A creatine shelf offers a dozen names, and the marketing behind each new one makes the same promise: better absorption, less bloating, a smaller dose. There are two separate questions hidden in the list. Formats — micronized, capsules, gummies, liquids — change how the same creatine is packaged. Salts and derivatives — HCl, nitrate, ethyl ester — change the molecule, and with it how much of each gram is creatine at all. This page sorts every form into one of the two, works out the creatine content of each salt from its molecular weight, and lists every head-to-head trial against monohydrate. It reports research and gives no usage guidance.
How much of each form is creatine
The arithmetic nobody prints: divide creatine's molar mass (131.13 g/mol) by the form's molar mass. Masses from PubChem, read 2026-09-24.
| Form | Molar mass (g/mol) | Creatine by weight | Grams of product for 5 g creatine |
|---|---|---|---|
| Creatine anhydrous | 131.13 | 100% | 5.00 |
| Creatine monohydrate | 149.15 | 87.9% | 5.69 |
| Creatine hydrochloride (HCl) | 167.59 | 78.2% | 6.39 |
| Creatine nitrate | 194.15 | 67.5% | 7.40 |
| Creatine ethyl ester HCl | 195.65 | 67.0% | 7.46 |
Two things follow. A product sold on a smaller serving — the common pitch for HCl — is delivering less creatine per gram, not more. And a label that states "5 g creatine nitrate" is stating about 3.4 g of creatine. Whether a label gives the salt or the creatine is often not said; the census of what US HCl labels declare is on creatine HCl.
Formats: the same molecule, packaged differently
| Format | What it is | What changes | Where it is covered |
|---|---|---|---|
| Monohydrate powder | creatine with one water molecule per molecule | — the reference form in nearly every trial | what is creatine |
| Micronized | monohydrate milled to smaller particles | dispersion and mixing; not the amount of creatine or how much water holds | micronized creatine |
| Creapure | a trademark for monohydrate made by one manufacturer in Trostberg, Germany | the supply chain and the specification; not the molecule | Creapure explained |
| Capsules and tablets | monohydrate (usually) in a shell | serving size and cost per gram; gelatin in many shells | creatine pills vs powder |
| Gummies | creatine in a confectionery matrix | whether the gummy contains what its label says — the format's documented problem | creatine gummies |
| Liquid / ready-to-drink | creatine dissolved in water | stability: in solution creatine slowly converts to creatinine, faster when acidic and warm | does creatine expire |
The last row is the one format where the form really does change what is in the product: creatine in water degrades, and the rate depends on acidity and temperature, as the stability data on does creatine expire set out. Powder does not have that problem.
Salts and derivatives: the head-to-head trials
Every trial below compared the newer form directly with creatine monohydrate.
| Form | Trial | Who | Result against monohydrate |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ethyl ester | Spillane 2009 | 30 untrained men, 7 weeks of training, randomised, double-blind | Serum creatine lower on ethyl ester; serum creatinine higher, rising at days 6, 27 and 48. Muscle creatine up in both, no difference. Strength, power, body composition: no difference |
| Buffered (Kre-Alkalyn) | Jagim 2012 | 36 resistance-trained adults, 28 days, muscle biopsies, randomised, double-blind | Neither the maker's low dose (1.5 g/day) nor a monohydrate-equivalent dose raised muscle creatine or improved body composition or strength more than monohydrate; against the maker's dose, monohydrate's muscle-creatine rise tended to be larger (p = 0.053) |
| Nitrate | Galvan 2016 | 13 (safety crossover) + 48 (28-day trial) | Muscle creatine rose by day 7 on monohydrate and on the higher nitrate dose, then fell back by day 28 on the nitrate. On bench-press volume only the higher nitrate dose beat placebo; the authors concluded 3 g of nitrate gave "similar performance benefits" to 3 g of monohydrate |
| Hydrochloride | — | — | No published head-to-head trial of muscle creatine was found; see creatine monohydrate vs HCl |
The ethyl-ester result is the instructive one. The form was marketed as better absorbed; what the blood showed was more creatinine — the breakdown product — consistent with the ester breaking down to creatinine before it can deliver creatine to muscle. The buffered-creatine trial is the other worth knowing, because it is the only one that tested the manufacturer's own low recommended amount and still found no advantage. The trial was run with Creapure monohydrate as the comparator, which means both arms of the comparison used a named commercial product.
What the reviews concluded
Overlapping author teams reviewed the whole field twice. In 2011 they found monohydrate "not degraded during normal digestion", with "nearly 99%" either taken up by muscle or excreted in urine, and "little to no evidence that any of the newer forms of creatine are more effective and/or safer" (Jäger 2011, PMID 21424716). The 2022 update opened by saying that "unsupported misrepresentations about the effectiveness and safety of various 'forms' of creatine have continued" (Kreider 2022, PMID 35268011). The International Society of Sports Nutrition's 2017 position stand, which reviews the trials behind the supplement's effects, rests almost entirely on monohydrate data (Kreider 2017, PMID 28615996).
One caution about those three papers: they share authors, so they are one group's reading of the field, not three independent verdicts. The trials in the table above are the check on the reviews' conclusion, and on muscle creatine they agree with it.
Where the other questions live
- Serving amounts and loading, as reported in trials: how much creatine should I take and creatine loading phase.
- Timing: creatine timing.
- Who checked the tub: certification by lot and brand-by-brand label records start with Thorne creatine.
- Creatine's place against the peptide market: creatine vs peptides.
The honest summary
- Formats (micronized, Creapure, capsules, gummies) package the same monohydrate; the one format that changes what is in the product is liquid, because dissolved creatine degrades.
- Salts carry less creatine per gram: monohydrate 87.9%, HCl 78.2%, nitrate 67.5%, ethyl ester HCl 67.0%.
- Every published head-to-head trial found — ethyl ester, buffered, nitrate — found no muscle-creatine advantage over monohydrate; ethyl ester did worse on blood creatine, and nitrate's muscle rise faded by day 28.
- No head-to-head muscle-creatine trial of HCl was found.
Limits of this page
The creatine percentages are computed from ideal molecular formulas; a real product's purity and moisture content differ, and only an assay shows what a batch contains. The trials are small (13 to 48 people) and short (28 days to 7 weeks). Magnesium creatine chelate, creatine citrate and other rarer forms are not tabulated because no head-to-head trial of them was opened for this page.
Sources and dates
- PubChem, read 2026-09-24: creatine CID 586 (131.13); creatine monohydrate CID 80116 (149.15); creatine hydrochloride CID 134732 (167.59); creatine nitrate CID 25231507 (194.15); creatine ethyl ester hydrochloride CID 25114309 (195.65).
- Spillane M, Schoch R, Cooke M, et al. The effects of creatine ethyl ester supplementation combined with heavy resistance training on body composition, muscle performance, and serum and muscle creatine levels. J Int Soc Sports Nutr 2009;6:6 — PMID 19228401
- Jagim AR, Oliver JM, Sanchez A, et al. A buffered form of creatine does not promote greater changes in muscle creatine content, body composition, or training adaptations than creatine monohydrate. J Int Soc Sports Nutr 2012;9:43 — PMID 22971354
- Galvan E, Walker DK, Simbo SY, et al. Acute and chronic safety and efficacy of dose dependent creatine nitrate supplementation and exercise performance. J Int Soc Sports Nutr 2016;13:12 — PMID 27034623
- Jäger R, Purpura M, Shao A, et al. Analysis of the efficacy, safety, and regulatory status of novel forms of creatine. Amino Acids 2011;40:1369–83 — PMID 21424716
- Kreider RB, Jäger R, Purpura M. Bioavailability, efficacy, safety, and regulatory status of creatine and related compounds: a critical review. Nutrients 2022;14:1035 — PMID 35268011
- Kreider RB, Kalman DS, Antonio J, et al. International Society of Sports Nutrition position stand: safety and efficacy of creatine supplementation in exercise, sport, and medicine. J Int Soc Sports Nutr 2017;14:18 — PMID 28615996