The formula
GlycoMode ingredients: all nine, read from the panel
Nine ingredients share one 1000 mg line on the Supplement Facts panel. This page takes each one in the order the panel lists it, says what it is, quotes what a source we actually opened says about it, and prints the caution that comes with it. Two of the nine carry no citation, and we say so on those two rather than reaching for a weaker source.
The blend is listed in descending order of weight, so L-lysine HCL is the largest single part of it and raspberry ketones the smallest. No other quantity is published. Two ingredients — cinnamon and bitter melon — have real glucose research behind them. Four are ones normally sold for testosterone, libido or weight loss.
What a proprietary blend hides
The FDA permits a manufacturer to group ingredients under a blend name and publish one combined weight. The trade-off, from the buyer's side, is total: you learn the sum and lose every part. The one rule that survives is that the ingredients inside the blend must be listed in descending order of predominance by weight.
This matters more here than in most products, because the nine ingredients on this label have wildly different research doses. Cinnamon is studied in grams. Tongkat ali in a few hundred milligrams. Raspberry ketones have no established dose at all. A 1000 mg total tells you that at most one of these ingredients can be anywhere near its researched intake, and does not tell you which.
1. L-Lysine HCL — an essential amino acid
Lysine is an essential amino acid, which means the body cannot make it and gets it from protein in food. It is the first ingredient listed, so it is the largest share of the 1000 mg blend. What it is doing in a blood-health formula is not explained anywhere on the label or in the brand's artwork. We looked for a plain-language reference page on lysine at NIH, NCCIH or Memorial Sloan Kettering, the sources we cite elsewhere on this site, and did not find one we could link, so there is no citation under this ingredient.
Typical amount in research: Supplement trials use 1-3 g a day, mostly for cold sores. Amount in GlycoMode: not published.
Caution. Most supplement research on lysine concerns cold sores rather than blood sugar. If you eat protein, you are already getting it.
Source. None. We searched NIH, NCCIH and Memorial Sloan Kettering — the three references this site uses — and found no page on this ingredient we could link. Rather than substitute a supplement retailer or a content farm, we leave this line empty and tell you it is empty.
2. Apple Cider Vinegar — Malus domestica, fruit
Apple cider vinegar has a large popular reputation and a small research file. Memorial Sloan Kettering's monograph states that the "available evidence to support ACV use is not conclusive due to heterogeneity between studies, variations in duration, dosage, and different formulations." Note also the format problem: the trials that exist use tablespoons of liquid vinegar, and this is a fraction of a 1000 mg powder blend.
Typical amount in research: Human trials typically use 15-30 ml of liquid vinegar a day. Amount in GlycoMode: not published.
Caution. MSK documents chemical burns from topical use, oesophageal injury from tablets, and cases of liver toxicity and acute pancreatitis linked to consumption.
Source. Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, About Herbs (2026). Apple Cider Vinegar.
3. Garcinia Cambogia Powder — Garcinia gummi-gutta
Garcinia is the ingredient on this label we would most want to ask the manufacturer about. The NIH Office of Dietary Supplements reports "little to no effect on body weight", with a meta-analysis finding a mean 0.88 kg difference against placebo that "was no longer statistically significant" once only rigorously designed trials were counted.
Typical amount in research: Trials use 1-2.8 g a day of extract standardised to hydroxycitric acid. Amount in GlycoMode: not published.
Caution. NIH lists headache, nausea, upper respiratory and gastrointestinal symptoms, and records three cases of mania and ten cases of liver toxicity resulting in one death and two liver transplants — noting that causality cannot be established because the products contained multiple ingredients.
Source. Office of Dietary Supplements, National Institutes of Health (2026). Dietary Supplements for Weight Loss: Health Professional Fact Sheet.
4. Tongkat Ali Extract — Eurycoma longifolia, root
Tongkat ali is the ingredient that explains the blend's name and confuses its purpose. It is marketed for testosterone and male vitality, not for glucose metabolism. As with lysine, we could not find a reference page at NIH, NCCIH or Memorial Sloan Kettering that we could link, so this ingredient carries no citation. The published human work that exists is small and often funded by extract makers.
Typical amount in research: Trials usually run 200-400 mg a day of a water-based root extract. Amount in GlycoMode: not published.
Caution. Because the reference base is thin, treat this as an ingredient with limited independent safety data rather than an exciting one.
Source. None. We searched NIH, NCCIH and Memorial Sloan Kettering — the three references this site uses — and found no page on this ingredient we could link. Rather than substitute a supplement retailer or a content farm, we leave this line empty and tell you it is empty.
5. Horny Goat Weed Extract — Epimedium grandiflorum, plant
Epimedium is the second ingredient on this label with no connection to blood sugar. Memorial Sloan Kettering's monograph is blunt about the evidence: "scientific evidence to support use of Epimedium is limited. More studies are needed to confirm its safety and efficacy." The one randomised human trial it highlights looked at bone loss in post-menopausal women.
Typical amount in research: Human trials are few and mostly use 100-900 mg a day of leaf extract. Amount in GlycoMode: not published.
Caution. MSK says to avoid epimedium if you have heart disease, citing reported tachyarrhythmia and hypomania, and to avoid it alongside CYP3A4 substrate drugs and aromatase inhibitors.
Source. Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, About Herbs (2026). Epimedium.
6. Wild Yam Extract — Dioscorea villosa, root
Wild yam is usually sold for menopausal symptoms, which makes its presence here another open question. Memorial Sloan Kettering reports that "studies in humans are quite limited" and show "mixed results on menopausal symptoms in a few small studies." There is no blood-sugar research in its monograph at all.
Typical amount in research: Most human work uses topical creams rather than oral doses. Amount in GlycoMode: not published.
Caution. MSK states plainly that because wild yam has oestrogenic effects, anyone with a hormone-sensitive cancer should speak to their physician before taking it. It repeats that warning twice.
Source. Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, About Herbs (2026). Wild Yam.
7. Cinnamon Extract — Cinnamomum verum, bark
Cinnamon is the ingredient that actually belongs in a glucose-metabolism product, and even its evidence is unsettled. NCCIH states: "It's unclear whether cinnamon supplementation is helpful for diabetes or weight loss. Higher quality research would be needed to clarify any benefits." It also notes that many studies failed to specify which cinnamon species or plant part was used, which makes the literature hard to read.
Typical amount in research: Trials commonly use 1-6 g a day of cinnamon powder. Amount in GlycoMode: not published.
Caution. NCCIH says cinnamon is likely safe in food amounts but that larger or long-term use is sometimes linked to gastrointestinal problems or allergic reactions, and flags coumarin in cassia cinnamon as a concern for people with liver disease. This label specifies Cinnamomum verum, which is the lower-coumarin species.
Source. NCCIH, National Institutes of Health (2026). Cinnamon: Usefulness and Safety.
8. Bitter Melon Extract — Momordica charantia, fruit
Bitter melon is the second ingredient with a genuine connection to blood sugar. Memorial Sloan Kettering reports that "data on whether bitter melon can reduce lower blood sugar levels are limited", and that "limited data suggest bitter melon may help lower blood sugar, but a meta-analyses concluded the evidence is low quality with little safety data."
Typical amount in research: Trials commonly use 2-6 g a day of fruit or extract. Amount in GlycoMode: not published.
Caution. This is the most important interaction on the label. MSK advises against bitter melon if you are pregnant, taking insulin, or using diabetes medicines, because it "may have additive effects" with them. Case reports include irregular heartbeat, gastric ulcers and kidney injury.
Source. Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, About Herbs (2026). Bitter Melon.
9. Raspberry Ketones — a synthesised flavour compound
Raspberry ketones are the last ingredient listed, which under FDA rules means the smallest share of the blend. The NIH Office of Dietary Supplements describes the evidence as "insufficient research to draw firm conclusions" and notes it has been "studied only in combination with other ingredients" — so even the trials that exist cannot tell you what the ingredient does on its own.
Typical amount in research: Studied only in combination with other ingredients, so no dose can be given. Amount in GlycoMode: not published.
Caution. NIH reports no safety concerns in one 8-week study while noting it is "not well studied". Absence of reported harm is not the same as evidence of safety.
Source. Office of Dietary Supplements, National Institutes of Health (2026). Dietary Supplements for Weight Loss: Health Professional Fact Sheet.
What is not in here
The most-shared marketing panel for this product is headlined “Nourish your body with essential vitamins & minerals”. Here is the Supplement Facts panel's complete list of vitamins and minerals: none. Not a milligram of chromium, which is the mineral most associated with glucose metabolism. No magnesium. No B vitamins. No zinc.
Why we are printing this rather than cropping it out
We could have left this panel out of the site altogether and nobody would have noticed. We have included it because you will meet it on a marketplace listing sooner or later, and when you do you should already know that the claim it makes is not supported by the panel on the back of the bottle.
There is a charitable reading. “Nourish your body” may be intended loosely, and plant extracts do carry trace micronutrients. But a headline that names vitamins and minerals specifically, over a product that lists neither, is not a phrase a careful label team leaves in place.
The other ingredients line is short and contains nothing nutritional: Gelatin Capsule, Rice powder, Magnesium Stearate Vegetable Grade. Those are the capsule shell, a filler and a flow agent.
Where the evidence actually is
If you strip this label down to the ingredients with published human research relevant to the reason the product is sold, you are left with two: cinnamon and bitter melon. Both have research files. Neither has a settled one.
The two that belong here
- Cinnamon. NCCIH: “It's unclear whether cinnamon supplementation is helpful for diabetes or weight loss.” A real research question, honestly unsettled.
- Bitter melon. MSK: “limited data suggest bitter melon may help lower blood sugar,” with a meta-analysis calling the evidence low quality.
- This label names Cinnamomum verum, the lower-coumarin species, which is the better choice of the two commonly sold.
- Both are named with species and plant part, which many labels in this category do not bother with.
The seven that need explaining
- Tongkat ali, horny goat weed and, arguably, wild yam are hormone-adjacent ingredients in a metabolic product.
- Garcinia cambogia and raspberry ketones are weight-loss ingredients; NIH finds little to no effect for the first and insufficient research for the second.
- Apple cider vinegar is here in powder form at a fraction of the amount trials use in liquid.
- L-lysine is the largest share of the blend and the label offers no reason for its presence.
That is the honest shape of this formula: two ingredients that make sense, one that is simply unexplained, and six that look like they were written for a different product. The how-it-works page goes through the proposed mechanisms one at a time.
- Office of Dietary Supplements, National Institutes of Health (2026). Dietary Supplements for Weight Loss: Health Professional Fact Sheet.
- NCCIH, National Institutes of Health (2026). Cinnamon: Usefulness and Safety.
- Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, About Herbs (2026). Bitter Melon.
- Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, About Herbs (2026). Wild Yam.
- Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, About Herbs (2026). Apple Cider Vinegar.
- Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, About Herbs (2026). Epimedium.
- U.S. Food and Drug Administration (2026). Questions and Answers on Dietary Supplements.
- U.S. Food and Drug Administration (2026). Dietary Supplement Labeling Guide.
How we chose which sources to cite
Three bodies, and one rule about what happens when none of them has a page.
NIH Office of Dietary Supplements
The US government's own fact sheets on supplement ingredients, written for health professionals. Blunt, current and unsentimental about negative findings.
NCCIH
The National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health, also part of NIH. Its herb pages are written for the public and are unusually direct about uncertainty.
Memorial Sloan Kettering, About Herbs
A cancer centre's herb monographs, maintained for clinicians dealing with patients who take supplements alongside treatment. The best single source for interactions anywhere.
And the rule: if none of those three has a page on an ingredient, we say so and publish no citation. We do not substitute a supplement retailer's blog, an aggregator or a journal abstract we cannot evaluate. Two of the nine ingredients here fall into that category, and both pages say so in the same words.
This is a stricter standard than most sites apply and it has a visible cost: two ingredients with a blank where a source should be. We think a visible blank is more honest than a link that looks authoritative and is not.
The four ingredients that raise the most questions
Not the ones with the worst safety files — those are on the safety page — but the four whose presence in a blood-health product is hardest to account for.
| Ingredient | Normally sold for | Connection to glucose metabolism |
|---|---|---|
| Tongkat Ali | Testosterone and male vitality | None we could source |
| Horny Goat Weed | Libido and male performance | None we could source |
| Wild Yam | Menopausal symptoms | None. MSK's monograph contains no blood-sugar research |
| L-Lysine HCL | Cold sores, and general protein nutrition | None we could source, and it is the largest share of the blend |
Taken together with the blend's name — Test Boost Proprietary Blend — the most economical explanation is that this formula was written for a different product and repurposed. We cannot prove that and we are not asserting it. We are saying it is what the label looks like, and that the manufacturer could settle the question in a sentence.
Read the label first, then decide
Sixty capsules a bottle, one 1000 mg blend, nine ingredients and no per-ingredient amounts. The live price and the return terms are both on the seller’s checkout screen.
Listing return terms · Questions first? Call +1 (302) 200-3480