# AOD-9604 added under 1 kg of weight loss in a 502-person trial URL: https://sciencebased.news/aod-9604/ Published: 2026-10-08 Updated: 2026-10-30 Claim: AOD-9604 is the fat-burning piece of growth hormone, without growth hormone's side effects. Grade: Debunked What to do: - Not proven: fat loss. In the largest trial, 502 adults lost about the same weight on the AOD-9604 tablet as on a placebo. - What worked in that trial was the eating and exercise plan. The placebo group lost about 6 kg (13 lb) in seven months. A registered dietitian can build you one. - If you want a drug that adds real weight loss, ask your doctor about the approved GLP-1 medicines. They have large placebo trials behind them. - Safety: the injected form sold today has never had a human safety study, and it is not an approved drug. - If you take it anyway, tell your doctor. # AOD-9604 added under 1 kg of weight loss in a 502-person trial *Evidence check, October 8, 2026. Updated October 30, 2026.* > **The claim:** "AOD-9604 is the fat-burning piece of growth hormone, without growth hormone's side effects." > > **Our grade: Debunked.** The side-effect half held up. The fat-loss half did not: in the largest trial, 502 adults lost about the same weight on the tablet as on a placebo, and the injected form has never been tested in people. ![An unimpressed man of about 50 with his arms crossed, next to a small glass vial labeled AOD-9604 standing on a white bathroom scale](https://sciencebased.news/images/aod-9604-hero-3.jpg) Tom is 50 and wants to lose 30 pounds. A wellness clinic near him offers AOD-9604, a shot under the skin. The pitch is that it is the part of growth hormone that burns fat, with the rest left out. If Tom took it for six months, how much more would he lose than by eating better and walking? That exact question has been tested. AOD-9604 is unusual on the peptide shelf: a drug company ran six placebo trials of it in about 900 people. The biggest one lasted six months and weighed everyone along the way. ## Where the claim came from Growth hormone does two things at once. It makes the body grow, and it tells fat cells to release fat. In the 1990s, researchers in Australia copied the tail end of the hormone, 15 of its 191 building blocks plus one extra [3], and found that this short piece still acted on fat in animals [6]. A company, Metabolic Pharmaceuticals, turned it into a drug candidate called AOD-9604. AOD stands for anti-obesity drug. The animal results were strong. Obese rats given it by mouth for 19 days gained less than half as much weight as untreated rats, 15.8 g against 35.6 g [6]. Obese mice treated for 14 days lost weight and body fat, and the effect vanished in mice bred without one receptor on fat cells, which told researchers how it worked [5]. The company never got it approved. Today it is sold by wellness clinics and online sellers. The FDA found clinics marketing it to "boost metabolism" and "support weight loss," and for joints, skin and anti-aging [3]. Dr. Craig Koniver, a peptide doctor who has been a guest on Andrew Huberman's podcast, uses it with two other peptides and says his patients report less belly fat. His clinic's page is careful to call that "clinical observation, not a trial result" [1]. So what did the trials find? ## The first trial looked like a win In 2004 the company tested a daily tablet in 300 adults with obesity for 12 weeks, at five doses from 1 mg to 30 mg, against a placebo (a dummy tablet). The trial was randomized and double-blind, so neither the volunteers nor the staff knew who got what. The lowest dose did best. People on 1 mg lost 0.22 kg a week, against 0.07 kg a week on placebo [3]. Over 12 weeks that is about 2.6 kg against 0.8 kg. There were two warning signs. The higher doses did worse than the lowest one, which is not how a working drug usually behaves. And the result was never published in a journal. The FDA went looking in 2024 and wrote, "We did not locate a publication of the study methods and results" [3]. The company itself later said the 1 mg result "fell short of significance" on its main analysis [2]. It was enough to justify a bigger, longer trial. ## The six-month trial, week by week The second trial, called OPTIONS, ran at 16 sites in Australia. It put 502 adults with obesity, aged 18 to 65 and averaging 106 kg (234 lb), on a daily tablet of 0.25 mg, 0.5 mg or 1 mg of AOD-9604, or a placebo, for 24 weeks. It was randomized and double-blind. Everyone got the same diet and exercise plan from a dietitian, starting four weeks before the first tablet [2]. The chart shows what happened. ![Line chart of average weight change over 24 weeks in 502 adults with obesity taking a daily AOD-9604 tablet or a placebo. All four lines fall together. At week 24: placebo down 3.5 kg, AOD-9604 1 mg down 3.5 kg, 0.25 mg down 4.0 kg, 0.5 mg down 4.2 kg. The biggest gap from placebo is 0.7 kg.](https://sciencebased.news/images/aod-9604-chart-2.png) *Redrawn from the weight chart on page 5 of the company's OPTIONS results announcement [2]. Values read from the figure.* The four lines fall together. After 24 weeks the placebo group was down about 3.5 kg. The three AOD-9604 groups were down about 3.5, 4.0 and 4.2 kg. We read those values off the chart in the company's announcement, so treat them as close, not exact. The company's own summary was that weight loss beyond diet and exercise "was less than 1 kg in all dose groups" [2]. The trial was built to detect a gap of 1.8 kg. It did not find one. Waist size, body fat on a scan, blood sugar and cholesterol showed "no relevant findings" either. The announcement ends the story in one line: "Development of the drug for this condition is terminated" [2]. So back to Tom. Six months of AOD-9604 would be expected to add somewhere between nothing and 0.7 kg (1.5 lb) to what he loses anyway. Now look at the placebo line again. Going by the same chart, those people lost about 2.3 kg in the four weeks before the tablets started and 3.5 kg after. That is close to 6 kg (13 lb) in seven months from a dietitian's plan and a dummy tablet. The trial's real finding is that the plan worked. ## The shot was never tested Both big trials used a tablet. Clinics sell an injection. The FDA reviewed every human study it could find in 2024. It found none of AOD-9604 injected under the skin, and none of the cream [3]. The closest was a small study in which 23 adults got it into a vein once a week for four weeks. They lost 0.58 kg over three weeks, no different from placebo [3]. An injection could work better than a tablet, since more of the drug may reach the blood. It could also work no better. Nobody has measured it. ## Our grade | Claim | Evidence | Grade | |---|---|---| | Burns fat in obese mice and rats | Several animal studies | Solid (in animals) | | No rise in IGF-1 or blood sugar, unlike growth hormone | Six placebo trials, about 900 people, run by the company | Promising | | The tablet adds weight loss to diet and exercise | Placebo trial of 502, 24 weeks: under 1 kg | Debunked | | The injection burns fat | No human study | Unproven | | Repairs joint cartilage | One study in 32 rabbits | Unproven | | Overall: a fat-burning piece of growth hormone | The largest human trial found no real difference | Debunked | The case for the other side: the safety half of the claim is true as far as it was tested. Across the six trials, AOD-9604 did not raise IGF-1 (the blood marker that follows growth hormone), did not worsen blood sugar, and side effects matched placebo [4]. That paper was written by people tied to the company, which also paid for the trials. There is also a hint in one group. Among 149 women who had lost under 2 kg before the tablets started, those on 0.5 mg lost about 3.1 kg against 0.8 kg on placebo. The company planned that comparison in advance. But the 1 mg group in the same set lost only about 1.2 kg, and each group averaged about 37 people [2]. It is a reason to run another trial, not a result. The joint claim rests on one study in 32 rabbits, with injections straight into the knee [7]. No one has tried it in human joints. A placebo trial of the injection, with body fat measured on a scan, would change this grade either way. In 2024 the FDA found none registered [3]. ## What this means for you - Start with what worked in this trial. The placebo group lost about 6 kg (13 lb) in seven months on a dietitian's eating and exercise plan. A registered dietitian can build you one. - If you want a drug that adds real weight loss, the approved GLP-1 medicines have large placebo trials behind them. See [the GLP-1 pill](/glp1-pill/) and [how to keep your muscle on them](/glp1-muscle-loss/). - If belly fat is the target, [tesamorelin](/tesamorelin/) cut deep belly fat about 15% in trials of 806 people with HIV. It is the peptide in this family with that kind of proof. - If you take AOD-9604 anyway, know that the injected form has no human safety study. The FDA's concern is that injected peptides made outside drug-factory standards can carry impurities that set off an immune reaction. It also has reports of serious side effects that may be linked to AOD-9604, with the cause not clear [9]. Tell your doctor you are on it. - Measure it. Weigh yourself and your waist weekly for 12 weeks. If the trend is no better than before you started, you have your answer. - If you compete in a tested sport, it is banned [10]. ## What's next No new human trial of AOD-9604 for fat loss was registered when the FDA looked in 2024 [3]. That December, an FDA advisory committee voted 12 to 0 against adding it to the list of ingredients that compounding pharmacies may use [8]. For now the 2007 trial is the best evidence there is. This is the sixth of our one-by-one checks on the peptides in [our guide to the best peptides](/peptide-guide/), after [tesamorelin](/tesamorelin/), [CJC-1295](/cjc-1295/), [ipamorelin](/ipamorelin/), [sermorelin](/sermorelin/) and [MK-677](/mk-677/). Next is [TB-500](/tb-500/), sold for healing injuries. ## Sources 1. Koniver Wellness. AOD-9604: What We've Seen in Practice, and What the Research Says. Clinic page; patient reports, not a study. https://www.koniverwellness.com/peptides/aod-9604 2. Metabolic Pharmaceuticals Ltd. Phase 2B trial results for obesity drug AOD9604 (OPTIONS Study). Announcement to the Australian Securities Exchange, February 21, 2007. 502 adults with obesity randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled, daily tablet, 24 weeks, 16 sites; company-run, not published in a journal. https://www.asx.com.au/asxpdf/20070221/pdf/3111t0ww55jr72.pdf 3. US Food and Drug Administration. Briefing document: AOD-9604-related bulk drug substances, Pharmacy Compounding Advisory Committee, December 4, 2024. Reviews all human studies found, including the 300-person, 12-week trial (conference abstract only) and the 23-person intravenous study. https://www.fda.gov/media/183584/download 4. Stier H, Vos E, Kenley D. Safety and tolerability of the hexadecapeptide AOD9604 in humans. *Journal of Endocrinology and Metabolism*, 2013. Six randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trials, about 900 adults, tablets and intravenous doses; funded by Metabolic Pharmaceuticals. [doi:10.4021/jem157w](https://doi.org/10.4021/jem157w) 5. Heffernan M, Summers RJ, Thorburn A, et al. The effects of human GH and its lipolytic fragment (AOD9604) on lipid metabolism following chronic treatment in obese mice and beta(3)-AR knock-out mice. *Endocrinology*, 2001. Obese mice, 14 days. [doi:10.1210/endo.142.12.8522](https://doi.org/10.1210/endo.142.12.8522) 6. Ng FM, Sun J, Sharma L, et al. Metabolic studies of a synthetic lipolytic domain (AOD9604) of human growth hormone. *Hormone Research*, 2000. Obese Zucker rats, oral dose for 19 days. [doi:10.1159/000053183](https://doi.org/10.1159/000053183) 7. Kwon DR, Park GY. Effect of intra-articular injection of AOD9604 with or without hyaluronic acid in rabbit osteoarthritis model. *Annals of Clinical and Laboratory Science*, 2015. 32 rabbits, knee injections. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26275694/ 8. US Food and Drug Administration. Summary minutes, Pharmacy Compounding Advisory Committee meeting, December 4, 2024. Vote on AOD-9604: 0 yes, 12 no. https://www.fda.gov/media/185642/download 9. US Food and Drug Administration. Certain Bulk Drug Substances for Use in Compounding that May Present Significant Safety Risks (AOD-9604, nominated but withdrawn). https://www.fda.gov/drugs/human-drug-compounding/certain-bulk-drug-substances-use-compounding-may-present-significant-safety-risks 10. World Anti-Doping Agency. WADA statement on substance AOD-9604, April 22, 2013. https://www.wada-ama.org/en/news/wada-statement-substance-aod-9604