|—— back to products

COGNITION & IQ RESEARCH.

This is our working literature review on cognitive enhancement: can you actually raise your IQ, or just feel sharper? We wrote it research-first — every claim links to the underlying study, and we try to be explicit about what each trial measured, how big it was, and where it falls short. We are going to disappoint anyone hoping for a single pill. We are also going to point you at the handful of things that genuinely move the needle.

Our summary of the field: there is no proven way to permanently raise trait IQ (the stable, heritable g-factor) in a healthy adult. What you can reliably change is your cognitive state and performance — how alert, focused, and clear-thinking you are on a given day — and your crystallized knowledge, which grows with learning your whole life. The biggest, best-evidenced levers are unglamorous: sleep, cardiovascular exercise, correcting nutritional deficiencies, and treating mood disorders. A small set of supplements and drugs (caffeine + L-theanine, creatine, modafinil) have real but modest human data. Most "nootropics," and essentially all commercial brain-training games, are oversold. [1][2][3][8].

CAN IQ ACTUALLY BE RAISED?

First you need to separate three things that get blurred together. Fluid intelligence (Gf) is your raw reasoning and problem-solving on novel material — this is what IQ tests try to isolate, it is substantially heritable, and it is the thing that is genuinely hard to permanently increase in adults. Crystallized intelligence (Gc) is accumulated knowledge and skill; it rises across the lifespan with education and deliberate practice and is very much within your control. Cognitive performance/state is how much of your underlying capacity you can actually access right now, which is gated by sleep, stress, mood, caffeine, blood sugar, and motivation.

The honest framing: most "biohacking" wins are state and crystallized wins, not Gf wins. That is not a consolation prize — a rested, fit, well-nourished, focused version of you out-performs a sleep-deprived, anxious version by a margin larger than any pill delivers. Two facts keep this grounded. First, IQ-test scores rose substantially across the 20th century (the Flynn effect), which proves the score is environmentally malleable at the population level even if the underlying g is sticky. Second, when researchers ran the largest test of commercial brain training — 11,430 people — trained tasks improved but there was no transfer to untrained reasoning. Practicing a thing makes you better at that thing, not smarter in general. [1]

HOW WE WEIGH THE EVIDENCE

Not all "studies" are equal, and cognition research is especially noisy. We rank evidence roughly: adequately powered, double-blind, placebo-controlled randomized trials > small randomized trials > open-label or uncontrolled human studies > mechanistic / cell-culture work > animal models > testimonials and influencer threads. Cognitive endpoints add their own traps: practice effects (you score higher just from taking the test twice), publication bias toward positive results, tiny acute studies that never test durable change, and outcome-shopping across a dozen subtests until one hits significance. A drug "improving cognition" in a press release often means it nudged one subtest in one population. We try to say which one.

THE BIGGEST LEVERS — UNGLAMOROUS, HIGH-YIELD

Sleep. Nothing on this page comes close to the cognitive cost of poor sleep. Sleep deprivation degrades attention, working memory, learning consolidation, and executive function, and chronic short sleep does it while you feel "fine." Before optimizing anything else, fix sleep duration, timing, and consistency. The cheapest, largest, most reliable "nootropic" is a full night.

Cardiovascular exercise. This is the closest thing to a real structural brain upgrade. In a randomized controlled trial, a year of aerobic exercise increased anterior hippocampal volume by ~2% in older adults — effectively reversing one to two years of age-related shrinkage — with improved spatial memory and higher serum BDNF. [2]
Trade-offs: the strongest causal data is in older adults; in young, healthy people the acute IQ-score gain is smaller. But exercise's effect on mood, sleep, insulin sensitivity, and long-term cognitive resilience is unmatched and has essentially no downside.

Correct real deficiencies. Iron (low ferritin), vitamin B12, vitamin D, and omega-3 status can each impair cognition when genuinely low — and correcting a true deficiency reliably helps. The nuance, exactly as with hair: supplementing someone who is already replete does little, and a few nutrients are harmful in excess. Test, don't guess. A basic blood panel beats a cabinet of capsules.

Treat mood and stress. Depression and chronic anxiety hammer working memory, concentration, and processing speed; treating them often produces the largest "cognitive enhancement" a person will ever experience. Chronic stress and elevated cortisol are directly anti-cognitive. This lane is unsexy and frequently the highest-yield one.

SUPPLEMENTS WITH REAL HUMAN DATA

Caffeine + L-theanine — the best-evidenced everyday stack. Caffeine reliably improves alertness and attention; pairing it with L-theanine (the calming amino acid in tea) improves speed and accuracy on demanding attention-switching tasks and reduces distractibility, with less jitter than caffeine alone. Common dose: ~50–100 mg caffeine with ~100–200 mg L-theanine. [5][6]
Trade-offs: these are acute, state-level effects — focus, not raw IQ. Tolerance builds, late-day caffeine wrecks the sleep that matters far more, and the benefit is real but modest.

Creatine — emerging, strongest under stress. Better known for muscle, creatine is also a brain energy buffer. A systematic review found it may improve short-term memory and reasoning, with the clearest benefit in people who are stressed, sleep-deprived, aging, or vegetarian (who start with lower stores); young, rested, omnivorous adults often show little change. A classic trial found 5 g/day for six weeks improved working memory and Raven's Matrices scores in vegetarians. [3][4]
Trade-offs: the cognitive (as opposed to muscle) evidence is still thin and heterogeneous; effects on most domains are unclear; expect a state benefit when depleted, not a permanent IQ bump. Safety profile is excellent.

Bacopa monnieri — slow memory support. An Ayurvedic herb with the best botanical evidence here: a systematic review of randomized trials found it improved free-recall memory (9 of 17 tests), though benefits in other domains were not established. It acts over weeks, not acutely. [7]
Trade-offs: 8–12 weeks to onset; the evidence is narrow (mostly memory recall, modest sample sizes); commonly causes GI upset; take with food.

Omega-3 (DHA/EPA). Worth getting adequate intake for brain and cardiovascular health, and a clear win if you are deficient. As a cognitive enhancer in already-replete, healthy adults, trial results are mixed and effect sizes small. Treat it as foundational nutrition, not a smart drug.

PHARMACEUTICAL OPTIONS — REAL EFFECTS, REAL TRADE-OFFS

Modafinil. An FDA-approved wakefulness drug widely used off-label as a "smart drug." A systematic review of healthy, non-sleep-deprived people found consistent benefits to executive function, attention, and learning on complex tasks, with little effect on mood and few side effects — though a few studies reported impaired divergent (creative) thinking. It is genuinely effective at sustaining effortful cognition, especially when tired. [8]
Trade-offs: prescription-only for good reason; insomnia, headache, appetite loss, and (rarely) serious skin reactions; it sharpens execution but does not raise underlying intelligence, and the creativity trade-off is notable. Not a casual supplement.

Prescription stimulants (ADHD medications). For people who actually have ADHD, treatment dramatically improves attention, working memory, and real-world function — a legitimate, large effect. In people without ADHD, stimulants mostly increase perceived productivity and wakefulness while delivering small and inconsistent gains on objective cognition, sometimes impairing tasks that need flexibility.
Trade-offs: abuse and dependence potential, cardiovascular effects, sleep and appetite disruption, tolerance. Diagnose and treat a real condition; don't borrow a controlled drug for a study session.

Racetams (piracetam, etc.). Popular in the nootropic world but the human evidence for enhancement in healthy people is weak and dated; most positive data is in cognitive impairment, not healthy users. Unapproved in the US for this use.
Trade-offs: thin, low-quality enhancement evidence; unregulated supply; we list it for completeness, not endorsement.

EXPERIMENTAL & OVERSOLD

Russian peptides (Semax, Selank, Cerebrolysin). Semax is the most-discussed of these — a synthetic ACTH(4–10) analog, given as nasal drops, that rapidly upregulates BDNF/NGF (neurotrophic growth factors) and modulates dopamine and serotonin. The mechanism is real and genuinely interesting: a single intranasal dose raises hippocampal BDNF and trkB signaling in rats alongside improved learning. [9] But the human evidence is thin: it has been used clinically in Russia for ~25 years mostly for sick populations (stroke, cognitive impairment), the trials are mostly small, non-randomized, and not placebo-controlled, and the most-cited one (110 post-stroke patients) was unblinded. [10] There is no Western-standard RCT showing Semax raises cognition in healthy adults, and Western supply is unregulated research-chemical grade with no long-term safety data in healthy users. Interesting frontier, not a foundation.

Lion's mane, Rhodiola, ginkgo, nicotine. Lion's mane has intriguing preclinical nerve-growth-factor data and a little preliminary human signal. Rhodiola is best characterized as an anti-fatigue adaptogen (helps tired/stressed people perform, not a raw IQ lever). Ginkgo's enhancement evidence in healthy adults is largely negative. Nicotine genuinely sharpens attention acutely but is addictive and not worth starting for cognition.
Trade-offs: mostly preclinical or small/mixed human data; effects, where real, are state-level and modest.

Commercial "brain training" games. The thing to skip. The largest controlled study showed gains stay locked to the trained game with no transfer to general cognition. If you want crystallized gains, learn something real (a language, an instrument, math) — that at least leaves you with the skill. [1]

TRADE-OFFS AT A GLANCE

A SANE "IQ" PROTOCOL

  1. Build the base first. Consistent 7–9h sleep, regular cardio + resistance training, whole-food diet, and stress management. This is 80% of the result and the only part that compounds.
  2. Get blood work. Check ferritin/iron, B12, vitamin D, and thyroid; correct anything genuinely low. Treat depression/anxiety if present.
  3. Add a low-risk daily stack if you want. Caffeine + L-theanine for focus sessions; creatine 3–5 g/day (especially if vegetarian or sleep-restricted); adequate omega-3.
  4. Grow crystallized intelligence on purpose. Deliberate practice and spaced repetition in a real domain. This is the one lane where "more" reliably equals "smarter at the thing."
  5. Treat drugs and peptides as a separate, higher-risk tier. Modafinil only with a prescription and a real reason; experimental peptides like Semax only with eyes open about the thin evidence and unregulated supply.
  6. Measure. If you experiment, change one variable at a time and track something concrete. Most reported nootropic benefits are placebo, practice effect, or just better sleep that week.

HOW TO READ THIS PAGE

  1. Separate trait IQ (hard to raise) from state/performance (very changeable) from crystallized knowledge (grows for life) — most "wins" are the last two.
  2. Spend your effort where the effect sizes are biggest and the trade-offs smallest: sleep, exercise, deficiencies, mood.
  3. Treat supplements as modest, mostly-acute helpers, not upgrades; treat drugs as a real but higher-risk tier.
  4. Be skeptical of "limitless pill" framing for any single compound. Read the primary papers above rather than trusting marketing, or our summary.

This page is educational and not medical advice. Several items here are prescription drugs or unregulated research chemicals; talk to a clinician before starting anything, especially if you take other medications.

refs:

  1. Owen AM, Hampshire A, Grahn JA, et al. Putting brain training to the test. Nature 2010.
  2. Erickson KI, Voss MW, Prakash RS, et al. Exercise training increases size of hippocampus and improves memory. PNAS 2011.
  3. Avgerinos KI, Spyrou N, Bougioukas KI, Kapogiannis D. Effects of creatine supplementation on cognitive function of healthy individuals: a systematic review of RCTs. 2018.
  4. Rae C, Digney AL, McEwan SR, Bates TC. Oral creatine monohydrate supplementation improves brain performance. Proc R Soc B 2003.
  5. Owen GN, Parnell H, De Bruin EA, Rycroft JA. The combined effects of L-theanine and caffeine on cognitive performance and mood. 2008.
  6. Haskell CF, Kennedy DO, Milne AL, Wesnes KA, Scholey AB. The effects of L-theanine, caffeine and their combination on cognition and mood. 2008.
  7. Pase MP, Kean J, Sarris J, et al. The cognitive-enhancing effects of Bacopa monnieri: a systematic review of RCTs. 2012.
  8. Battleday RM, Brem AK. Modafinil for cognitive neuroenhancement in healthy non-sleep-deprived subjects: a systematic review. Eur Neuropsychopharmacol 2015.
  9. Dolotov OV, Karpenko EA, Inozemtseva LS, et al. Semax, an analog of ACTH(4-10) with cognitive effects, regulates BDNF and trkB expression in the rat hippocampus. Brain Res 2006.
  10. Gusev EI, Martynov MYu, Kostenko EV, et al. The efficacy of semax in the treatment of patients at different stages of ischemic stroke. Zh Nevrol Psikhiatr 2018.

Back to all protocols: products.html.