What this comparison won’t do
It won’t tell you which brand is the best, because public data doesn’t allow an honest answer. It compares what can be compared (the dose of elemental magnesium, the real price of that dose, the composition) and it shows why the ranking of forms repeated by every comparison rests on far less than people assume.
The ranking of forms is poorly established
The dominant view ranks the forms like this: bisglycinate first, citrate next, oxide and marine magnesium at the bottom. It is repeated everywhere. Yet the clinical data behind it is thin, and often produced by the people who sell the ingredient.
The most telling example is a double-blind crossover trial on 40 volunteers, published in Nutrients in December 2024, which compared four sources: oxide, citrate, bisglycinate and a microencapsulated magnesium. Result: plasma magnesium rose significantly with the microencapsulated form and, at some measurement times, with oxide and citrate, but no significant rise was observed with bisglycinate (PMID 39770988).
This result goes against the commercial consensus, and it has to be read with its limitation, which is huge: the authors belong to Lubrizol Life Science, which owns the microencapsulated ingredient that came out on top. So we can’t conclude that bisglycinate is useless. We can conclude something else, and it is already a lot: the ranking of forms rests on small studies with contradictory results, almost all funded by an interested party. When a study paid for by a competitor of bisglycinate finds nothing for bisglycinate, and the studies favourable to bisglycinate are paid for by its manufacturers, the only serious reading is to stop choosing on that criterion.
The magnesium in mineral water has been measured at around 59% absorption, and the same caveat applies: the study was funded by the water industry. The details are in our ranking of magnesium-rich waters.
The two criteria that hold up
The dose of elemental magnesium, not the weight of the salt
This is trap number one. A 750 mg capsule of magnesium bisglycinate does not provide 750 mg of magnesium: bisglycinate is a salt, and magnesium is only a fraction of it. Albion-quality bisglycinate states a minimum of 18% elemental magnesium. So always look for the « magnesium » line in the nutrition table, never the weight shown on the front of the label.
The benchmark for comparison is the adequate intake set by Anses, published on 21 February 2025: 380 mg a day for a man, 300 mg for a woman, unchanged during pregnancy and breastfeeding.
The price of 100 mg of elemental magnesium
The price of the bottle means nothing: daily doses range from two to four capsules depending on the brand, and pack sizes from 60 to 240 capsules. The only honest unit is the price of the magnesium you actually get. The table below calculates it, and the calculation is given so that you can redo it yourself.
Ten brands, eleven formats
Dynveo appears twice because its two formats are not equal on the price of the magnesium supplied: that is exactly what the table is there to show.
| Product | Form | Elemental Mg / dose | Pack size and price | Price / 100 mg elemental |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Sensilab, Essentials Magnésium Glycinate | Bisglycinate only | 300 mg (2 capsules) | 120 capsules, 19.99 EUR | 0.111 EUR |
| Nat&Form, Bisglycinate de magnésium | Bisglycinate only, + B6 | 300 mg (3 capsules) | 90 capsules, 13.50 EUR | 0.150 EUR |
| Novoma, Magnésium bisglycinate | Complex of 80% bisglycinate, 20% oxide, + taurine and B6 | 300 mg (3 capsules) | 120 capsules, 20.90 EUR | 0.174 EUR |
| Nutripure, Magnésium Taurine B6 | Bisglycinate, + taurine and B6 | 240 mg (2 capsules) | 60 capsules, 14.90 EUR | 0.207 EUR |
| Nutrimea, Magnésium bisglycinate | Bisglycinate, + B6 | 300 mg (3 capsules) | 90 capsules, 18.90 EUR | 0.210 EUR |
| Dynveo, Magnésium bisglycinate chélaté | TRAACS bisglycinate, not buffered with oxide | 300 mg (4 capsules) | 180 capsules, 29.90 EUR | 0.221 EUR |
| AqeeLab, Magnésium bisglycinate + B6 | Bisglycinate only, + B6 | 275 mg (2 capsules) | 60 capsules, 19.95 EUR | 0.242 EUR |
| Nutrimuscle, Complexe Magnésium | Citrate, Albion bisglycinate, pidolate, marine | 264 mg (2 capsules) | 60 capsules, 19.95 EUR | 0.252 EUR |
| Dynveo, Magnésium bisglycinate chélaté | TRAACS bisglycinate | 300 mg (4 capsules) | 60 capsules, 11.90 EUR | 0.264 EUR |
| Nutri&Co, Magnésium B6 | Microencapsulated Magshape, malate, TRAACS bisglycinate, + B6 | 300 mg (3 capsules) | 60 capsules, 19.90 EUR | 0.332 EUR |
| Nutriforce, Magnésium bisglycinate | Bisglycinate | 250 mg (3 capsules) | 60 capsules, 23.99 EUR | 0.480 EUR |
What the table says, and that is about all it can say: Sensilab is the cheapest per milligram of magnesium supplied, with a bisglycinate only, with no oxide or vitamin B6, ahead of Nat&Form, which adds B6 and works out 35% more expensive. Novoma follows, with a complex whose page details the share of oxide (20%), plus taurine and active B6, then Nutrimea and the large Dynveo pack. The most expensive product in the table costs 4.3 times the cheapest for the same magnesium. Over a year at 300 mg a day, the gap reaches 404 EUR (122 EUR against 526 EUR). It is the only gap in this comparison that can be quantified with certainty, and it is wider than the one advertising puts forward.
What the table doesn’t say: which one works best. None of these products has been the subject of a clinical trial at its own dosage, and the literature on forms doesn’t allow a verdict, for the reason set out above.
Some brands are missing, and that is deliberate
Nutripure long refused automated reading of its product pages; we recorded it from a browser on 23/10/2026 and it now appears in the table, fourth at 0.207 EUR per 100 mg (0.185 EUR on a discounted three-month course). Pharmacy brands remain absent: rather than copying their figures from a third-party site, which is how price errors spread, we leave them out. Ten sourced brands are better than twelve with four approximate ones: that is exactly the flaw we found, and corrected, in our own creatine comparison.
What matters more than the brand
Digestive tolerance decides for you. Magnesium that speeds up transit is no use if it comes straight back out. If one form bothers you, change the form before you change the brand, and split the dose into two servings.
Check whether B6 is necessary. It is often added because it takes part in magnesium metabolism. It is useful if your diet is short of it, pointless otherwise, and it has its own safety limit, so it is best not to stack it with other supplements.
Start with your plate. Thirty grams of pumpkin seeds provide 178 mg of magnesium, more than a litre of the most magnesium-rich water. Food sources and the signs that should make you suspect a shortfall are in our guide magnesium: benefits, deficiency and foods.
Before increasing doses, see our guide too much magnesium: symptoms and maximum dose.
Our sources
- Official Nat&Form, Novoma, Nutrimea, Dynveo, AqeeLab, Nutrimuscle, Nutri&Co and Nutriforce pages, consulted on 23/09/2026: forms, dose of elemental magnesium, pack sizes and prices.
- Official Sensilab page, consulted on 27/10/2026: form, dose of elemental magnesium, pack size and price.
- Anses, Références nutritionnelles en vitamines et minéraux, 21 February 2025: adequate intakes for magnesium.
- Pajuelo D. et al., Comparative Clinical Study on Magnesium Absorption and Side Effects, Nutrients, 2024: PMID 39770988. Declared conflict of interest: authors employed by the owner of the ingredient tested.