Thorne's is the most searched of the creatine brands this site has measured — about 71,000 US searches a month for the name alone — and almost every page that ranks for it is a shop, a seller's blog or a list of picks. This page does something narrower. It reads what Thorne publishes about the product, checks the certification against the certifier's own register, prices it at one named store on one date, and states what the label leaves out. Every figure below is from a page opened on 2026-09-24.
What the label states
Seven Thorne creatine products were found on Thorne's own store. Label figures are from each product page's ingredient panel, read 2026-09-24.
| Product (Thorne SKU where shown) | Serving | Creatine per serving | Everything else on the label | Servings |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Creatine, unflavoured (SF903) | 1 scoop | 5 g creatine monohydrate | nothing | 90 |
| Creatine, unflavoured (SF904) | 1 scoop | 5 g | nothing | 180 |
| Creatine – Travel Packs (SF903P) | 1 packet | 5 g | silicon dioxide | 30 |
| Creatine – Strawberry | 1 scoop | 5 g | natural flavour, citric acid, malic acid, rebaudioside M, beet juice powder (colour) | 60 |
| Creatine – Pineapple Orange | 1 scoop | 5 g | natural flavours, citric acid, malic acid, turmeric and beet juice powder (colour), rebaudioside M | 60 |
| Creatine + Alpha GPC | 1 scoop | 5 g | alpha-GPC 600 mg; maltodextrin, natural flavours, citric acid, malic acid, rebaudioside M, beet juice powder and turmeric | 30 |
| Creatine + BCAAs | 1 scoop | 5 g | L-leucine 2.5 g, L-isoleucine 1.25 g, L-valine 1.25 g, L-glutamine 1 g; flavours, acids, sea salt, colours, rebaudioside M, monk fruit extract, sunflower lecithin | 30 |
Two details are worth reading closely. The unflavoured tubs contain one ingredient, which makes the label easy to check against a lab result — there is nothing else to account for. And the creatine dose is the same 5 g in every product; what changes is what is added around it. The 5 g is stated as creatine monohydrate, which is 87.9% creatine by molecular weight — about 4.4 g of creatine itself, the arithmetic set out on types of creatine.
The labels also differ on pregnancy. The unflavoured and fruit-flavoured tubs say "If pregnant, consult your health-care practitioner"; Creatine + Alpha GPC and Creatine + BCAAs say "If pregnant or nursing, do not use this product." The stricter wording appears only on the two combination products, which add alpha-GPC or amino acids to the same 5 g of creatine. What is known about creatine itself in pregnancy is on creatine and pregnancy.
What NSF's register shows
The product page carries the NSF Certified for Sport mark. NSF's own register, searched for Thorne creatine on 2026-09-24, holds seven listings covering six products:
| NSF listing | Form | Package on the listing | Serving on the listing | Certified lot numbers listed |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Thorne Creatine | powder, unflavoured | 450 g, 900 g | 1 scoop (5 g) | 65 |
| Thorne Creatine | powder, unflavoured | 453 g | 1 scoop (5 g) | 7 |
| Thorne Creatine | stick, unflavoured | 30 × 5.15 g | 1 stick (5.15 g) | 15 |
| Thorne Creatine Strawberry | powder | 372 g | 1 scoop (6.2 g) | 4 |
| Thorne Creatine Pineapple Orange | powder | 384 g | 1 scoop (6.4 g) | 7 |
| Thorne Creatine + Alpha GPC (Watermelon Lemonade) | powder | 231 g | 1 scoop (7.7 g) | 4 |
| Thorne Creatine + BCAA (Peach Mango) | powder | 432 g | 1 scoop (14.4 g) | 3 |
(The unflavoured powder appears twice, with different package sizes; both listings are shown.)
The certification is by lot, not by brand. Each listing carries the batch numbers NSF has certified, and a tub's lot number, printed on the container, either appears in that list or it does not. That is the single most useful check a buyer can make, and it is not mentioned on Thorne's product page. Every listing also records "Free of Claims: Gluten", matching the "Gluten Free" line on the product page.
What the mark covers, in NSF's own words on its Our Mark page: the product contains none of 290 substances banned by major athletic organisations; the contents match the label; there are no unsafe levels of contaminants; and the facility is GMP-certified and audited once or twice a year. Thorne's page puts the banned-substance figure at "nearly 300". What it does not cover: whether the product does anything. Certification is a statement about contents and contamination, not about effect, and it says nothing about particle size, raw-material origin or price.
The contamination problem certification exists for is set out, with the 14.8% figure from the one large international test, on is creatine a steroid.
Cost per gram, at one store, on one date
Prices from Thorne's own store, thorne.com, as displayed on 2026-09-24. Other retailers, subscriptions and discounts differ, and prices change; a price with no date is not a fact.
| Product | Price | Creatine monohydrate in the container | Per gram | Per 5 g serving |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Unflavoured, 90 servings | $44 | 450 g | $0.098 | $0.49 |
| Unflavoured, 180 servings | $84 | 900 g | $0.093 | $0.47 |
| Travel packs, 30 | $36 | 150 g | $0.24 | $1.20 |
| Strawberry or Pineapple Orange, 60 | $48 | 300 g | $0.16 | $0.80 |
| Creatine + Alpha GPC, 30 | $49 | 150 g | — (combination) | $1.63 |
| Creatine + BCAAs, 30 | $52 | 150 g | — (combination) | $1.73 |
The per-gram figures for the combination products are left blank on purpose: the price pays for alpha-GPC or amino acids as well, and dividing it all by the creatine would overstate what the creatine costs.
What the label and the page do not say
- Where the creatine is made, and by whom. Neither the ingredient panel nor the product page names the raw-material manufacturer or its country. A brand using the German trademarked monohydrate can name it on its label; the trademark and its specification are on Creapure explained. Thorne's label names no source.
- That it is micronized. The ingredient list says "creatine monohydrate". The word "micronized" appears only in the page's answer about bloating — "the micronized form used by Thorne is designed for easy mixing and absorption" — with no particle size and no study cited. What grinding changes and what it does not is on micronized creatine.
- Purity or an assay figure. The page says Thorne tests "each ingredient for identity, purity, and potency", but publishes no certificate of analysis or purity percentage for a lot.
- That creatine is not an amino acid. The page's answer to "Can women take creatine monohydrate?" calls creatine "a naturally occurring amino acid". It is a guanidino compound the body makes from three amino acids — arginine, glycine and methionine — a small error of classification (what is creatine).
What the page's own questions answer, checked
Thorne's product page answers its own frequently asked questions. Read against the literature:
- Loading. The page says a loading phase "isn't required". That matches the trial record: loading fills muscle in five to six days, and 3 g a day reached similar stores in about 28 days in the Hultman 1996 biopsies (creatine loading phase, how long creatine takes to work).
- Timing. The page stresses consistency over timing. What the timing trials measured is on creatine timing.
- Water retention. The page says some people "notice mild water retention in the muscles when they first start". That is the measured pattern — water drawn into muscle with the creatine in the first days (creatine bloating).
The gummy question
About 590 searches a month ask about Thorne creatine gummies. No Thorne creatine gummy was found — not among the seven creatine products on Thorne's store, not at the product address such a page would use (it returned "not found" on 2026-09-24), and not among Thorne's six creatine listings on NSF's register. The format's documented problem, gummies that miss their label claim, is on creatine gummies.
The honest summary
- Label: one ingredient in the unflavoured tub — 5 g creatine monohydrate a scoop, about 4.4 g of creatine.
- Certification: six Thorne creatine products (seven listings) on NSF's Certified for Sport register, lot by lot; the unflavoured powder's listing carries 65 lot numbers.
- Cost: about $0.093–$0.098 a gram unflavoured at Thorne's store on 2026-09-24; $0.24 in travel packs; $0.16 flavoured.
- Not stated: raw-material origin or manufacturer, particle size, a lot's purity figure.
- Not on this page: a ranking, a verdict or any claim that we have bought, used or tested the product.
Limits of this page
Everything here is what Thorne and NSF publish, read on one date; neither has been verified by a laboratory for this page. The NSF register is a snapshot and changes as lots are added. Prices are one store's list prices on one day. Search volume is DataForSEO's clickstream-adjusted US estimate from 2026-09-23.
Sources and dates
- Thorne product pages, read 2026-09-24: Creatine – 90 Servings, Creatine – 180 Servings, Creatine – Travel Packs, Creatine – Strawberry, Creatine – Pineapple Orange, Creatine + Alpha GPC, Creatine + BCAAs.
- NSF Certified for Sport register, search "thorne creatine" and listing details 1495542, 1204244, 1663109, 1732943, 1732944, 1748625, 1741747 — nsfsport.com, read 2026-09-24.
- NSF, Our Mark, read 2026-09-24.
- PubChem molar masses for creatine (CID 586) and creatine monohydrate (CID 80116), read 2026-09-24.