L-Lysine
Of 1,896 on-market l-lysine products in the January 2026 DSLD dump, the median declared dose is 500 mg, and 55.4% list L-Lysine Hydrochloride as the primary form.
Form share
Of 1,889 products with an identifiable primary form, here is the share held by each form of L-Lysine on the market today.
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| Form | Quality tier | n | Share |
|---|---|---|---|
| L-Lysine Hydrochloride | Unrated | 1,046 | 55.4% |
| unspecified/undisclosed form | Unrated | 830 | 43.9% |
| L-Lysine Acetate | Unrated | 13 | 0.7% |
Form share over time
Entry-year breakdown of the top forms, 2012–2025.
Dose distribution
Deciles of declared dose per serving (mg), among 1,216 products with a disclosed amount.
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- 28.5% of products fall below the fairy-dust threshold (200 mg, 20% of the studied low dose).
- 34.7% of products don't disclose an amount because L-Lysine is declared inside a proprietary blend.
Where does your dose rank?
Enter a per-serving dose (mg) to see exactly how it compares to the 1,216 on-market l-lysine products with a disclosed amount. The chart above groups doses into deciles; this looks up the exact percentile for one number.
By dosage form
By target group
Top brands
Search interest over time
How often people search for l-lysine on Google, US only, the last 5 years. This is public interest, not DSLD label data — a spike here doesn't necessarily line up with anything on this page, and Google's own index (100 = that term's peak popularity in the chosen window) is relative, not an absolute search-volume count.
Or see this search directly on trends.google.com.
Forms explained
Label discloses only "Lysine" with no salt or source form.
Elemental fraction: 80.0% (C6H14N2O2 x HCl, anhydrous 1:1 (lysine 146.19 / 182.65); a monohydrate (0.729) is occasionally declared)
The salt used in the herpes simplex trials above (lysine monohydrochloride) and the dominant disclosed form (~565 rows named 'L-lysine hydrochloride'); no study compared it with free lysine.
Source: Griffith RS et al. 1987, PMID 3115841; McCune MA et al. 1984, PMID 6435961
Elemental fraction: 70.9% (C6H14N2O2 x C2H4O2, 1:1 (146.19 / 206.24); assumed)
No head-to-head human bioavailability or efficacy comparison of this form was located in PubMed searches.
Reference values
- RDA (adult): not established — Indispensable (essential) amino acid. IOM's 2005 RDA is weight-based (38 mg/kg/day for adults per secondary sources, i.e. ~2.7g/day for a 70kg adult). The primary report text could not be retrieved for this reference set, so no single adult mg figure is entered rather than converting an unverified value.
- Tolerable Upper Intake Level (adult): not established — No UL established; amino acids are not covered by the NASEM vitamin/element UL tables. Adverse-effect data were not extracted from the trial abstracts reviewed, so no safe-intake figure is stated.
- Studied clinical dose range: 1000–3000 mg
- Evidence is mixed. High end: Griffith RS et al. 1987, Dermatologica 175(4):183-90, PMID 3115841 -- double-blind placebo-controlled multicenter trial of L-lysine monohydrochloride tablets (1,000mg lysine per dose) three times daily x6 months in recurrent herpes simplex (27 on lysine, 25 on placebo completed): fewer infections, reduced severity and healing time. Low end: McCune MA et al. 1984, Cutis 34(4):366-73, PMID 6435961 -- randomized double-blind placebo-controlled crossover, 41 patients: 1,248mg/day L-lysine monohydrochloride (about 1,000mg lysine, by stoichiometry) decreased recurrences, 624mg/day did not. Negative trial: DiGiovanna JJ, Blank H 1984, Arch Dermatol 120(1):48-51, PMID 6419679 -- lysine HCl 400mg three times daily in 21 patients showed no substantial benefit.
- Note: The studied range is anchored on herpes simplex recurrence trials from the 1980s with small samples and inconsistent results; it is a dose that has been tested, not a settled efficacy threshold. Lysine HCl is ~80% lysine by weight, and L-Lysine HCl is the dominant disclosed source. Hydroxylysine, polylysine, lysine peptide fragments and omega-3 lysine complexes are different ingredients and are not aliased.