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Chondroitin sulfate
A glycosaminoglycan, a long sugar chain that is one of the building blocks of the cartilage in your joints, taken from animal cartilage. EFSA assessed a joint claim for it and rejected it, and it sits in one formula, at 800 mg, on a knee trial rather than on a claim.
WHAT WE ARE ALLOWED TO SAY
No authorised claim. EFSA turned down the joint claim.
There is no health claim for chondroitin on the EU register, so there is no wording for us to quote. EFSA assessed the claim put forward for it on the maintenance of joints (claim IDs 1504 and 1505) and rejected it: the animal and laboratory evidence did not predict an effect on normal human joints (EFSA Journal 2009;7(9):1262). Nothing for it made it into Regulation 432/2012.There is no health claim for chondroitin on the EU register. EFSA assessed a joint claim for it and rejected it, so there is nothing for us to quote.
You will read that chondroitin rebuilds cartilage or keeps your joints moving. That is exactly the area where EFSA said no. In Bones & joints, the authorised claims are for bones, and they come from the calcium, vitamin D3, vitamin K2 and magnesium next to it, not from the chondroitin.
WHY STANDARDISED
No claim to protect. Where it comes from is what you need to know.
No form of chondroitin carries an authorised claim, so the form is not a claim argument and we do not use it as one. Our regulatory file ties this ingredient to one form, a standardised chondroitin sulfate that it describes as bovine and marine, and our form file marks it as the preferred one: it dissolves in water and tastes neutral. The same file marks it as not stable in liquid, which matters in a liquid system, and we say so below.
Our files record cartilage from cattle or shark as its origin, and the label warning covers bovine, porcine and marine material. That makes it an animal ingredient: not vegan, not vegetarian, and our allergen file flags it for shellfish and crustacean allergy.
The sulfate form of chondroitin, standardised: the one form our files record for it, and the one they mark as preferred. It goes into Bones & joints as a food supplement ingredient, with no authorised claim behind it.
Our form file marks this form as not stable in liquid, and Bones & joints is a liquid formula. How it holds up in the cartridge is not documented yet, and neither is which animal the supply comes from. We would rather write that down than leave it out.
Our notes describe how it is thought to work. It gives the cells of your cartilage raw material to build their own structural molecules, it slows some of the enzymes that break cartilage down, such as elastase, hyaluronidase and the aggrecanases, and it may have a mild anti-inflammatory effect. Only a small part is absorbed: our file puts it at 10–20%, and records that it leaves through your kidneys. Its half-life is not documented yet. Our notes put any change 8 to 12 weeks away, and our own confidence in the ingredient is graded B. It is a proposed mechanism, not an authorised claim.Our notes say it is thought to feed the cells of your cartilage and slow the enzymes that break it down. Only 10–20% is absorbed, and any change is put 8 to 12 weeks away.
WHERE IT APPEARS
One of the twenty-nine carries chondroitin.
It appears only in Bones & joints, the CORE formula taken each night with dinner, next to calcium, vitamin D3, vitamin K2, magnesium and undenatured type II collagen. The window is the formula's, set around the calcium, not its own. The knee trial on file, GAIT, tested chondroitin alone, glucosamine alone and the two together. The result our file records is for the two together, in a subgroup of that trial, and this formula does not carry glucosamine, which is not in our library. So it does not describe this formula. Our formula file also cites a 2016 trial by Hochberg on chondroitin with glucosamine, with no full reference on file. The formula is pending clinical validation and has its own exclusions, listed on its page.
THE CEILING
No upper limit set. We serve 800 mg.
EFSA has not established an upper intake level for chondroitin, and no NRV is set either. Our dose file records that in some EU countries, France and Italy among them, bovine or porcine chondroitin sulfate is also authorised as a prescription medicine, and notes a 2017 EMA assessment that confirmed its safety profile as a medicine of established use there. That status does not apply to a food supplement and gives us no claim. The engine has no rule written for chondroitin yet: today, what keeps your total at 800 mg is that only one formula carries it.EFSA has not established an upper intake level for chondroitin, and the engine has no rule for it yet. Today only one formula carries it, so your total stays at 800 mg.
Only Bones & joints carries it, at 800 mg each night. That is the amount our formula file sets. No NRV, upper limit or authorised claim stands behind it, so it is not a promise of anything.
Our dose file holds no ceiling for it and no reference amount as a food supplement, so there is nothing to scale it against. The 800 mg is the formula's amount, and no second formula adds to it.
It contains material of bovine, porcine or marine origin: if you have allergies, check that you tolerate it. Our allergen file flags it for shellfish and crustacean allergy. It is not vegan or vegetarian. If you take an anticoagulant such as warfarin, ask a healthcare professional before you start. Stop it two weeks before planned surgery. Do not exceed the daily dose, keep it out of reach of young children, and do not use it in place of a varied, balanced diet. Bones & joints is also ruled out if you have high blood calcium or sarcoidosis, or take a vitamin K antagonist such as warfarin.
WHAT IT REACTS WITH
Documented pairs, not hunches.
Chondroitin sulfate is one of the 140 ingredients in our library, so it has 139 possible partners. We have not documented any of them yet, out of the 443 pairs on file.
Our pair table has no row for it. In Bones & joints it shares a pour with calcium, vitamin D3, vitamin K2, magnesium and undenatured type II collagen, and none of those five pairings is documented. Unchecked, not cleared.
Our notes record that it leaves through your kidneys, but hold no data yet on the CYP450 liver pathways that medicines go through, or on its half-life. That is a gap, not a clean result.
Our label warnings ask you to check with a healthcare professional before starting it if you take an anticoagulant such as warfarin, but our drug table has no row for chondroitin and the engine has no rule written for it. Nothing documented is not the same as proven safe, so if you take regular medication, ask first.
443 of the 9,730 possible pairs in our library are documented, which is 4.55%. The rest are not "safe", they are simply unchecked, and we would rather write that down than let the number look like a badge.443 of the 9,730 possible pairs in our library are documented, which is 4.55%. The rest are not safe, they are simply unchecked, and we would rather write that down than let the number look like a badge.
SOURCES
Everything on this page, with its reference.
Reviewed by VION nutrition team · last reviewed 16 September 2026
140 INGREDIENTS · 64 IN USE TODAY
Every one of them has a page like this.
What it is, what we are allowed to say about it, which formulas carry it, what it reacts with and where each of those statements comes from. No proprietary blends, no hidden amounts.