2024's Brain & Memory Supplements Buying Guide

How We Found the Best Supplements For Cognitive Enhancement and Energy

Cognitive enhancement is one of the latest trends in the natural supplement world, and desire to boost the function of the brain has spurred the development of all sorts of supplements in recent years. Nowadays there are hundreds of pills, supplements, and drugs of all kinds that promise to promote cognitive function, improve focus, and promote mental energy levels¹.

Improving our mental faculties can have a major impact on our jobs, our school work, and our personal lives, which is why there’s been such interest in coming up with a product that can boost our brainpower. While these “nootropic supplements” can’t make you as smart as a Nobel Prize winner, there is some evidence that they can either improve focus and mental clarity or help people maintain better problem-solving skills.

The issue when it comes to cognitive enhancement is that it’s so popular that it’s spurred the growth of a massive nootropic industry, and now the market is flooded with hundreds of pills that promise to make you smarter, more focused, and happier. Unfortunately, many of these products are low in quality, and some others contain ingredients that aren’t proven to do a thing.

Frankly, there are too many options, and so lots of customers don’t even know where to begin. That’s why we wrote this handy guide: to help customers out there, young and old, to learn the real truth. We’ve compiled all the latest and greatest information from across the internet in an effort to inform people about what they should expect when they’re pursuing for nootropic supplements.

What follows is a guide to help users understand the basics of cognitive enhancement, as well as info about how to make the right decisions when it comes to buying. We’ve topped it off with our Top 5 Favorite Nootropic Supplements at the very end of it.

To start, let’s look at exactly what nootropic supplements are, and how they can help your life.

Nootropics: What’s the Deal?

Nootropic supplements are generally plant or gelatin-based pills filled with plant and animal extracts intended to promote mental clarity, focus, and mood stability.

Understanding The Brain

The brain is the most important organ in the body, and while it’s extremely powerful, its function can start to weaken just like any other organ. According to the CDC, 1 in 9 American adults had some form of subjective cognitive decline². When you get to age 70 or older, that can increase to 2 in 3³. The symptoms of cognitive problems include slower mental processing, slower performance, and becoming easily distracted⁴. While cognitive impairment can be caused by injuries to the brain or by aging, many people experience forms of it due to inadequate production of neurotransmitters. Read more >>

Top 3 Criteria For The Right Nootropic Supplement

We’ve spent lots of time researching all the latest ingredients in the world of natural health, and particularly looked at the ingredients users have said were the biggest help. After all our research we managed come up with a list of the top 3 ingredients you MUST have in a good nootropic product. While a pill can also contain other ingredients, it must contain the following three at a MINIMUM:

• Phosphatidylserine
  Derived from cabbage or soy bean, this natural chemical is an integral part of cellular functions throughout the body. More especially, it’s been found to correlate with better memory in people with age-related mental decline, and is supposed to reduce some effects of Alzheimer disease¹⁴.
• Huperzia Serrata
  This is a plant, long-used in Chinese folk medicine for thousands of years for various functions. In the field of modern natural health, it’s been used in promoting cognitive enhancement. It contains a chemical called Huperzine A, which inhibits acetylcholinesterase – a chemical that prevents the important memory and thought chemical acetylcholine from breaking down¹⁶.
  
• Alpha GPC
  A popular chemical in the nootropic world, and one that’s also found naturally in the body. It’s used for improving thinking skills and memory, and has been tested on people with Alzheimer disease and dementia. It’s supposed to increase the brain’s production of acetylcholine, which is an important part of memory and learning processes15.

4 Things To AVOID
When Buying A Nootropic Supplement

1. Too Few Ingredients

Lots of supplements meant to help with cognitive issues will select one well-known ingredient and make it the sole active ingredient in a product. While the ingredient might be decent enough, you won’t be getting your money’s worth. Choose supplements that come with a variety of respected ingredients that promote cognitive enhancement from multiple angles to make sure you get the most out of your purchase.

2. Not Backed Up By Research

A supplement is only as good as its ingredients, so if an ingredient is suspect, why would the supplement be any good? Only choose supplements containing ingredients backed up by clinical research, otherwise you could end up getting something that doesn’t work.

3. Bad Return Policy

If a product doesn’t work, why should you pay for it? You need to make sure the company you buy from has a robust and permissive return policy, otherwise you could end up losing money. If a product isn’t returnable within a minimum 30-day window, it shows the company doesn’t have confidence in their product. Avoid them.

4. Blindly trusting Amazon Reviews

According to a study, there were as many as 1.8 million unverified Amazon reviews in March 2019, and almost 100% were 5-star reviews¹⁷. That’s a huge problem. With e-commerce relying on positive customer reviews, many companies have resorted to paying people to write 5-star reviews of their products without even trying them, all in an effort to boost their ratings and getting better visibility. Just because a product seems popular doesn’t mean it is.

2024’s Top Five Nootropic Supplements

Our review involved over a HUNDRED different nootropic supplements, and we evaluated each one according to a thorough review process. To select the Top 5 Nootropic Supplements of 2021, we looked for the right balance of effectiveness, scientific research, product safety, value, customer service, and customer reviews.