Best CoQ10 Supplement

Coenzyme Q10, or CoQ10, is one of the most popular supplements for heart health and general wellness.1 In addition to cardiovascular support, studies link it to blood sugar regulation, cancer prevention, skin rejuvenation, and even migraine control.

Some of these claims are more overblown than others, but there appears to be an undeniable benefit to supplementing with CoQ10. And there are plenty of options for your CoQ10 intake — so many that figuring out which ones are safest and most effective can be a chore.

This guide will break down what CoQ10 is, how it can help you, and which companies make the best supplements.

If you’re pressed for time, take a quick look at our summary of recommendations:

Over the past two decades, Innerbody Research has helped tens of millions of readers make more informed decisions about staying healthy and living healthier lifestyles.

At Innerbody Research, we extensively test each health service or product we review, including CoQ10 supplements. We’ve ordered and tried these products for ourselves, so we can speak to things like taste, pill size, shipping times, and customer service. Our team also spent more than 300 hours studying clinical research into how CoQ10 can affect various bodily systems, including heart health, cognition, and fertility.

Additionally, like all health-related content on this website, this review was thoroughly vetted by one or more members of our Medical Review Board for accuracy. We’ll continue monitoring the CoQ10 landscape for developments to keep this content current.

When we set out to evaluate CoQ10 supplements, we found a few set criteria to be the most useful in comparing one to another. We focus most of our attention on efficacy, looking at doses and ingredients to see which CoQ10 supplement might have the best chance of working for you. Cost was a close second, as the prices of these supplements can range dramatically. That was followed by safety, an important consideration in general but not one that’s terribly different among CoQ10s. Our last consideration was customer service and convenience, much of which we gathered from our experience ordering and trying these products.

Effectiveness

Winner: Garden of Life Raw CoQ10

What makes one CoQ10 supplement more effective than another? The dose is important, to be sure. But CoQ10 is lipophilic, which means it loves fat.2 The coenzyme absorbs much more efficiently in the presence of fats, so most companies include some form of fat inside their softgels. Garden of Life uses the highest quality fats of any other company in our ranking. And its utilization of complex food sources and probiotics to create an experience closer to absorbing CoQ10 from dietary sources provides you with more nutrients than the typical supplement.

Another key difference among CoQ10 supplements is the use of ubiquinol or ubiquinone. We’ll get deeper into the technical specifics below, but suffice it to say ubiquinol has studies backing it that show superior absorption to ubiquinone. But ubiquinone boasts a greater number of studies and manufacturing practices that keep its costs low.

Garden of Life uses ubiquinone because it’s derived from a bacterial cycle involving various live ingredients. The result is a CoQ10 closer to what you’d find in a natural diet. The fact that the supplement contains raw cold-pressed chia seed oil, a fruit and vegetable complex, and a probiotic mixture only adds to the quality. Bluebonnet Nutrition’s Ubiquinol is a close second in our minds as the only vegetarian formula to utilize ubiquinol from Japanese manufacturer Kaneka. The big downside to Bluebonnet, however, is the cost.

Specific studies looking into Garden of Life’s CoQ10 formulation aren’t available, but it should absorb better than other ubiquinone-based CoQ10 supplements thanks to those superior fats and ingredients that can foster better gut performance.

Cost

Winner: Kirkland Maximum Potency

When we consider the cost of a CoQ10 supplement, we look at more than just sticker price or cost per dose. That’s because different companies offer different doses. To make sense of the field, we prefer to calculate the cost per gram of CoQ10 (cost per milligram renders prices too low to compare them reasonably). We also take into consideration the initial cost of trying the product.

Kirkland takes top prize in this category because it has the lowest overall cost per bottle and is tied for lowest cost per gram of CoQ10 (one of only two recommendations to have a cost per gram below $1).

Here’s a look at how each company on our list breaks down their pricing by dose and by gram of CoQ10:

The prices here reflect the Bluebonnet deal available through the auto-ship & save program at iHerb. We also used iHerb to get the best price on Garden of Life’s CoQ10, and we used Amazon for Kirkland’s CoQ10, not because the price is better (it’s the same) but because you can get it there even if you aren’t a Costco member. The low price of Puritan's Pride CoQ10 in this chart requires purchasing through Amazon.

Safety

Winners: Bluebonnet Nutrition and Sports Research

CoQ10 is mostly safe for healthy individuals, with mild side effects occasionally reported that include digestive issues or insomnia, even at doses as high as 720 mg/day.3 There is a danger to those on blood thinners, however, as CoQ10 can reduce their efficacy. It may also interact poorly with insulin and certain cancer drugs.

But there’s CoQ10 in all of these CoQ10 products, so how do we pick a winner for safety? To do that, we looked beyond the CoQ10 itself to compare manufacturing methods, testing procedures, and other ingredients. Bluebonnet squeaked ahead of most of the competition for a few reasons. For starters, its ubiquinol is vegetarian, non-GMO, and soy- and gluten-free. It doesn’t undergo third-party testing, but it performs internal testing in a lab that’s accredited by the ANSI National Accreditation Board (ANAB) and ISO 17025, which lends credence to its testing claims.

Sports Research does subject its CoQ10 to third-party testing, which is surprisingly unusual in this particular supplement space. It also specifies the source of its medium-chain triglycerides (coconut oil), which few other brands do.

Nootropics Depot was the next closest competitor in the safety space thanks to a similar quality of internal testing that Bluebonnet uses and the fact that its CoQ10 contains no other ingredients. But as a powder, there is a greater risk of over- or under-supplementing, and its CoQ10 might degrade in an acidic stomach environment before reaching the small intestine.

Convenience and customer service

Winners: Qunol Liquid CoQ10 and Garden of Life

Most CoQ10 supplements boast the same relative degree of convenience. They almost all require you to take a single pill once per day. But some of these pills are rather large, making them inconvenient for anyone who has a tough time swallowing medicine. And because the softgels are necessary to prevent the medicine from degrading in oxygen, you can’t snap them in half or break them down to make them easier to take.

Qunol’s Liquid CoQ10 solves this problem by delivering doses in liquid form. That makes it easy for anybody to take. If there’s one inconvenience in the liquid form, it’s that liquids don’t travel as well as softgels do. Still, this inconvenience is far rarer than the common trouble with big pills.

Most CoQ10 supplements work best when you take them with food. Not only will extra fats in your meal increase absorption efficiency, but the presence of food will help guard against digestive upset. Garden of Life is our runner-up for convenience because its ancillary ingredients — a fruit and vegetable complex and a probiotic complex — work great for absorption and decrease the odds of an upset stomach if you have to take your pill without food.

Garden of Life also has the best customer service infrastructure we’ve encountered, especially its phone support. The science team is in regular contact with product support, and representatives have a wealth of knowledge at their fingertips. In all of our interactions, they were friendly and knowledgeable, and we never waited on hold for more than 30 seconds or so.

Coenzyme Q10 is an antioxidant naturally produced inside your body. It’s a key component of the electron transport chain, which is essential to creating adenosine triphosphate (ATP) — fuel for your cells. CoQ10 is incredibly abundant in the body and can be found in about 95% of our cells.

Large amounts of CoQ10 in the form of ubiquinol reside in the brain, liver, heart, and kidneys. But your body doesn’t produce as much CoQ10 as you age,4 which is why supplementation can be important whether or not you suffer from a clinical deficiency.5

CoQ10 and statins

CoQ10 is popular for the sheer variety of its applications. But one application tends to draw a lot of attention among people taking statins. Statins are medications that target cholesterol and triglycerides to prevent heart disease. One common side effect of statins is muscle pain, and some research correlates statin use and a deficiency in CoQ10.6

Additional research showed 100mg of CoQ10 supplementation could reduce symptoms of mitochondrial dysfunction brought on by statin use.7

Ubiquinol vs. ubiquinone

CoQ10 has two forms available for supplementation, and knowing the difference between the two might help you pick a supplement for your regimen. CoQ10 molecules convert back and forth between these states naturally. Both forms are safe in supplements, but one might have an edge in performance.

There isn’t quite enough research to definitively say that ubiquinol is superior in terms of absorption and efficiency. Still, of the research that does exist, it either indicates an advantage to ubiquinol or no advantage at all between the two.8 Research preferring ubiquinone over ubiquinol is scarce, but ubiquinone is the more thoroughly researched form of CoQ10.

There have been various studies into the potential benefits of CoQ10 supplementation. Among other things, these studies show evidence that CoQ10 supplementation can help with the following:

Because CoQ10 production declines with age, supplementation simply replaces the CoQ10 that would otherwise be there. That allows the cells in just about every organ of the body to perform more efficiently.

CoQ10 offers a wide enough variety of benefits that nearly everyone could find something it could improve in their lives. The question becomes whether the improvements are genuinely needed. People deficient in CoQ10 obviously have the most to gain, but benefits for heart health are among the most common reasons people look to CoQ10.

If you have cardiovascular issues, CoQ10 may be able to help, but its relationship to certain anticoagulant medications and a few other drugs is nuanced enough that you should definitely talk to a doctor first.

People also like to take CoQ10 for its purported effects against aging. While the coenzyme seems to have a positive effect on certain age-related disorders, there is little evidence that it will slow the effects of aging or turn back the clock. You won’t start taking CoQ10 on your 60th birthday and feel 20 just a few weeks later.

Young and otherwise healthy individuals may not find much of a reason to take CoQ10. Given its low side effect risk, though, you might consider adding it to your regimen if you’re aging out of your youth and know of certain predispositions in your family toward things like diabetes, migraine, or heart disease.

Most studies involving CoQ10 report few to no adverse effects in study populations.3 When side effects did occur, they were generally mild and included:

CoQ10 appears to be safe at doses as high as 750mg/day, and the highest dose available among the supplements in this guide is 600mg (Puritan’s Pride). We haven’t seen much evidence that a dose this high is needed in many situations, but it should be safe for most people if you and your doctor decide to utilize it.

No studies have established whether CoQ10 supplements are safe during pregnancy or nursing periods. Those who are pregnant or nursing or who hope to become pregnant should avoid CoQ10 supplements. And, as always, speak to your doctor before introducing any new supplement into your daily regimen.

Best overall, best vegan option, and best gut support

Garden of Life makes a wide variety of supplements and other nutritional products like protein bars and probiotics. Its process is somewhat unconventional. While many supplement companies seek to isolate their primary ingredients from all others, Garden of Life often manufactures its intended ingredients among complex mixtures of fruits, vegetables, bacteria, and more. The idea behind this manufacturing process is that nutrients perform at their best when delivered amidst a complex of other elements — just the way you’d find them in nature.

That’s why its CoQ10 supplement contains a complex of over 20 fruits and vegetables, along with a probiotic blend made up of Lactobacillus plantarum and Lactobacillus bulgaricus. And since CoQ10 is lipophilic, the company includes raw cold-pressed chia seed oil in its capsules to help with absorption. Most other companies use MCTs, soybean, or palm oil. MCTs often come from coconut, which, along with soy, can present an allergen concern, while palm oil cultivation has been devastating to rainforests.

Garden of Life Raw CoQ10 pricing

One bottle of Garden of Life Raw CoQ10 costs $41.99 through iHerb, where you can also subscribe to bring that cost down to $39.89. Either way, you’ll get free shipping since iHerb offers it on orders over $20.

Here’s a quick look at how costs compare between iHerb and Garden of Life’s direct purchasing:

Garden of Life offers a 30-day satisfaction guarantee that reimburses you if you don’t think their products are for you, but you won’t be able to recoup any shipping charges. iHerb offers a similar guarantee, but it lasts for 60 days instead of 30.

Best for ubiquinol

Among the companies that utilize Kaneka’s yeast-based ubiquinol CoQ10, Bluebonnet offers the cleanest overall formula. It advertises its CoQ10 supplement as suitable for vegetarians, but it’s unclear what about the listed ingredients makes it unsuitable for vegans. Its formula is also excellent for anyone who suffers from common allergies, as it's free of:

• Gluten
• Soy
• Milk
• Eggs
• Fish
• Shellfish
• Tree nuts
• Peanuts
• Wheat

One knock against Bluebonnet’s ingredient list may be the inclusion of carrageenan, which is a controversial ingredient in some nutrition circles. Studies looking into its relationship with inflammation are at the heart of the controversy, though it seems many of those use a reduced form of carrageenan that’s toxic compared to the dietary form, and they often inject subjects with the substance rather than feed it to them.

Bluebonnet offers its ubiquinol in 50mg, 100mg, and 200mg doses. We recommend the 200mg dose, as it appears to be perfectly safe, and it should grant you the greatest possible effectiveness. If you’re interested in Bluebonnet, we also recommend iHerb, where you can purchase it as a single bottle or sign up for an auto-ship program, saving you about 25% compared to buying directly from Bluebonnet.

Here’s how the pricing breaks down for Bluebonnet’s Ubiquinol at each dosage for a 60-capsule supply:

The most direct comparison for these prices comes from Qunol, whose ubiquinol products are far less expensive. However, we couldn't find any evidence of product testing from Qunol, and its capsules contain gelatin, making them unsuitable for vegans or vegetarians. These things call Qunol’s ingredient quality into question, at least for its non-CoQ10 components. (Qunol uses Kaneka ubiquinol, a reputable brand.)

As is the case with Garden of Life, the Bluebonnet return policy isn’t as forgiving as iHerb’s, which gives you 60 days to return products, even if they’re opened. Bluebonnet only accepts unopened products for return.

Easiest to take

Qunol is one of the most recognizable brands in the CoQ10 space. Its Liquid CoQ10 is ideal for anyone who wants to avoid the hassle of swallowing pills or the added ingredients that come from softgels. The company also offers CoQ10 gummies. Unfortunately, neither the gummies nor the liquid is available in a 200mg dose — both come in 100mg doses only. You could always double up on the amount yourself, but that would get expensive quickly.

For the most part, Qunol uses Kaneka ubiquinol in its CoQ10 supplements, but some contain ubiquinone. Some of those ubiquinol options come with a 250mg dose of omega-3s, which are an ideal lipid partner for CoQ10. They’ll aid in absorption while also providing their own health benefits, such as guarding against cardiovascular disease.17 Others utilize palm oil, which may not be as bad for cardiovascular health as once thought but does have significant negative effects on the planet and the people who live where it’s cultivated.23

Here’s a look at Qunol’s various CoQ10 products:

This is, by far, the most diverse offering of delivery mechanisms for CoQ10 of the companies on this list. And the prices for ubiquinol-based CoQ10 supplements from Qunol are significantly less than its competitors. A 60-serving bottle of 200mg ubiquinol from Bluebonnet costs nearly three times as much as Qunol charges, and both companies use Kaneka as their source.

Qunol also makes supplements in the following categories:

• Turmeric
• Magnesium
• Sleep
• Immune support
• Omega-3s

Qunol offers free shipping on all orders made within the US, as well as a 30-day money-back guarantee. Both of these approaches are superior to most competitors, who typically have cost thresholds for free shipping and strict return policies.

Best powder form

While the heart is the organ most often associated with CoQ10, the brain stands to enjoy serious benefits from supplementation.18 The most powerful of these is CoQ10’s neuroprotective potential that can help stave off cognitive decline that comes naturally with age and senility disorders like Alzheimer’s. And that’s why you see CoQ10 from a company renowned for its brain-boosting supplements.

Some of the most significant differences among some CoQ10 supplements are the materials used for their softgels and the lipids used to increase absorption. Nootropics Depot doesn’t deal with either, delivering a pure CoQ10 powder. Not only does that let you control what lipids you match with it in your meals or smoothies, but it also gives you complete control over dosing.

The bottle of CoQ10 you get from Nootropics Depot doesn’t come with a scoop of any kind, so we recommend using a small kitchen scale or even a jeweler’s scale to weigh out your doses. You can use the recommended dose of 200mg — one of the most common CoQ10 doses out there — or use less until you’re comfortable with its effects. Double-check with your doctor before going any higher than 200mg.

Pricing

Here’s the pricing for Nootropics Depot CoQ10:

• 15 grams: $29.99
• 30 grams: $49.99

Nootropics Depot says it offers free shipping on orders over $50, but our testers received free shipping on single orders of the 30-gram bottle at $49.99. And since the shipping charge on the 15-gram bottle is at least $10, we think the 30-gram bottle holds the best value.

If you opt for the 15-gram bottle, your shipping options are calculated by location. Here’s an example of shipping costs to the New York metro area:

• FedEx 2-3-day: $10.20
• USPS Priority: $10.25
• FedEx Home Delivery 3-7 days: $17.77
• USPS Express 1-2 days: $48.20

How 2-3-day FedEx shipping costs less than 3-7-day shipping is a mystery to us. Whatever the cause, we still recommend opting for the bottle size that comes with free shipping. If you’re not satisfied with Nootropics Depot products, you can return them for up to 30 days. This is definitely superior to the return policy from Bluebonnet, but it’s pretty typical of CoQ10 supplements bought directly from manufacturers, with Life Extension’s one-year policy a noteworthy exception.

The two most common variables in the debate over CoQ10’s absorption are its accompanying fat and its oxidized state (ubiquinol vs. ubiquinone). Sports Research uses ubiquinone with coconut oil, the medium-chain triglycerides that absorb more efficiently than some other fats. It also employs Bioperine, a black pepper extract that often ends up in supplements to improve general bioavailability.19 This makes for one of the more readily bioavailable CoQ10 supplements made with ubiquinone. If it came in a 200mg dose — closer to the likes of Garden of Life, Bluebonnet, and Qunol — we’d have put it much higher on our list.

A single bottle of Sports Research CoQ10 contains 120 softgels (100mg) and costs $27.95, but you can save 15% by subscribing. That brings your cost down to $23.76/bottle with flexible shipping options every two, four, or six months.

Sports Research also has one of the best money-back guarantees in its class at 45 days. You’ll still be on the hook for any shipping charges incurred in either direction, but you can try the product for up to a month and a half and get a nearly total refund if it doesn’t work for you. That’s 15 days more than you get from any other company on our list, though products bought through iHerb have a 60-day guarantee. And 45 days is a lot shorter than Life Extension’s 365-day guarantee.

Longest money-back guarantee

Life Extension offers a wide array of products, from supplements and foods to skincare serums and lab testing. Most of its product line is geared toward extending life and quality of life and achieving a healthier, more youthful appearance.

Life Extension makes the only CoQ10 in our guide to include shilajit and PQQ. Let’s break each of those down so you can understand what makes them beneficial.

Pricing

One bottle of Life Extension Super Ubiquinol costs $38.25. Subscribers save 28% and only pay $27 per bottle. Subscriptions also unlock free shipping. If you choose not to subscribe, here are the shipping rates you’ll encounter in the US:

• Basic: $5.50
• UPS 2nd Day Air: $12.50
• UPS Overnight: $21.50

Life Extension claims to have a generous one-year return policy, though the particulars of this policy are nowhere on the company's website. You could subscribe to its CoQ10 for a year and then find out the return policy can only apply to a single order, returning just $28 of the $336 spent. You might get back the whole $336 in such a case, but the lack of transparency leads us to believe otherwise. Still, this is the longest guarantee we’ve seen in the space.

Best high dose

If you’re looking for an exceptionally high dose of CoQ10, Puritan’s Pride produces softgels containing 600mg doses. It does so using a form of ubiquinone called Q-Sorb. It’s a fermented CoQ10, so it isn’t lab-generated by mixing potentially noxious chemicals together. But other companies boast similarly produced CoQ10. And despite its name, there isn’t anything identifiable about Q-Sorb that improves its absorption compared to those competitors.

Still, very few companies offer doses as high as 600mg. You can also get Q-Sorb CoQ10 in these doses:

• 30mg
• 50mg
• 100mg
• 120mg
• 200mg
• 300mg
• 400mg

If you buy direct from Puritan's Pride, one bottle of 600mg costs $118.49, which seems extremely expensive until you realize you actually get three bottles for this price. Puritan’s Price lists this as a “Buy 1 Get 2 Free” promotion, but considering that price, it really just amounts to bulk savings. And that promotional structure prevents you from buying a single bottle at a lower price if you don’t have over $100 to spend up-front.

Because of this, unless you know for sure that this is the right product for you, you may be better off considering other purchasing options. We'd suggest purchasing from Amazon, where you really can buy a single, 60-serving bottle of Q-Sorb 600mg for $30, which is actually $7-$9 less than the effective single-bottle price you'd get buying direct (with or without a subscription). This way, you can try the product without spending over $100 at the outset.

Here’s a closer look at how the pricing works out if you choose to buy direct.

As you can see, there isn’t much of a reason to spend the additional money on the six-bottle deal, as its final cost per bottle works out to the same numbers as the three-bottle deal. No other company in this space has such an odd price structure. It works out to a reasonable cost overall, but it’s prohibitive to those without a lot of capital. You can set your shipments to arrive in intervals running from 1-6 months.

Puritan’s Pride’s 90-day return policy is the second-most generous on our list, falling short of Life Extension’s one-year guarantee but beating out the next best policy by a month.

Best budget

Kirkland is the brand name associated with Costco Wholesale, the members-only quantity retailer. Its CoQ10 supplement comes in a 300mg dose, which is unusual compared to most other companies’ offerings. It’s a little more than the most common dose — 200mg — without increasing side effect risks significantly. Still, you should talk to your doctor before beginning a regimen of this or any CoQ10 supplement.

Kirkland delivers one of the best deals around, with one of the lowest costs per dose of anything in our guide. And it has the lowest cost per gram of CoQ10 by far. Unfortunately, it achieves this by using some inexpensive ingredients like soybean oil to cut costs.

Kirkland products are also sold exclusively to Costco members, so you’d have to calculate for the cost of membership or purchase from a third-party retailer like Amazon. That said, Costco is known for having particularly liberal return policies if you want to try some CoQ10 for a while. With 100 softgels in a bottle, you can try this supplement for over two months and likely face no issues getting your money back if you’re not satisfied.

One bottle of Kirkland CoQ10 300mg costs $24.99. Shipping for Costco members is free.

CoQ10 supplementation appears to have many potential benefits. But if you’re interested in it for a particular reason, you might find superior or complementary options out there that are worth your investigation. Let’s take a look at a few potential goals people commonly look to CoQ10 to address and discuss some alternatives.