Creatine is by far the most popular muscle-building supplement and for good reason. There are thousands of research studies showing its effectiveness for building muscle, boosting performance, and improving body composition.
But what does creatine do for you and your body?
In this blog post, we're going to answer all of your questions about creatine benefits. This includes:
- Creatine nutrition facts
- What kind of creatine you should be taking
- What dose you should be supplement with
- Do you need to cycle off creatine periodically
- Whether you need to do a loading phase or not
- And more!
Let’s get right into it.
TL;DR
Creatine is a safe, effective, and natural supplement for enhancing muscle growth, strength, and performance. Creatine monohydrate is the best form to use daily at 5g, without needing loading or cycling. It doesn't cause bloating or hair loss and supports both men’s and women’s fitness and cognitive health.
What is Creatine?
Creatine is a naturally occurring molecule in muscle tissue. Steak, poultry, and seafood are all natural sources of creatine.
Contrary to what many people think, creatine is NOT a steroid. It’s a completely natural substance.
Although we can get creatine from our diet, the amount of creatine present in food is actually rather low. It is simply not enough to help you build substantial muscle on its own. For example, you’d need to eat about 16 servings of steak per day to reach a useful dose of creatine. If muscle building is your goal, there's a better way to support creatine intake.
How Does Creatine Actually Work?
When we work out, we use ATP, also known as adenosine triphosphate, as the main source of energy. This compound is what contracts our muscles and fuels exercise. ATP is simply a molecule of adenosine that has three phosphate molecules attached to it (see image below). This will be important to know when we explain how creatine works in just a bit.
Figure 1: Adenosine Triphosphate
We all have some ATP readily available in our muscles. However, it’s not much and it usually runs out after just a couple of seconds of intense exercise. Our bodies can also produce ATP to fuel exercise by two different mechanisms known as aerobic and anaerobic metabolism. However, these two mechanisms produce ATP at a rate slower than that used by your muscles during exercise.
In other words, there simply isn't enough to go around. We can’t produce ATP quickly enough to keep up with the demands of our muscles during resistance training. So, the amount of ATP available in our muscles is one of the limiting factors. Without enough ATP on reserve, muscular failure is all but a given.
If you failed on a set of squats after 10 reps, you probably also ran out of ATP momentarily.
This is where creatine comes in.
Aside from readily available ATP just sitting in the muscle, ATP goes deeper. There is, in fact, another way our bodies can quickly produce ATP to contract our muscles. These means are known as the phosphocreatine system.
When we take creatine as a supplement, we store it in our muscles as phosphocreatine. When we use ATP to contract our muscles during exercise, the ATP is converted to ADP or adenosine diphosphate. The ATP then loses one of its phosphate groups. Creatine phosphate can donate it’s phosphate group to ADP to quickly regenerate ATP, as illustrated below:
Figure 2: Creatine Phosphate Regenerates ATP
We always have some creatine phosphate in our muscles, even if you don’t take creatine as a supplement. However, taking creatine as a supplement can help increase your phosphocreatine stores. This can, in turn, help increase the amount of ATP available during exercise.
In essence, creatine works by helping you have more ATP to fuel exercise This might help you get 1-2 more repetitions at the end of a set. By helping to boost your overall performance in the gym, creatine contributes to better muscle growth and strength over time.
For example, in this study (PMID: 29214923) participants performed 4 days of resistance training per week and trained each muscle group 2x per week. Half of the participants received a creatine supplement while the other half received a placebo. The results showed a distinct difference when compared with the placebo. Those who were supplemented with creatine experienced significantly greater muscle hypertrophy in both the upper and lower body. Even with the same training regimen, the results were distinct.
Figure 3: Creatine Supplementation Results in Greater Muscle Hypertrophy in both the Upper and Lower Body
Similarly, this 2020 study published in Nutrients (PMID: 32599716) had participants resistance train for six weeks. Again half the participants were supplemented with creatine while the other half were provided a placebo. Instead of assessing muscle hypertrophy though, the researchers looked at changes in muscle strength. They demonstrated that creatine supplementation resulted in significantly greater strength improvements in both lower and upper body exercises. These included the leg press and chest press (see below).
Figure 4: Creatine Supplementation Increased 1RM strength to a Greater Degree than Placebo
These are just two of the many studies that show the benefits of creatine supplementation for strength and hypertrophy. There is no doubt that supplementing with creatine will help you make better gains over time.
What is the Best Form of Creatine?
There are many different types of creatine. Creatine HCL, Creatine ethyl ester, super creatine, buffered creatine, and the list goes on. But we're here to tell you that all of these are bullsh*t. Supplement companies just try to sell “new forms of creatine” to set themselves apart for marketing purposes.
The most well-studied form of creatine is creatine monohydrate. That’s all you need. It’s also the cheapest form of creatine; all of those other forms of creatine tend to be more expensive.
Even better, there’s no scientific evidence that these forms of creatine are more effective than creatine monohydrate for growing muscle and improving strength over the long term.
In short, just buy creatine monohydrate and don’t waste your money. Our Recovery product contains 5g of micronized creatine monohydrate per serving. It also contains other evidence based ingredients to help you recover from hard training and build muscle!
How Much Creatine Should I Take?
Most people will benefit from taking 5g of creatine per day. Some argue that creatine recommendations should be more specific and based on body weight. However, most studies supplement all participants, regardless of age, gender, and other factors with 5g of creatine. These studies have shown improvements in muscle mass and strength.
If you’re a large person (over 200 lbs.), you might benefit from taking a slightly higher dose. And if you're a smaller person, you may still see benefits with a slightly lower dose.
When Should I Take Creatine?
It doesn’t matter when you take creatine. Since creatine is a supplement that has cumulative effects, what matters most is that you take it consistently. You can take creatine in the morning or at night, and you can take it before or after your workout... it doesn't matter. Just make sure that you are using it consistently
Some users find best results when they take creatine every day. Some require a bit of padding between doses. But know that aside from some GI irritation, creatine is safe to take every day.
For those people who have sensitive tummies or GI issues, you may want to avoid taking creatine before your workout.
Creatine is a known gut irritant. It’s funny because many pre-workouts often include creatine (not ours.) However, some people can experience an upset stomach when they supplement with creatine.
Gut irritation is not uncommon, however some people are more sensitive than others. If that's you, then you may want to wait until after your workout. Take your creatine with food or after a meal on a full stomach to avoid GI discomfort.
That covers the majority of the info you need to know about creatine. Next, we are going to address some frequently asked questions that people have when it comes to supplementing with creatine.
Creatine FAQs
Do you need to do a loading phase?
A loading phase refers to taking a large dose of creatine per day for the first week of supplementation. Loading doses are usually about 20 grams per day.
The reason a loading phase can be helpful is that it helps saturate your muscle creatine stores quicker. However, some people experience significant GI distress with such high doses of creatine. Symptoms could include upset stomach, bloating, and cramping.
The good news is that a loading phase is completely unnecessary. You will fully saturate your muscles with creatine after about a month of supplementation. This is assuming you just take a normal dose of 5 grams per day.
Does creatine cause bloating or weight gain?
Creatine does cause water retention. In fact, this is one of the reasons for creatine's anabolic effects.
Creatine pulls water into the muscle cells. It’s normal for you to gain between 3-5 lbs the first month after starting creatine supplementation. However, since creatine is stored inside our muscle cells, the water we retain is also inside the muscle. This will actually help your muscles look fuller and larger.
Creatine does not cause you to increase water retention under the skin, so it doesn’t make you look bloated or puffy. This is a common misconception about creatine.
What are the benefits of creatine for women?
Similar to men, the benefits of creatine for women include:
- Improved muscle strength,
- Increased muscle mass,
- Better performance when exercising,
- Support for bone health,
- And more.
Creatine is a safe supplement for women to use that supports both physical and mental performance. Some research has shown great benefits for women. And the results are distinct whether users were pre- or post-menopausal.
Do you need to stop taking creatine during a fat loss phase?
Absolutely not. People think they need to stop creatine during a fat loss phase because it causes a bit of weight gain. However, the weight gain from creatine supplementation is just water inside the muscle and none of it is fat.
On top of that, creatine doesn’t inhibit fat loss in any way. If anything, creatine may be helpful during a fat loss phase. This is because it helps you train harder, which can help you retain more muscle during fat loss.
Do you need to cycle creatine?
In other words, do you need to periodically stop taking creatine throughout the year? The answer is no. There is no data showing that it’s harmful to take creatine long-term.
Creatine is completely safe to take indefinitely. Furthermore, there isn’t any data saying that it’s any less effective the longer you take it. Moreover, there really isn’t any sort of benefit to stopping creatine supplementation.
If you require an effective and muscle-positive supplement to pair with your physical activity, creatine has you covered.
Does creatine cause hair loss?
No. This myth originates from a 2009 study on rugby players. That study showed that creatine supplementation increased dihydroxy testosterone or DHT concentrations.
DHT is a metabolite of testosterone that is associated with hair loss. However, this is the only study that’s shown this relationship. Multiple follow-up studies have failed to demonstrate that creatine increases DHT concentrations. Furthermore, there are absolutely no studies that show that creatine actually causes hair loss.
Creatine Summary:
As you can see, the creatine benefits are vast and can likely apply to your supplement needs. Here are just a few final thoughts, if you’re looking for some key creatine takeaways:
- Creatine is the most well-studied sports supplement. It has consistently been shown to improve both strength and hypertrophy adaptations.
- Creatine works by providing additional ATP to fuel muscle contraction during exercise.
- 5g of creatine per day is sufficient to realize its performance-enhancing benefits.
- Timing doesn't matter, just focus on taking creatine consistently.
- A loading phase is not necessary but it can help saturate the muscle cells faster.
- Creatine may cause some weight gain in the form of water retention in the muscle. However, it does not inhibit fat loss and should not be avoided during weight loss.
- Creatine does not need to be cycled throughout the year and can be taken indefinitely.
- Creatine does not cause hair loss.
Creatine Interview with Dr. Layne Norton
Dr. Peter Attia and Dr. Layne Norton discuss how creatine works and the benefits of creatine supplementation:
Outwork Nutrition Recovery
Outwork Recovery contains 5g of creatine per serving and other evidence-based ingredients to help you recover from hard training and build more muscle. 💪
