Joint Formula Buying Guide 2021

We tested over 220 products. More than half didn’t even have all the ingredients they claimed

If you’ve suffered from joint pain, then you know exactly how much it can impact your life. Even the slightest movement can send pain shooting through your entire body, making even the simplest tasks incredibly painful.

In order to meet the demands of this huge market, many companies have made joint support formulas to ease the pain and support healthy joints.The problem with this is, many of them don’t work. We’ve had dozens of readers write into us, asking us to find out why these products aren’t living up to their promises…and to find one that will.

When we dug deeper into this problem, we were shocked by what we found. Many of the top supplements on the market didn’t even have all the ingredients they claimed! And others didn’t use the most effective ingredients, most likely because the manufacturers wanted to cut costs.

Luckily, we did find a few products that give users great results: less pain, more mobility, and healthier joints. Read on to find out which products you should use if you finally want to leave joint pain behind.

First, Why Your Joints Hurt – And How To Make Them Stop

Scientists have long believed that the cause of chronic joint pain is a breakdown of the cartilage and connective tissue in the joints. When this tissue breaks down, the joints grind on each other, making even the most basic movement an agonizing ordeal.

What researchers are learning is that, to prevent cartilage from breaking down, you need to boost your body’s production of the compounds that make up cartilage and connective tissue. This is where a joint formula comes in.

One of the richest sources of the nutrients your joints need is in eggshell membrane. Not only is this membrane filled with glucosamine and chondroitin, two of the most proven joint health ingredients, it’s also jam-packed with other joint-protecting compounds like collagen and hyaluronic acid.

In a study published in Clinical Rheumatology, joint pain sufferers who were given a daily supplement of eggshell membrane saw an incredible 72% reduction in pain after 30 days! In addition, they also saw a 43% increase in flexibility, allowing them to go about their daily tasks with much less pain and discomfort than before. [Link to study]

All of this combines to make eggshell membrane the most effective natural solution to joint pain. That means that, if you want to finally get relief for your aching joints, you need a supplement that’s full of eggshell membrane.

Finding the Best Supplement

Of course, the #1 question that people have is: how do you decide which supplement is best?

There are a few things you can look for that boost your chances of getting the most effective joint supplement possible. You need to carefully read the label of any product you’re considering, and look for the following things:

Does it contain eggshell membrane? A no-brainer, but you’d be shocked by how many companies are still pumping out supplements that don’t take advantage of this breakthrough ingredient. Sadly, many companies are more concerned with getting rid of their inferior old formula than with serving their customers.
Does it contain a powerful anti-inflammatory? While building up your joint tissue is essential, it also takes time. That’s why you need something to ease the joint inflammation that causes so much pain. Look for ingredients like turmeric, Growth Factor B, and eggshell membrane.
Has it been third-party tested? This one can’t be overstated. Of the products we tested, over half didn’t have the ingredients they claimed. The only way to know for sure what’s in your supplement is to see if it’s been verified by an independent third party.

With these criteria in mind, we evaluated almost two dozen joint supplements to find out which one was most effective. Read on to find out who was crowned #1.

Our Research Method

We used two factors to determine a supplement’s qualities: the ingredients, and the experiences that real people had with it.

First off, if a product didn’t have the ingredients mentioned above, there was virtually no chance that it would score well in user reviews or our tests. You simply can’t have an effective product without effective ingredients.

Then we looked at the company itself and evaluated the company based on whether or not they’re attempting to cash in on the new joint health trend, how long they’ve been around, and some other metrics, such as their return policy

And finally, we talked to customers directly to see if they enjoyed their experience working with the company–especially the most important question: would they buy from them again?

What Our Research Found

As we suspected, a lot of products failed to pass the initial ingredient test. Lots of companies offer inferior products that are don’t have the ingredients necessary to make a difference, including the all-important eggshell membrane.

What’s worse, some of the products that did have eggshell membrane listed on the label didn’t have nearly as much as they claimed. One supplement even claimed to have “over 500 mg of eggshell membrane”- but when we tested it, we found it only had half that much!

Other companies were rejected because they were difficult to contact, and often only offered one product, which always sets off the alarm bells in our heads. Naturally, we’d never recommend one of these brands to our readers.

This left us with only a handful of high-quality supplements from trusted suppliers. Of this group, though, one joint supplement stood out from the rest of the pack.

This supplement:

Had a considerable amount of the active ingredients we look for in a joint supplement
Has been third-party tested, giving you extra peace of mind

So which product do we recommend over any other? The answer is below.

Our Top Picks

We’ve compiled a list of what we found to be the top five products in this category.

#Top Choice: Arthrogenix

A+

Overall Grade

by Alpha Vita

Total Ranking

9.8/10

(711 votes) Vote And Review

PROS

Contains 4 Clinically Studied Ingredients proven to promote Optimal Joint Health
100% Non-GMO, Gluten-Free, Dairy-Free, Sugar-Free, Soy Free, and Preservative Free
Includes LongVida® Optimized Curcumin, clinically proven to cross blood-brain barrier 285XMore Effective than 95% Standardized Curcumin
Clinically shown to perform significantly better than glucosamine+Chondroitin
Formulated by UCLA Neuroscientists
Doctor Recommended
24-hours potency in 400 mg daily dose

Cons

Sold Out Regularly
Expensive

A+

Overall Grade

Read full review

Total Ranking

9.8/10

(711 votes) Vote And Review

Product Safety

Return Policy

Projected Effectiveness

Customer Satisfaction

Value

The Bottom Line

If you’ve been looking for a joint health supplement that could offer you fast relief, then this is the one for you.

Out of every product we looked at, Alpha Vita had the highest quality supplement, making it the only one we can safely recommend you purchase.

They include all the ingredients we wanted to see, in the most effective doses possible. That includes 500 mg of Natural Eggshell Membrane, 300 mg of Boswellia, 200 mg of Turmeric, and 100 mg of white willow. These numbers exceeded all of our minimums, and for the price, you won’t get more bang for your buck.

Similarly, Alpha Vita is an established company that makes supplements that customers love. They’ve been selling supplements for a long time, and they aren’t one of those companies that just pops up overnight hoping to get rich fast.

On top of all this, they use strict third-party testing to guarantee that their products are perfect before they offer them for sale. This shows a concern for the customer, not just for their bottom line.

They also back every single one of their products with a 90-day, money-back guarantee- something none of our other finalists could match. Standing behind their product like this tells us that they absolutely believe it works, and they’re willing to put their money where their mouth is.

If there is one negative we could find about Alpha Vita, it’s that they have difficulty keeping their products in stock. And as word continues to spread about their products, it seems likely that they’ll continue to have issues with being sold out more often than not.

Click the link below to read our full review of Alpha Vita’s Arthrogenix. We’ve also provided a link with a special discount if you’re interested in trying it for yourself.

(Note: Intelligent Reviews makes no guarantees about the availability of the product. As mentioned, this product sells out often, and we cannot promise that it will still be in stock when you read this.)

read full review

#2 SECOND CHOICE: INSTAFLEX JOINT SUPPORT

A+

Overall Grade

by InstaFlex

Total Ranking

9/10

(717 votes) Vote And Review

A+

Overall Grade

Read full review

Total Ranking

9/10

(717 votes) Vote And Review

Product Safety

Return Policy

Projected Effectiveness

Customer Satisfaction

Value

The Bottom Line

We also like the joint support supplement from Instaflex. Like Alpha Vita, Instaflex uses high-quality ingredients. The product also had a fair price, but upon closer inspection, you’ll see that the price isn’t quite right.

This is because the ingredient that we most want to see, Natural Eggshell Membrane, is replace by the more traditional Glucosamine. This helps the company cut a corner, but also means they’re missing the biggest thing in joint health going on right now.

They do include white willow, Tumeric, and Boswellia, though. So while the egg membrane is missing, we’re still happy to see this other joint-happy ingredients.

Instaflex doesn’t use binders or synthetic ingredients. But they do have a few filler ingredients that don’t really need to be there and don’t third-party test as far as we can tell. While this is nowhere near as effective as the supplement from Alpha Vita, it still earns our second spot thanks to positive customer reviews and a supplement with most of the ingredients we want to see.

read full review

#3 Third Choice: Natural Factors Natural EggShell Membrane

A-

Overall Grade

by Pure Essence Labs

Total Ranking

8/10

(412 votes) Vote And Review

A-

Overall Grade

Read full review

Total Ranking

8/10

(412 votes) Vote And Review

Product Safety

Return Policy

Projected Effectiveness

Customer Satisfaction

Value

The Bottom Line

Natural Factors Natural Eggshell Membrane will round out our list of top supplements. These guys generally do a good job with supplements, but this one left us wishing for more. Like the others, they don’t use binders and synthetics, but that’s probably because they don’t use much else.

This supplement has the always-effective Natural Eggshell Membrane and a veggie capsule, and that’s it. This just isn’t enough to get higher on our list. Eggshell membrane is great, but when combined with the other ingredients we’ve mentioned, you get a truly amazing product.

So while this nice supplement gets a nod, it just doesn’t offer enough to make it higher on our list.

read full review