Inside the Formula | The Most Important Thing in Your NAD+ Supplement Isn't on the Label

With TRU Niagen & TESTED by SuppCo: Inside the Formula is a new sponsored series featuring brands in the TESTED by SuppCo certification program, where we spotlight the fascinating research behind products that have received the certification. Learn more about TESTED by SuppCo.

Here is a number that should make you put down whatever NAD+ supplement you're currently holding: roughly 65% of NAD precursor products on the market deliver less than 90% of what the label promises, and some deliver close to nothing at all.

That figure doesn't come from an advocacy group or a competitor running a hit piece.

It comes from TRU Niagen's own internal testing program, where the company systematically purchases and analyzes rival products in the NR, NMN, and NAD categories. And the person who told me this wasn't doing it to score points. He was making a case that the entire space needs a higher bar, and that his company has spent over a decade trying to set one.

Aron Erickson, VP of Research and Development at TRU Niagen, has been at the company for 12 years, which in the supplement industry is something close to a geological epoch. He joined when the company was still called ChromaDex, a name that meant something specific in scientific circles. ChromaDex wasn't a wellness brand. It was a reference standards company, one of the businesses scientists and regulators actually trust to define how products should be tested. It built its reputation on analytical rigor before it ever launched a consumer product. That origin shapes everything about how Erickson thinks about quality today.

The ingredient at the center of TRU Niagen's entire operation is nicotinamide riboside (NR), a precursor to NAD+, the molecule your cells use to run hundreds of metabolic reactions. NAD+ levels decline with age, and that decline is increasingly associated with the fatigue, cognitive fog, and reduced cellular function that people tend to attribute to "just getting older." The appeal of NR is that it can offer a way to replenish those levels. But not all precursors are equal, and this is where TRU Niagen parts ways with most of the category. NR can be taken up directly into the cell to produce NAD+. Its lesser-known competitor, NMN, often has to be broken down first before that conversion can happen.

The research foundation here is not thin. TRU Niagen supplies its ingredient to over 300 independent research institutions, providing material at no charge to university and institutional scientists who design their own studies without company involvement. That independence matters enormously, and it is a model most supplement companies do not follow. Beyond external research, the company holds over 60 patents on NR, covering everything from synthesis to crystal morphology, and has spent five to six years co-developing a USP monograph for nicotinamide riboside, a standardized testing protocol validated across three independent labs that is set to become official later this year. This is infrastructure building, not marketing.

TRU Niagen's participation in the TESTED by SuppCo certification adds an important layer to all of this. SuppCo anonymously purchased TRU Niagen the same way any consumer would, through normal retail channels, with no advance notice to the brand. An independent laboratory then tested the product for label accuracy and identity, confirming that what is on the bottle is what is in the bottle. For a product whose entire value proposition rests on delivering a precise amount of a specific molecule, that confirmation is not a formality. It is the whole point.

I sat down with Aron Erickson, VP of Research and Development at TRU Niagen, to dive deeper into the science.

JG: "You test competitor products in the NAD category. What are you actually finding?"

AE: "We've tested a variety of NR products, NMN products, and even NAD products. What we see is that over 65% of products across all categories have less than 90%, and some close to 0%, of their label claim. Meaning the consumer is not getting what the bottle says they should be getting. That's an issue."

JG: "There's a lot of confusion in this space about NR versus NMN versus just taking NAD directly. Help us understand why those distinctions actually matter biochemically."

AE: "NAD by itself really breaks down into multiple different components and doesn't seem to have that big of an impact on your NAD levels. Research suggests NMN most often has to be dephosphorylated, broken down, before it's absorbed into the cell. Nicotinamide riboside can be directly taken up into the cell and produce NAD."

JG: "You supply your ingredient for free to independent researchers. What compels you to do that?"

AE: "In a large majority of cases, we provide the material just to advance the science. The researchers have the idea. They have the study design. They just need the material. We really think having this program is an incredible benefit, not just to us, but to the consumer, because it drives the science and brings light to what benefits could NR, and even NAD created from NR, actually produce."

JG: "Why did you decide to go through TESTED by SuppCo certification?"

AE: "It means that we have such confidence in what we've developed that we know a third party would be able to test at the same level of scrutiny and integrity that we would do on our side. It also gives the consumer another point of trust with the company and the product itself. So the consumer can say: you're not just telling us it's what it is. You actually have a third party confirm that it's a high-quality product."

JG: "How do you draw the line on claims in a longevity space that's full of overreach?"

AE: "We let the science push the products. We don't like to suggest or exploit benefits based on maybe an incomplete study or one that wasn't peer-reviewed. When we do make a claim, we have a pretty rigorous justification pulled together from multiple studies and background research to ensure we can actually support it in the market."

What the Research Pipeline Tells You That the Label Cannot

I came into this conversation with the standard skepticism I carry into most supplement interviews, which is considerable. My background is in nutritional biochemistry, and the NAD space specifically has developed a reputation for enthusiasm that outpaces evidence. Founders in this category tend to lead with enthusiasm and follow with selective citations. So I was paying attention to where TRU Niagen's claims came from, and whether they held up when I pushed.

What I did not expect was the external research program. 

Most companies fund their own trials, keep tight control over study design, and publish selectively. Handing your ingredient to independent researchers with no strings attached, including the understanding that results may not favor you, is a different posture entirely. The fact that TRU Niagen has done this at scale with over 300 institutions is the single most credibility-building thing they have going for them that doesn't make it onto a product page.

That said, the translation from preclinical research to human outcomes is always where I slow down. The early body of work in this space leaned heavily on animal models, and Erickson was candid that the exciting shift happening right now is the conversion toward human clinical trials. That's honest, and it reflects where the science actually is. The NAD decline story is well-established. The clinical outcomes story is still being written. The data on NAD+ repletion via NR in humans is promising, and the comparisons to NMN are compelling, but this is an evolving picture rather than a closed case.

What I came away with is that TRU Niagen is operating more like a science-driven company than a supplement brand. The USP monograph work, the reference standards heritage, the competitor testing program, the independent research partnerships. These are not things you do to look credible. They are things you do when you are staking your company's identity on being credible. That is a meaningful distinction in this category, and one that earned my attention more than anything else I heard in this interview.