published on the product page.

Creatine is the rare case where the well-informed answer is also the cheap one: monohydrate, 5 grams daily, no loading week, taken consistently. Anyone selling you a substantially more expensive version is selling you a solution to a problem the research hasn't found.

These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease.