MSM
A sulphur compound found in food, taken mainly for aching, stiff joints.
- Joint pain and stiffness
- Exercise recovery
A plain-English overview, not advice. Written from published reviews and trials and from what people say in public forums.
On this page
What is MSM?
MSM is short for methylsulfonylmethane, a naturally occurring sulphur compound that is present in small amounts in many everyday foods. It is chemically related to dimethyl sulfoxide, better known as DMSO, and the two have often been studied side by side. It is sold on its own, and it is also a common ingredient in blends, where it sits alongside other nutrients rather than being the only active thing in the tub. It has become a popular supplement over the years, taken for a range of purposes, and the one researchers describe as commonest is as an anti-inflammatory.
Why do people take MSM?
Joint pain and stiffness
The thinking. Aching, stiff knees are what most people buy MSM for. Part of the thinking is practical: the anti-inflammatory tablets usually taken for worn joints can be hard on the stomach, so researchers went looking for gentler options to test. Most of the trials were run in adults with osteoarthritis of the knee.
What research has found. Five randomised trials measured knee pain and function in 49 to 180 adults over eight to twelve weeks, and a systematic review of two older trials covered 168 adults between them. Most found pain and physical function a little better than on a dummy tablet, though the differences were small, stiffness did not move in two of them, and a trial in young military trainees found nothing; in one trial everyone took glucosamine and chondroitin and only half of them also took MSM, so it tested MSM added to a blend rather than on its own. The review called the evidence positive but not definitive. A fair body of trials has looked at this, and most point the same way.
Exercise recovery
The thinking. The other thing people reach for MSM for is recovery: the soreness and heaviness that follow a long run or a hard session. Runners often say that pain and soreness are what knock their training off course, so anything that might blunt them gets tried. The same anti-inflammatory and antioxidant properties are the idea here, applied to muscles rather than joints.
What research has found. Four small trials, most of them with around twenty people, gave MSM for ten days to a month before a 14 km run or a half-marathon. Two found blood markers of muscle damage and oxidative stress lower than in the group given plain water, and the body’s own antioxidant measures higher. A third found no statistically significant difference on any measure, although muscle and joint pain fell by an amount the researchers called clinically meaningful; the newest, with five runners on it and five on a dummy, measured immune-related gene activity and reported changes without saying which way they cut. Research here is still young: a few studies so far, mostly pointing the same way.
What does MSM do in the body?
MSM is a sulphur-containing compound, and it is neither a vitamin nor a drug. The body meets small amounts of it in ordinary food; a supplement simply supplies a great deal more. Researchers describe it as having anti-inflammatory and antioxidant properties, and that description is what almost every study of it has been built to test, in animals first and then in people.
What that means in practice shows in what the trials measure. In the exercise studies, blood was drawn before and after a long run for creatine kinase and lactate dehydrogenase, which the researchers use as measures of muscle damage, and for a set of markers they use to gauge oxidative stress. Alongside those they measured glutathione, in both its spent and its unspent forms, and the ratio between the two, which is treated as a measure of antioxidant capacity in reserve. The joint trials come at it from the other end, with questionnaires that score pain, stiffness and how easily a knee gets through an ordinary day.
What do people say about taking MSM?
These are anecdotes people have shared, not evidence.
What people like
- The accounts are scattered across joint, skin, raw-food and allergy communities, and one is a site of submitted remedy reports, where posts lean positive.
- In the joint threads a few describe easier knees or hips, though nearly always while taking glucosamine, curcumin, vitamin D or fish oil as well.
- On the remedy-reports page, three of the four people taking it for allergies said their symptoms settled, one of them within hours of a first dose.
- One or two say it gives them something extra for exercise, and a couple took it hoping for clearer skin or faded scars.
Common complaints
- Taste is the commonest complaint: the powder is bitter enough that people stir it into water, juice or coffee and drink it quickly.
- Several cannot say what MSM itself did, because they started it alongside glucosamine, fish oil or three or four other things at once.
- One person taking it for allergies and back pain reported no change after nearly five weeks, and one poster doubted it does anything at all.
- One describes headaches and a flu-like spell in the first days, and another advises building the amount up slowly rather than starting high.
How people take it
- Powder is the form described most often, measured by the teaspoon or tablespoon and stirred into water, coffee or a shake.
- Amounts range from about 1,000 mg once or twice a day up to a tablespoon of powder two or three times daily.
- Hardly anyone takes it by itself: glucosamine, chondroitin, curcumin, vitamin C, vitamin D and fish oil are the usual companions in the joint threads.
- Those taking it for joints describe it as one item in a long-running list of supplements rather than a short course.
Read from these public discussions:
- MSM supplement (BoneSmart joint replacement forum, 2010)
- Supplements for joint pain? What works? (Mumsnet, 2021)
- To ask if you take any supplements and if so what difference have they made? (Mumsnet, 2026)
- Maca and msm, how do you overcome the taste? (The Rawtarian community)
- MSM Powder makes Vitamins work better? (Acne.org forum, 2011)
- MSM for Allergies (Earth Clinic, 2018)
What forms of MSM are there?
| Form | What’s different | Per serving, on products we list |
|---|---|---|
| MSM | Methylsulfonylmethane itself: there is one form, so labels differ in the amount per serving, not the chemistry. | 1 g to 1.6 g |
What else is worth knowing about MSM?
- A safety review describes it as well tolerated by most people at up to four grams a day, with few and mild side effects, and notes that it carries Generally Recognised As Safe status. The military trial recorded three grams a day being used safely over eight weeks.
- Labels give the amount per serving, and a serving is often more than one tablet: in one knee trial people took ten 200 mg tablets a day to reach two grams. Across the trials the daily amount ranged from about one gram to six grams.
- Nearly everyone in these trials was either an adult with knee osteoarthritis, aged 40 to 90, or a healthy runner, trainee or young man, and the trials ran from ten days to twelve weeks. The systematic review said the best dose and the longer-term safety of taking it were still to be worked out.
- It is often sold combined with other nutrients rather than on its own, which matters when comparing prices: a blend’s price per dose covers everything in the capsule, not the MSM alone.
If you take medication, are pregnant, or have a health condition, check with a pharmacist or GP first.
The research behind this page (11 studies)
- Systematic review of the nutritional supplements dimethyl sulfoxide (DMSO) and methylsulfonylmethane (MSM) in the treatment of osteoarthritis. (2008, systematic review)
- Methylsulfonylmethane Improves Knee Quality of Life in Participants with Mild Knee Pain: A Randomized, Double-Blind, Placebo-Controlled Trial. (2023, randomised trial)
- Comparison of Glucosamine-Chondroitin Sulfate with and without Methylsulfonylmethane in Grade I-II Knee Osteoarthritis: A Double Blind Randomized Controlled Trial. (2017, randomised trial)
- A randomized controlled trial evaluating methylsulfonylmethane versus placebo to prevent knee pain in military initial entry trainees. (2017, randomised trial)
- Efficacy of methylsulfonylmethane supplementation on osteoarthritis of the knee: a randomized controlled study. (2011, randomised trial)
- Efficacy of methylsulfonylmethane (MSM) in osteoarthritis pain of the knee: a pilot clinical trial. (2006, randomised trial)
- Using the Rise and Fall of Oxidative Stress and Inflammation Post-Exercise to Evaluate the Effect of Methylsulfonylmethane Supplementation on Immune Response mRNA. (2025, randomised trial)
- Effects of Methylsulfonylmethane (MSM) on exercise-induced oxidative stress, muscle damage, and pain following a half-marathon: a double-blind, randomized, placebo-controlled trial. (2017, randomised trial)
- Effect of methylsulfonylmethane supplementation on exercise - Induced muscle damage and total antioxidant capacity. (2012, randomised trial)
- Effect of chronic supplementation with methylsulfonylmethane on oxidative stress following acute exercise in untrained healthy men. (2011, randomised trial)
- Methylsulfonylmethane: Applications and Safety of a Novel Dietary Supplement. (2017, review)
How much does MSM cost?
That depends on the form and the pack, so we work out the price of the same dose of every MSM product we can find and rank them.