Krill Oil vs Fish Oil – Which is Healthier?

10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.

Our Verdict

When comparing krill oil to fish oil, we picked the krill oil.

Why?

Both of these products are good sources of omega-3 fatty acids EPA and DHA, and for the specific brand depicted above, in both cases 2 softgels will give you the recommended daily amount (which is generally held to be 250–500mg combined omega-3s per day).

This brand’s fish oil gives more (640mg combined omega-3s per 2 softgels, to the same brand’s krill oil’s 480mg per 2 softgels), but since the krill oil is already in the high end of RDA territory, the excess beyond the RDA is not helpful, and not a huge factor. More quantity is not always better, when the body can only process so much at a time.

However, the krill oil gives some extra things that the fish oil doesn’t:

  • Astaxanthin, a “super-antioxidant”
  • and neuroprotectant, heart-healthy phospholipids

Additional considerations

We have declared “the winner” based on health considerations only. That’s a sticking point for us in all our writings; we’ll occasionally look at and mention other factors, but we know that health is what you’re here for, so that’s what we’ll always treat as most critical.

However, in case these factors may interest you and/or influence you to one or the other:
•⁠ ⁠The fish oil is about 30% cheaper financially
•⁠ ⁠The krill oil is a lot more sustainable environmentally

Back to the health science…

Read more:
•⁠ ⁠What Omega-3 Fatty Acids Really Do For Us
•⁠ ⁠Astaxanthin: Super-Antioxidant & Neuroprotectant

Want some? Here for your convenience are some example products on Amazon:

Krill oil | Fish oil

(brands available will vary per region, but now you know what to look out for on the labels!)

Don’t Forget…

Did you arrive here from our newsletter? Don’t forget to return to the email to continue learning!

Recommended

  • Tofu vs Seitan – Which is Healthier?
  • Kale vs Watercress – Which is Healthier?
    Kale triumphs over watercress with its superior polyphenol content, edging ahead in the nutrient-packed greens showdown.

Learn to Age Gracefully

Join the 98k+ American women taking control of their health & aging with our 100% free (and fun!) daily emails:

  • Metformin For Weight-Loss & More

    10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.

    Metformin Without Diabetes?

    Metformin is a diabetes drug; it works by:

    • decreasing glucose absorption from the gut
    • decreasing glucose production in the liver
    • increasing glucose sensitivity

    It doesn’t change how much insulin is secreted, and is unlikely to cause hypoglycemia, making it relatively safe as diabetes drugs go.

    It’s a biguanide drug, and/but so far as science knows (so far), its mechanism of action is unique (i.e. no other drug works the same way that metformin does).

    Today we’ll examine its off-label uses and see what the science says!

    A note on terms: “off-label” = when a drug is prescribed to treat something other than the main purpose(s) for which the drug was approved.

    Other examples include modafinil against depression, and beta-blockers against anxiety.

    Why take it if not diabetic?

    There are many reasons people take it, including just general health and life extension:

    One of the cheapest diabetes drugs on the market can also slow aging and extend your life span. Here’s how

    However, its use was originally expanded (still “off-label”, but widely prescribed) past “just for diabetes” when it showed efficacy in treating pre-diabetes. Here for example is a longitudinal study that found metformin use performed similarly to lifestyle interventions (e.g. diet, exercise, etc). In their words:

    ❝ Lifestyle intervention or metformin significantly reduced diabetes development over 15 years. There were no overall differences in the aggregate microvascular outcome between treatment groups❞

    Source: Long-term effects of lifestyle intervention or metformin on diabetes development and microvascular complications over 15-year follow-up

    But, it seems it does more, as this more recent review found:

    Long-term weight loss was also seen in both [metformin and intensive lifestyle intervention] groups, with better maintenance under metformin.

    Subgroup analyses from the DPP/DPPOS have shed important light on the actions of metformin, including a greater effect in women with prior gestational diabetes, and a reduction in coronary artery calcium in men that might suggest a cardioprotective effect.

    Long-term diabetes prevention with metformin is feasible and is supported in influential guidelines for selected groups of subjects.❞

    Source: Metformin for diabetes prevention: update of the evidence base

    We were wondering about that cardioprotective effect, so…

    Cardioprotective effect

    In short, another review (published a few months after the above one) confirmed the previous findings, and also added:

    ❝Patients with BMI > 35 showed an association between metformin use and lower incidence of CVD, including African Americans older than age 65. The data suggest that morbidly obese patients with prediabetes may benefit from the use of metformin as recommended by the ADA.❞

    Real World Data: Off-Label Metformin in Patients with Prediabetes is Associated with Improved Cardiovascular Outcomes

    We wondered about the weight loss implications of this, and…

    For weight loss

    The short version is, it works:

    …and many many more where those came from. As a point of interest, it has also been compared and contrasted to GLP-1 agonists.

    Compared/contrasted with GLP-1 agonists

    It’s not quite as effective for weight loss, and/but it’s a lot cheaper, is tablets rather than injections, has fewer side effects (for most people), and doesn’t result in dramatic yoyo-ing if there’s an interruption to taking it:

    Comparison of Beinaglutide Versus Metformin for Weight Loss in Overweight and Obese Non-diabetic Patients

    Or if you prefer a reader-friendly pop-science version:

    Ozempic vs Metformin: Comparing The Two Diabetes Medications

    Is it safe?

    For most people yes, but there are a stack of contraindications, so it’s best to speak with your doctor. However, particular things to be aware of include:

    • Usually contraindicated if you have kidney problems of any kind
    • Usually contraindicated if you have liver problems of any kind
    • May be contraindicated if you have issues with B12 levels

    See also: Metformin: Is it a drug for all reasons and diseases?

    Where can I get it?

    As it’s a prescription-controlled drug, we can’t give you a handy Amazon link for this one.

    However, many physicians are willing to prescribe it for off-label use (i.e., for reasons other than diabetes), so speak with yours (telehealth options may also be available).

    If you do plan to speak with your doctor and you’re not sure they’ll be agreeable, you might want to get this paper and print it to take it with you:

    Off-label indications of Metformin – Review of Literature

    Take care!

    Share This Post

  • Bored of Lunch – by Nathan Anthony

    10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.

    Cooking with a slow cooker is famously easy, but often we settle down on a few recipes and then don’t vary. This book brings a healthy dose of inspiration and variety.

    The recipes themselves range from comfort food to fancy entertaining, pasta dishes to risottos, and even what the author categorizes as “fakeaways” (a play on the British English “takeaway”, cf. AmE “takeout”), so indulgent nights in have never been healthier!

    For each recipe, you’ll see a nice simple clear layout of all you’d expect (ingredients, method, etc) plus calorie count, so that you can have a rough idea of how much food each meal is.

    In terms of dietary restrictions you may have, there’s quite a variety here so it’ll be easy to find things for all needs, and in addition to that, optional substitutions are mostly quite straightforward too.

    Bottom line: if you have a slow cooker but have been cooking only the same three things in it for the past ten years, this is the book to liven things up, while staying healthy!

    Click here to check out Bored of Lunch: The Healthy Slow Cooker Book, and take the effort out of healthy cooking!

    Share This Post

  • Astaxanthin: Super-Antioxidant & Neuroprotectant

    10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.

    Think Pink For Brain Health!

    Astaxanthin is a carotenoid that’s found in:

    • certain marine microalgae
    • tiny crustaceans that eat the algae
    • fish (and flamingos!) that eat the crustaceans

    Yes, it’s the one that makes things pink.

    But it does a lot more than that…

    Super-antioxidant

    Move over, green tea! Astaxanthin has higher antioxidant activity than most carotenoids. For example, it is 2–5 times more effective than alpha-carotene, lutein, beta-carotene, and lycopene:

    Antioxidant activities of astaxanthin and related carotenoids

    We can’t claim credit for naming it a super-antioxidant though, because:

    Astaxanthin: A super antioxidant from microalgae and its therapeutic potential

    Grow new brain cells

    Axtaxanthin is a neuroprotectant, but that’s to be expected from something with such a powerful antioxidant ability.

    What’s more special to astaxanthin is that it assists continued adult neurogenesis (creation of new brain cells):

    ❝The unique chemical structure of astaxanthin enables it to cross the blood-brain barrier and easily reach the brain, where it may positively influence adult neurogenesis.

    Furthermore, astaxanthin appears to modulate neuroinflammation by suppressing the NF-κB pathway, reducing the production of pro-inflammatory cytokines, and limiting neuroinflammation associated with aging and chronic microglial activation.

    By modulating these pathways, along with its potent antioxidant properties, astaxanthin may contribute to the restoration of a healthy neurogenic microenvironment, thereby preserving the activity of neurogenic niches during both normal and pathological aging. ❞

    Source: Dietary Astaxanthin: A Promising Antioxidant and Anti-Inflammatory Agent for Brain Aging and Adult Neurogenesis

    That first part is very important, by the way! There are so many things that our brain needs, and we can eat, but the molecules are unable to pass the blood-brain barrier, meaning they either get wasted, or used elsewhere, or dismantled for their constituent parts. In this case, it zips straight into the brain instead.

    See also:

    How To Grow New Brain Cells (At Any Age)

    (Probably) good for the joints, too

    First, astaxanthin got a glowing report in a study we knew not to trust blindly:

    A Multicenter, Randomized, Double-Blinded, Placebo-Controlled Clinical Trial to Evaluate the Efficacy and Safety of a Krill Oil, Astaxanthin, and Oral Hyaluronic Acid Complex on Joint Health in People with Mild Osteoarthritis

    …and breathe. What a title that was! But, did you catch why it’s not to be trusted blindly? It was down at the bottom…

    ❝Conflict of interest statement

    NOVAREX Co., Ltd. funded the study. Valensa International provided the FlexPro MD® ingredients, and NOVAREX Co., Ltd. encapsulated the test products (e.g., both FlexPro MD® and placebo)❞

    Studies where a supplement company funded the study are not necessarily corrupt, but they can certainly sway publication bias, i.e. the company funds a bunch of studies and then pulls funding from the ones that aren’t going the way it wants.

    So instead let’s look at:

    Astaxanthin attenuates joint inflammation induced by monosodium urate crystals

    and

    Astaxanthin ameliorates cartilage damage in experimental osteoarthritis

    …which had no such conflicts of interest.

    They agree that astaxanthin indeed does the things (attenuates joint inflammation & ameliorates cartilage damage).

    However, they are animal studies (rats), so we’d like to see studies with humans to be able to say for sure how much it helps these things.

    Summary of benefits

    Based on the available research, astaxanthin…

    • is indeed a super-antioxidant
    • is a neuroprotective agent
    • also assists adult neurogenesis
    • is probablygood for joints too

    How much do I take, and is it safe?

    A 2019 safety review concluded:

    ❝Recommended or approved doses varied in different countries and ranged between 2 and 24 mg.

    We reviewed 87 human studies, none of which found safety concerns with natural astaxanthin supplementation, 35 with doses ≥12 mg/day.❞

    Source: Astaxanthin: How much is too much? A safety review

    In short: for most people, it’s very safe and well-tolerated. If you consume it to an extreme, you will likely turn pink, much as you would turn orange if you did the same thing with carrots. But aside from that, the risks appear to be minimal.

    However! If you have a seafood allergy, please take care to get a supplement that’s made from microalgae, not one that’s made from krill or other crustaceans, or from other creatures that eat those.

    Where can I get it?

    We don’t sell it, but here’s an example product on Amazon, for your convenience

    Enjoy!

    Share This Post

Related Posts

  • Tofu vs Seitan – Which is Healthier?
  • Health Hacks from 20 Doctors

    10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.

    Doctor Mike’s Approach

    You may be used to Tuesday’s expert insights column, where we break down the work or research of a medical expert. Doctor Mike, the creator of the video below, has put us to shame, interviewing 20 experts and condensing it into one, sub 12-minute video.

    In short, Doctor Mike has interviewed medical professionals and asked them to share a unique piece of advice, specific to their field, that’s easy to incorporate into your daily routine. He calls them Health Hacks (hey, that sounds similar to our Life Hacks section).

    We aren’t going to list out all 20—you’ll have to watch the video for that—but here are a few of our favourites

    Toenail Fungus Treatment

    Dr. Dana Brems, a podiatrist, reveals that Vicks VapoRub has antifungal properties, and thus can be used on toenails affected by fungus.

    Water Intake Myth

    Dr. Rena Malik, a urologist, debunks the myth that everyone needs to drink eight glasses of water daily, advising people to drink when thirsty and monitor urine color for hydration.

    (You can see what we’ve written on this subject here, as well as here).

    Natural Lip Plumper

    Dr. Anthony Youn, a plastic surgeon, offers a simple recipe for plumping lips—add a drop or two of food-grade peppermint oil to your lip gloss.

    Toothbrushing Technique:

    Dr. Winters, an orthodontist, explains that brushing teeth at a 45-degree angle towards the gums is more effective than the common side-to-side method. See our thoughts on this here and here.

    Want more tips? Watch them all in the video below:

    How was the video? If you’ve discovered any great videos yourself that you’d like to share with fellow 10almonds readers, then please do email them to us!

    Don’t Forget…

    Did you arrive here from our newsletter? Don’t forget to return to the email to continue learning!

    Learn to Age Gracefully

    Join the 98k+ American women taking control of their health & aging with our 100% free (and fun!) daily emails:

  • Eye Exercises That Measurably Improve Your Vision

    10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.

    Our eyesight, like most of the rest of our body’s functions, will decline if not adequately maintained. Modern lifestyles see most of us indoors for most of the day (which means a reduced maximum focal length) and often looking at screens (even further reduced focal length), which means that part of our eyes responsible for focus will tend to atrophy and wither. And if we want to see something better, we adjust the settings instead of adjusting our eyes. However, it is perfectly possible to recover our clear youthful vision:

    See the results for yourself (and see them clearly!)

    The exercises that gave him the results he showed between the two tests, are:

    1. Blink for 30 seconds
    2. Focus on something in front and (keeping your focus on that stationary point) move your head left & right, upwards & downwards, and diagonally
    3. Take a break and blink for 30 seconds
    4. Keep your head still while you move your eyes left & right, upwards & downwards, and diagonally
    5. Focus on something in front while you move move your head left & right, upwards & downwards, and diagonally

    This should temporarily improve your vision immediately, because of what has been going on in the capillaries in and around your eyes, but sustained results require sustained (i.e. daily) practice. This is because the vasculature is only part of the mechanism; it’s also a matter of improving the muscles responsible for focusing the eyes—and like any muscles, it’s not a case of “do it once and enjoy the results forever”. So, even just 2–3 minutes each day is recommended.

    For more on all of this plus a visual demonstration, enjoy:

    Click Here If The Embedded Video Doesn’t Load Automatically!

    Want to learn more?

    You might also like to read:

    Are Your Glasses Making Your Eyesight Worse?

    or, if you are very serious about having excellent vision for life:

    Vision for Life, Revised Edition – by Dr. Meir Schneider ← this one’s a book, and a very good one at that

    Take care!

    Don’t Forget…

    Did you arrive here from our newsletter? Don’t forget to return to the email to continue learning!

    Learn to Age Gracefully

    Join the 98k+ American women taking control of their health & aging with our 100% free (and fun!) daily emails:

  • PlantYou: Scrappy Cooking – by Carleigh Bodrug

    10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.

    This is a book that took “whole foods plant-based diet” and ran with it.

    “Whole foods”, you say? Carleigh Bodrug has you covered in this guide to using pretty much everything.

    One of the greatest strengths of the book is its “Got this? Make that” section, for using up those odds and ends that you’d normally toss.

    You may be thinking: “ok, but if to use this unusual ingredient I have to buy four other ingredients to make this recipe, generating waste from those other ingredients, then this was a bad idea”, but fear not.

    Bodrug covers that too, and in many cases leftover “would get wasted” ingredients can get turned into stuff that can go into longer-term storage one way or another, to use at leisure.

    Which also means that on the day “there’s nothing in the house to eat” and you don’t want to go grocery-shopping, or if some global disaster causes the supply lines to fail and the stores become empty (that could never happen though, right?), you will have the mystical ability to conjure a good meal out of assorted odds and ends that you stored because of this book.

    Bottom line: if you love food and hate food waste, this is a great book for you.

    Click here to check out Scrappy Cooking, and do domestic magic!

    Don’t Forget…

    Did you arrive here from our newsletter? Don’t forget to return to the email to continue learning!

    Learn to Age Gracefully

    Join the 98k+ American women taking control of their health & aging with our 100% free (and fun!) daily emails: