BlendsTesa/IpaTesamorelin + Ipamorelin blend

Tesamorelin / Ipamorelin Blend

Fixed-ratio growth-hormone blend · tesamorelin 10 mg + ipamorelin 3 mg · nightly

This is the pre-mixed pairing of a GHRH analog and a GHRP — Tesamorelin, the one growth-hormone peptide with a real FDA approval behind it, and Ipamorelin, the selective ghrelin-receptor agonist most people start with. Together they push the pituitary from two directions at once, which is the same logic behind the CJC-1295 / Ipamorelin blend. The scheduling could not be tidier: both are injected once daily at bedtime on an empty stomach, for the same reason, so one shot covers both. The doses are the awkward part. Tesamorelin's evidence rests on 2 mg a day while ipamorelin's convention is 200–300 mcg per injection — roughly a sevenfold to tenfold gap — and the ratios vendors actually sell, from 1:1 to about 5:1, do not span it. Every draw therefore trades one component's ideal dose against the other's, and this page works out exactly where. Note also that no single vial ratio is standard here, so the label matters more than usual.

TL;DRThe whole page · in 30 seconds

GH from two angles · Nightly · Visceral fat · Lean recovery

The growth-hormone pair whose schedules actually match. Tesamorelin is the one GH peptide with a real FDA approval, and Ipamorelin is the clean GHRP that adds a second receptor to the same pulse — and both want the same nightly, empty-stomach shot, so one injection covers them.

The basics

A pre-mixed powder, most often 10 mg tesamorelin + 3 mg ipamorelin, injected once a night.
A GHRH plus a GHRP — two different receptors on the same pituitary cell, which is why the pair fires a bigger pulse than either alone.

Why people use it

Two receptors, one pulse — the GHRH half primes the cell and the GHRP half triggers it, the same pairing logic as CJC-1295 / Ipamorelin.
The GHRH half has real approval behind it — tesamorelin is approved as Egrifta, and its pivotal trial cut deep visceral fat about 15% and raised IGF-1 around 80% over 26 weeks.
A clean partner — ipamorelin is the selective GHRP, largely avoiding the hunger and the cortisol response that GHRP-2 and GHRP-6 bring.
One shot, one schedule — both are nightly and both want an empty stomach, so nothing has to be juggled.

How to run it

Dose: 20 units nightly (≈ 1.3 mg of blend = 1 mg tesamorelin + 300 mcg ipamorelin); 10 units to start, 30 at the top
How often: Once daily
How: A small injection under the skin — one syringe covers both halves
When: Bedtime, on an empty stomach — about 2–3 hours after your last meal
Cycle: 8–12 weeks on, then 4–8 weeks off

Stacks well with

Nothing from the same family — a second GHRH like CJC-1295 or Sermorelin pulls the identical lever, and a second GHRP does too.
Separate vials, if you want tesamorelin's full 2 mg — the fixed ratio can't get there without doubling ipamorelin past its usual ceiling.

Good to know

The ratio is the catch: tesamorelin is dosed in milligrams and ipamorelin in hundreds of micrograms, so no single draw is ideal for both. At 20 units tesamorelin sits at its lower dose and ipamorelin at the top of its usual range — the closest this ratio gets.
There is no standard vial here — 10+2, 6+2, 10+3, 10+5 and 5+5 are all sold. Check your label before trusting any unit figure, including the ones on this page.
Empty stomach is the one rule that matters — eat near the shot and you blunt the pulse you paid for.
Growth hormone nudges blood sugar upward, so glucose is the thing to watch on a longer run.
Banned in tested sport — both halves are on the WADA list at all times.

Bottom line: The tidiest GH pairing to actually run — one nightly shot both halves agree on — as long as you accept that a fixed ratio can't give each peptide its own ideal dose.

Molecular identity

Specs

Composition: Tesamorelin 10 mg · Ipamorelin 3 mg = 13 mg per vial. No ratio is standard across vendors; others sold include: 10 mg + 2 mg, 6 mg + 2 mg, 10 mg + 5 mg, and 5 mg + 5 mgCross-source vendor agreement
Ratio: 10 : 3 by mass — 76.9 % tesamorelin · 23.1 % ipamorelinCalculated
Structure / class: Fixed-ratio, co-lyophilized blend of a GHRH analog and a growth-hormone-releasing peptide — not a new molecule; each component keeps its own identity and pharmacologyCross-source vendor agreement
Tesamorelin (10 mg): C221H366N72O67S · 5,135.9 g/mol · CAS 218949-48-5 · UNII MQG94M5EEO · stabilized GRF(1-44) analogPubChem CID 16137828
Ipamorelin (3 mg): C38H49N9O5 · 711.9 g/mol · CAS 170851-70-4 · Aib-His-D-2-Nal-D-Phe-Lys-NH₂PubChem CID 9831659
Molecular target: Two receptors on the same pituitary somatotroph — the GHRH receptor for tesamorelin and GHS-R1a, the ghrelin receptor, for ipamorelinFDA label · PMID 9849822
Half-life (per component): Both short — tesamorelin ~26–38 min (original Egrifta formulation; ~8 min for the SV reformulation), ipamorelin ~2 h (human IV, terminal). The pulse each triggers outlasts the peptideFDA label · PMID 10496658Half-life curve →
Regulatory status: Tesamorelin is FDA-approved (Egrifta) for HIV-associated lipodystrophy only; ipamorelin is not approved for any indication. No trial has tested the combination. Both prohibited in sport at all times (WADA S2)FDA label / WADA Prohibited List

Plain English

Mechanism

A blend is a packaging decision, not a new drug: the vial holds two peptides freeze-dried together in fixed proportions, so every draw carries both in the vial's ratio. What makes this particular pairing coherent is that the two halves act on the same cell through different doors. Tesamorelin is a stabilized analog of growth-hormone-releasing hormone and binds the GHRH receptor on pituitary somatotrophs, driving the cAMP pathway that tells the cell to make and release growth hormone. Ipamorelin binds GHS-R1a, the ghrelin receptor on the same cell, and triggers a separate signaling cascade. Priming a cell and triggering it are complementary jobs, which is why a GHRH plus a GHRP is the canonical growth-hormone pairing rather than a doubled dose of either.

Both halves raise the body's own growth hormone rather than supplying it from outside, so the pituitary's natural pulsatile rhythm and its feedback loops stay in the circuit. That is the shared appeal of the class, and it is why timing matters so much: the largest natural GH pulse fires in early deep sleep, and a meal before the injection raises insulin and somatostatin — growth hormone's off-switch — which blunts the pulse the peptides are trying to amplify. Both components' own pages land on the same instruction for the same reason, which is unusual and convenient.

The evidence behind the two halves is very unevenly weighted, and that asymmetry is worth carrying. Tesamorelin is an approved drug with two pivotal Phase 3 trials: in the pivotal study it reduced visceral adipose tissue by roughly 15% and raised IGF-1 by about 81% over 26 weeks, in adults with HIV-associated lipodystrophy — the one indication it is approved for. Ipamorelin has a genuine human intravenous pharmacokinetic study and a human Phase II trial, but that trial was in post-operative ileus and it missed its efficacy endpoint; there is no validated subcutaneous human dose for it. So one half brings trial-grade evidence for a narrow indication, and the other brings a well-characterized mechanism with no efficacy win behind it.

Nothing has tested the two together. The synergy argument is mechanistic — two receptors, one pulse — and it is the same argument the CJC-1295 / Ipamorelin blend rests on. It is a reasonable argument, and it is not a trial result.

Sources:FDA label PMID 18057338 PMID 9849822 PMID 10496658 PMID 25331030

Why people reach for it

Potential benefits

This pairing is reached for by people who want the growth-hormone axis worked from both directions on a schedule that is genuinely easy to keep. Here is what the research reports and what draws people to it.

Two receptors on one pulse — The defining appeal. The GHRH half primes the somatotroph and the GHRP half triggers it, so the pair is described as producing a larger release than either alone — the same complementary logic behind every GHRH-plus-GHRP stack.
A GHRH half with real approval behind it — Tesamorelin is an approved drug, and in its pivotal trial it reduced visceral fat by about 15% and raised IGF-1 by roughly 81% over 26 weeks. That is human trial data, unusual in this catalog — though the approval covers HIV-associated lipodystrophy specifically.
A clean GHRP partner — Ipamorelin is the selective member of its family: animal work reports it releases growth hormone without meaningfully raising cortisol or ACTH, unlike GHRP-2 and GHRP-6, which raise both — which is why it is the usual choice for this slot.
Schedules that actually agree — Both halves are nightly, both want an empty stomach, and both for the same reason — so unlike some blends there is no cadence to reconcile. One injection, one rule to follow.
An honest limit — The fixed ratio cannot give both peptides their own ideal dose. Tesamorelin's evidence sits at 2 mg a day and ipamorelin's convention at 200–300 mcg, and no ratio on the market bridges a gap that wide — so every draw is a trade.

Sources:PMID 18057338 PMID 20101189 PMID 9849822

What the research reports for each component and what people reach for the pairing for — not proven outcomes for the combination, which has never been tested. Tesamorelin's trial figures belong to its approved indication in HIV-associated lipodystrophy, not to body-composition use.

Implied timing

Best time to dose

Implied best time

Bedtime (empty stomach)

Inject at bedtime on an empty stomach, roughly two to three hours after the last meal. Both halves independently arrive at this instruction, which makes it the least ambiguous timing call of any blend here.

The body's largest natural growth-hormone pulse fires in early slow-wave sleep. Both components amplify a pulse rather than supplying hormone, so dosing at bedtime stacks their signal on top of the nocturnal surge instead of competing with it.
Food is the reason for the empty stomach, and it is not a minor effect: a meal raises insulin and somatostatin, and somatostatin is growth hormone's direct off-switch. Eating near the injection blunts the very pulse the shot is meant to produce.
Both peptides clear quickly — tesamorelin in well under an hour and ipamorelin with a terminal half-life around two hours — so the value is the pulse each triggers, not sustained blood levels. Placing that pulse at the start of the night is the whole timing argument.
Because the two share this window exactly, the blend needs no scheduling compromise at all. The compromise on this page is in the dose, not the clock.

No study establishes an ideal time of day for either component — this is reasoned from GH-axis physiology and from what both component pages independently conclude. The bedtime, empty-stomach rule is the strongest timing consensus in this class.

Sources:FDA label PMID 10496658

How to run it

Dosing & protocol

One nightly injection covers both halves, and the only real decision is how far up the ratio to go. Because the vial is fixed, picking a draw sets both doses at once — so the useful way to read the tiers below is not "how much blend" but "where does each peptide land against its own page's range". On a 10 mg + 3 mg vial the answer is that they never both land well, and 20 units is the closest they come.

Community convention, not trial-proven: no study has tested tesamorelin and ipamorelin together. Tesamorelin is FDA-approved only for HIV-associated lipodystrophy, so body-composition use is off-label; ipamorelin's human data are IV-only and its Phase II trial missed its endpoint. Both are WADA S2 prohibited. These figures assume a 10 mg + 3 mg vial — a different ratio changes every number here.

Tiered dose ranges (total blend per draw)

Standard mix: 13 mg vial + 2 mL bacteriostatic water = 6,500 mcg/mL of blend, which is 5,000 mcg/mL tesamorelin and 1,500 mcg/mL ipamorelin. One unit on a U-100 syringe is 65 mcg of blend — 50 mcg tesamorelin plus 15 mcg ipamorelin.

Low — 10 units (≈ 0.65 mg):: 500 mcg tesamorelin + 150 mcg ipamorelin nightly. Ipamorelin lands at the top of its own 100–150 mcg introductory band; tesamorelin is at half its own lowest tier. A sensible first week to check tolerance, and an honestly weak dose for the tesamorelin half.
Standard — 20 units (≈ 1.3 mg):: 1 mg tesamorelin + 300 mcg ipamorelin nightly. This is the least-bad point on this ratio and the reason to run this vial at all: tesamorelin reaches its own low tier of 1 mg, and ipamorelin lands exactly on the top of its 200–300 mcg standard band. Neither is compromised badly, and neither is ideal.
High — 30 units (≈ 1.95 mg):: 1.5 mg tesamorelin + 450 mcg ipamorelin nightly. Tesamorelin moves toward its 2 mg trial dose, but ipamorelin is now half again above its own standard ceiling. This is the point where the ratio starts costing more than it gives.
What the ratio cannot do:: Two things. First, ipamorelin's own high tier is 200–300 mcg taken 2–3 times a day — more injections, not a bigger one — and a once-nightly blend cannot reproduce that at any draw size. Second, tesamorelin's approved and trial dose is 2 mg, which is 40 units on this vial — and that draw carries 600 mcg of ipamorelin, twice the top of its standard band. There is no way to give tesamorelin its evidence-backed dose from this vial without doubling ipamorelin past its convention. If the 2 mg dose is the point of the protocol, separate vials are the honest answer.

Subcutaneous administration

One nightly injection into subcutaneous fat; the empty-stomach window is the variable that actually decides whether the dose works.

Injection site:: Abdomen (a couple of inches clear of the navel), the love-handle area, or the outer thigh. Rotate nightly to avoid lipohypertrophy — the fatty lumps that come from repeatedly using one spot.
Measuring the dose:: Drawn on a U-100 insulin syringe. At the standard 13 mg + 2 mL mix: 10 units = 500 mcg tesamorelin + 150 mcg ipamorelin · 20 units = 1 mg + 300 mcg · 30 units = 1.5 mg + 450 mcg · 40 units = 2 mg + 600 mcg. Egrifta SV's 1.4 mg equivalent is 28 units, carrying 420 mcg of ipamorelin. The calculator on this page shows the split for any vial size or water volume.
Time of day:: Bedtime — see Best time to dose above. Both halves want the same window, so there is nothing to stagger.
Food window:: The one rule that matters. Inject roughly 2–3 hours after the last meal and avoid eating for about 30 minutes after. Insulin and somatostatin, both raised by food, suppress the pituitary's growth-hormone output and will blunt the pulse.

Cycle & washout

Both components are run in defined blocks rather than indefinitely, on the shared reasoning that continuous stimulation dulls the axis.

Standard cycle:: 8–12 weeks of nightly use — the overlap of both component pages' conventions. Tesamorelin's trial data ran 26 weeks continuously in its approved indication, so the shorter community block is convention rather than a trial finding.
Washout:: 4–8 weeks off between cycles, following tesamorelin's page, which is the longer of the two. Checking IGF-1 at the end of a block, before the washout, is the practical way to see whether the axis responded.
Vial life:: At 20 units a night a 13 mg vial is exactly 10 doses, so a vial is a bit under a fortnight and a 12-week block takes nine vials (84 nights at 10 doses each). A reconstituted vial should be used within about four weeks, which the nightly schedule comfortably clears.

Reconstitution at a glance

The on-page calculator does this live and splits every draw; the quick reference for the standard 13 mg vial:

Mixing:: 13 mg vial + 2 mL bacteriostatic water = 6,500 mcg per mL of blend — 5,000 mcg/mL tesamorelin and 1,500 mcg/mL ipamorelin. One unit on a U-100 syringe delivers 50 mcg tesamorelin and 15 mcg ipamorelin.
Why 2 mL:: It puts the tesamorelin half at exactly the 5,000 mcg/mL its own page uses, so the familiar figures carry over unchanged — 20 units is 1 mg of tesamorelin here just as it is there, and 40 units is 2 mg.
Check your label first:: This is the one blend on the site with no standard ratio. Vendors sell 10 mg + 2 mg, 6 mg + 2 mg, 10 mg + 3 mg, 10 mg + 5 mg and 5 mg + 5 mg. Every number on this page assumes 10 + 3; on a 5 + 5 vial mixed in the same 2 mL, the same 20-unit draw would deliver 500 mcg of each instead — a completely different protocol.

Sources:FDA label PMID 18057338 PMID 9849822 PMID 10496658

Substrate the signal needs

Nutritional cofactor precision

Both halves do the same job — push the pituitary to release more growth hormone — so the cofactors follow that single mechanism: relieve the brake on the pulse, cover the metabolic cost of raised GH, and supply the material the resulting IGF-1 signal asks for.

Reasoned from GH-axis physiology and general nutrition, not from a cofactor study of either peptide or of the blend. Supplement doses are common community ranges.

Amplify — relieve the somatostatin brake

Growth-hormone release is gated by somatostatin. Anything that lowers it around the injection window makes the same dose land harder.

The fasted window is the lever:: Free and more effective than any supplement: 2–3 hours after the last meal, nothing for ~30 minutes after. Carbohydrate and fat both raise the hormones that suppress the pulse.
Alpha-GPC:: 300–600 mg about 30 minutes before the injection. A choline source used to support the cholinergic tone that lowers somatostatin — the standard partner for GH secretagogues.
L-arginine or glycine:: L-arginine 3–6 g, or glycine 3–10 g, in the same pre-injection window. Both are long-standing GH-axis adjuncts; take them with the fasted window, not with a meal.

Mitigate — the glucose cost

Raised growth hormone transiently pushes blood sugar up and lowers insulin sensitivity. On a nightly protocol run for months, this is the trade-off worth watching rather than ignoring.

Berberine and alpha-lipoic acid:: Berberine 500 mg with meals, or alpha-lipoic acid 600 mg daily — both used to support insulin sensitivity alongside a GH-raising protocol.
Magnesium:: 300–400 mg elemental at bedtime, which also fits the injection window and supports sleep quality — and sleep is when the pulse this protocol amplifies actually happens.
Track it:: Fasting glucose and HbA1c before and during a block are the honest way to know whether the trade is acceptable for you. Tesamorelin's own label carries glucose monitoring for this reason.

Supply — the substrate the IGF-1 signal asks for

The point of raising GH is the downstream IGF-1 rise, and IGF-1 drives protein synthesis. Without material and a training stimulus, the signal has nothing to act on.

Protein:: 1.6–2.0 g per kilogram of body weight daily, spread across the day.
Zinc and magnesium at night:: A ZMA-style pairing at bedtime, which coincides with the injection window and supports sleep depth — the phase in which the natural pulse occurs.

Sources:FDA label PMID 18057338

Combinations + timing

Stacking notes + timing windows

This blend already occupies both halves of the growth-hormone pairing, which makes most same-family additions redundant by construction. The useful partners come from other axes entirely, and the most useful adjustment is not an addition at all.

Combinations reasoned from complementary mechanisms — not studied head-to-head, and the blend itself has never been tested. Doses are each partner page's own convention.

Separate vials, when 2 mg is the point

The most useful change to this protocol is usually to stop using the blend for part of it.

Why it works:: Tesamorelin's entire evidence base sits at 2 mg a day, and this ratio cannot deliver that without carrying 600 mcg of ipamorelin — twice its standard ceiling. Running Tesamorelin from its own vial at 2 mg and Ipamorelin from its own at 200–300 mcg gives both peptides their own page's dose, at the cost of a second draw.
The protocol:: Tesamorelin 2 mg and ipamorelin 200–300 mcg, both subcutaneous at bedtime on an empty stomach — the same window the blend uses, so nothing else about the routine changes. They can be drawn into one syringe if you prefer a single injection.
Outcome:: Reached for by anyone whose goal is the visceral-fat result tesamorelin's trials actually measured, rather than a general GH nudge.

The blend + BPC-157 or a repair blend

A local-repair layer under the systemic anabolic backdrop — a different axis, so it adds rather than duplicates.

Why it works:: The GH axis works systemically through IGF-1; BPC-157 works locally on angiogenesis and connective-tissue repair. Neither touches the other's receptor, which is what makes the pairing additive rather than redundant.
The protocol:: The blend nightly as usual, plus BPC-157 250–500 mcg subcutaneously daily — or the pre-mixed Wolverine if a tendon or ligament is the actual target.
Outcome:: Reached for when recovery from training or injury is the goal alongside body composition.

What not to add

The redundancy cases here are unusually clear, because the blend already holds one of each type.

A second GHRH:: CJC-1295 or Sermorelin on top of tesamorelin is the same receptor twice. Tesamorelin's own page names this explicitly as a stack not to run.
A second GHRP:: GHRP-2, GHRP-6 or Hexarelin duplicates the ipamorelin half at GHS-R1a, and brings back the appetite spike and the ACTH/cortisol response that ipamorelin was chosen to avoid.
The CJC-1295 / Ipamorelin blend:: Running it alongside this one doubles both halves at once — a GHRH on a GHRH and a GHRP on a GHRP. Pick the pairing that suits the schedule you want: that blend if a weekly DAC option or a cheaper daily GHRH appeals, this one if tesamorelin's trial evidence is the draw.

Sources:FDA label PMID 9849822

Reconstitution math

Reconstitution calculator

Calculated for a 1 mL U-100 insulin syringe (100 units/mL).

Peptide per vial

BAC water added

Desired dose

Units per dose

Draw to this mark on a U-100 syringe

This dose contains

Tesamorelin1 mg
Ipamorelin300 mcg

Fixed ratio — every draw carries all of the vial's peptides in the same proportions; only the total changes.

Volume per dose: 0.2 mL
Doses per vial: 10
Concentration: 6.5 mg/mL

One vial lasts

Daily: 10 days
Every other day: 20 days
5×/week: 14 days

Research use only. Not for human consumption. Outputs are reference values based on research literature — verify all measurements independently.

From the studies

Side effects from research

There is no safety study of the combination, so the picture is the two component pictures side by side — and they are very differently sourced. Tesamorelin has a real drug label: the common reported effects are injection-site reactions, joint pain, muscle aches, swelling from fluid retention, and paraesthesia, and the label carries monitoring for glucose because growth hormone raises blood sugar and reduces insulin sensitivity. It also carries the class considerations for a GH-raising therapy, including caution in active malignancy, since IGF-1 is a growth signal.

Ipamorelin's safety information comes from a much smaller base: a human intravenous pharmacokinetic study and one Phase II trial in post-operative ileus, where it was reported well tolerated but did not beat placebo on efficacy. Its selling point is what it does not do — animal work reports it leaves cortisol and ACTH essentially unmoved, unlike the older GHRPs — but there is no long-term human safety dataset for subcutaneous use at these doses.

Two cautions belong to the blend itself rather than to either half. Because the ratio is fixed, a side effect attributable to one component can only be addressed by lowering the whole dose or moving to separate vials — and on this page that matters more than most, because the draws that give tesamorelin a meaningful dose are the same draws that push ipamorelin above its usual range. And the fluid retention, joint discomfort and glucose effects that people report on GH protocols scale with the total growth-hormone signal, which is precisely what a two-receptor pairing is designed to increase.

Both components are prohibited in sport at all times under WADA S2, which matters for anyone tested. And tesamorelin's approval covers HIV-associated lipodystrophy only — the safety data supporting it were gathered in that population, not in healthy adults using it for body composition.

Sources:FDA label PMID 18057338 PMID 25331030 PMID 9849822 WADA

As reported in literature

Research dosing ranges

There is no research dose for this pairing, because no study has tested the two together. What follows is the cited evidence behind each component separately — shown here so the asymmetry is visible, since one half is an approved drug with pivotal trials and the other is a well-characterized molecule whose one efficacy trial missed its endpoint. Read these as the evidence the practical figures lean on, not as doses for the blend.

Dose	Route	Model	Outcome	Sources:
Any	Subcutaneous	— no study of the two-peptide combination	No published study has tested tesamorelin with ipamorelin; the pairing rationale is mechanistic, and the vial ratios are market convention
2 mg daily	Subcutaneous	Human — pivotal Phase 3, 26 weeks, n=412 (HIV-associated lipodystrophy)	Visceral adipose tissue reduced ~15%; IGF-1 raised ~81%	PMID 18057338
2 mg daily	Subcutaneous	Human — Phase 3 + extension, n≈404 (tesamorelin)	Benefit maintained on continued dosing; visceral fat returned after discontinuation	PMID 20101189
Label dose	Subcutaneous	Human — FDA-approved product (Egrifta / SV / WR)	Approved for reduction of excess abdominal fat in HIV-associated lipodystrophy; SV 1.4 mg and WR 1.28 mg are reformulated bioequivalents of 2 mg	FDA label
Various	In vitro / IV	Swine and rat (ipamorelin, founding study)	Selective GH release; no FSH, LH, prolactin or TSH change, and ACTH/cortisol not significantly different from GHRH stimulation	PMID 9849822
4.21–140.45 nmol/kg	IV infusion (15 min)	Human (healthy, n=8/dose) — ipamorelin PK	Dose-proportional pharmacokinetics; t½ ~2 h	PMID 10496658
0.03 mg/kg twice daily	Intravenous	Human — Phase II, post-operative ileus (n=114)	Well tolerated; no efficacy difference versus placebo — the trial missed its endpoint	PMID 25331030

Quick answers

Frequently asked

What is in this vial, and is there a standard ratio?

This page assumes the common 10 mg tesamorelin plus 3 mg ipamorelin vial, 13 mg total. But unlike the other blends here, there is no settled ratio: 10 mg + 2 mg, 6 mg + 2 mg, 10 mg + 5 mg and 5 mg + 5 mg are all sold. That matters, because the ratio decides what a given draw delivers — on a 5 + 5 vial mixed in the same 2 mL, 20 units gives 500 mcg of each rather than 1 mg and 300 mcg. Check the label before using any number here.

Why can't one draw give both peptides their proper dose?

Because their doses are on different scales. Tesamorelin's evidence sits at 2 mg a day; ipamorelin's convention is 200–300 mcg per injection — roughly a sevenfold to tenfold difference. The ratios sold run from 1:1 to about 5:1, which is nowhere near wide enough. At 20 units on a 10 + 3 vial you get 1 mg of tesamorelin and 300 mcg of ipamorelin, which is the closest this ratio comes to suiting both.

How do I get tesamorelin's full 2 mg?

From this vial it takes 40 units, and that draw also delivers 600 mcg of ipamorelin — twice the top of its standard range. If the 2 mg dose is the reason you are running the protocol, separate vials are the honest answer: tesamorelin at 2 mg and ipamorelin at 200–300 mcg, both at bedtime, drawn into one syringe if you want a single injection.

Why bedtime and why an empty stomach?

The body's biggest natural growth-hormone pulse happens in early deep sleep, and both peptides amplify a pulse rather than supplying hormone — so dosing at bedtime stacks their effect on top of it. Food is the complication: a meal raises insulin and somatostatin, and somatostatin directly switches growth-hormone release off. Leaving 2–3 hours after eating protects the pulse you are trying to create.

Is either half an approved medicine?

Tesamorelin is — it is approved as Egrifta for reducing excess abdominal fat in HIV-associated lipodystrophy, and that is the only indication it is approved for. Ipamorelin is not approved for anything; its human data are an intravenous pharmacokinetic study and a Phase II trial that missed its endpoint. The combination has never been tested.

Is it banned in sport?

Yes. Both components sit under WADA S2 and are prohibited at all times, tesamorelin named specifically among GHRH analogues. This page presents research literature only and makes no therapeutic claims.

Primary sources

References

PubChem CID 16137828PubChem CID 16137828 (Tesamorelin)
PubChem CID 9831659PubChem CID 9831659 (Ipamorelin)
FDA labelFDA label / DailyMed — Egrifta SV (tesamorelin) prescribing information
PMID 18057338Falutz et al., N Engl J Med 2007 (pivotal Phase III, visceral fat and IGF-1)
PMID 20101189Falutz et al., J Acquir Immune Defic Syndr 2010 (Phase III + extension, discontinuation)
PMID 9849822Raun et al., Eur. J. Endocrinol. 1998 (ipamorelin, the first selective GH secretagogue)
PMID 10496658Gobburu et al., Pharm. Res. 1999 (ipamorelin human PK)
PMID 25331030Beck et al., Int. J. Colorectal Dis. 2014 (ipamorelin Phase II, post-operative ileus)
WADAWADA Prohibited List (S2 — GHRH analogues incl. tesamorelin, and GH secretagogues; prohibited at all times)

Reviewed by Ki Researcher Team · Research use only · Not medical advice · Updated 2026-09-02