Vitamin C Supplement

Vitamin C is the only ingredient in our formula that European law permits us to say anything good about. That is not a footnote. It is the reason it's in the bottle. Caffeine, guarana and taurine all carry a dose and no claim. Vitamin C carries both.

So this is the one page on this site where we are allowed to answer the question you actually came with, which is: what does it do?

What vitamin C is

Ascorbic acid. Water-soluble, which means your body doesn't store it and excretes what it can't use. That's the reason you need it regularly rather than occasionally, and the reason a large single dose behaves differently from what people assume.

Humans are one of the few mammals that cannot make it. Dogs make their own. Cats make their own. We lost the enzyme somewhere back down the evolutionary line, which is why long sea voyages produced scurvy and why the Royal Navy ended up handing out limes.

The EU Nutrient Reference Value is 80mg per day. That's the figure every percentage on every label is calculated against. Our 560mg is 700% of it.

What we ARE allowed to tell you

Every other ingredient page on this site has a section explaining what EU law forbids us from claiming. This page is where that inverts.

Under Regulation (EC) No 1924/2006, a health claim may only be made if it has been assessed and authorised. Vitamin C has been. These are authorised claims, in the wording the European Commission approved, and a product qualifies to use them if it contains at least 15% of the NRV. We contain 700%.

Read that first line again, because it's the important one. Contributes to the reduction of tiredness and fatigue. Not eliminates. Not cures. Contributes to the reduction of. The precision is the point, and it is the difference between a claim that has been assessed and a claim that has been invented.

Why 560mg, and not 1000mg

1000mg is the number the category has settled on, and it's mostly a marketing decision. Here's the honest version.

Vitamin C absorption is saturable. The more you take in a single dose, the smaller the proportion your gut actually absorbs. At modest intakes you absorb most of it. At a gram in one go, absorption efficiency drops considerably, and what isn't absorbed passes through. It's water-soluble, so what does get absorbed and isn't used is excreted.

Which means a 1000mg tablet does not deliver twice what a 500mg one does. It delivers a bigger number on the label, some additional absorbed vitamin C, and a certain amount of expensively-produced urine.

We are not going to pretend 560mg is a magic figure either. It's a high dose, seven times the reference value, comfortably in the range where the authorised claims apply, and chosen without pretending that more is linearly better. If a brand can explain why it picked its number, that tells you something. Most can't.

The label test

Take this column, open any other vitamin C supplement you're considering, and see how many rows you can fill in from their label.

The rest of the formula, which gets no such privilege

For completeness, and because it's the whole argument of this site:

• Caffeine. Claims on alertness and attention were assessed and not authorised. 180mg per dose, no claim.
• Guarana. A botanical. Claims submitted, put on hold, never authorised. 60mg per dose, no claim.
• Taurine. No authorised claims at all. 400mg per dose, no claim.

Three ingredients with doses and no permission to describe them. One with both. That asymmetry is the most honest thing about this category, and almost nobody in it will tell you about it.

Aurora Flow Energy Complex, in full

Questions people actually ask

What does vitamin C do?

The EU has authorised a specific set of claims: it contributes to the reduction of tiredness and fatigue, to normal energy-yielding metabolism, to normal psychological function, to normal functioning of the nervous system and immune system, to the protection of cells from oxidative stress, to normal collagen formation, and it increases iron absorption. Those are the assessed, permitted statements. Anything a brand tells you beyond them, it made up.

How much vitamin C should I take per day?

The EU Nutrient Reference Value is 80mg per day, which is the baseline every label's percentage is calculated against. Supplements routinely provide far more, because vitamin C is water-soluble and the body excretes what it doesn't use. Aurora Flow provides 560mg per daily dose, or 700% NRV.

What does NRV mean?

Nutrient Reference Value. It's the EU's reference figure for daily intake of a nutrient, and it's the denominator behind every percentage on a supplement label. For vitamin C it's 80mg. So 560mg is 700%. A label showing a percentage without the milligrams is telling you a ratio and hiding the number.

Is 700% NRV too much vitamin C?

Vitamin C is water-soluble, and the body excretes what it doesn't use rather than storing it. The EU has not established a tolerable upper intake level for vitamin C, although intakes above roughly a gram a day are associated with gastrointestinal effects in some people. 560mg sits well below that. As always, the sensible thing is to know your total across everything you're taking.

Why not 1000mg like everyone else?

Because absorption is saturable. The proportion your gut absorbs falls as the single dose rises, so a 1000mg tablet does not deliver twice what a 500mg one does. It delivers a better number on the front of the bottle. We picked 560mg deliberately and we'd rather explain the reasoning than round up for the packaging.

Does vitamin C help with tiredness?

This is the one benefit sentence on this entire website, and here is its exact authorised wording: vitamin C contributes to the reduction of tiredness and fatigue. Not eliminates. Not cures. Contributes to the reduction of. We use it verbatim, because paraphrasing an authorised claim is how brands accidentally make an unauthorised one.

Is vitamin C vegan?

The L-ascorbic acid used in supplements is produced by fermentation and is not animal-derived. As with everything in this category, the question is really about the capsule shell. Gelatin is animal collagen. Aurora Flow uses pullulan, which is plant-derived.

Related reading

• Energy supplements, explained: how to read any label
• Caffeine capsules: dose ranges and the EFSA reference intakes
• Taurine supplement: what it is, and the myth about where it comes from
• Guarana capsules: extract vs powder, and how to read the label
• Supplements and brain fog: an honest look at the evidence
• Aurora Flow Energy Complex: 60 capsules, four ingredients, every dose disclosed