Copper peptides: what the studies say
What are copper peptides?
A peptide is a short chain of amino acids, the little blocks that proteins are built from. 🧱 A copper peptide is one of those chains holding a tiny bit of copper.
The best known one is GHK-Cu. On a label it goes by copper tripeptide-1. ✨
Lots of other ingredients have copper in the name too. Each one is its own ingredient, with its own studies, or none.
Do copper peptides help with wrinkles?
One of them has a real face study. 🧪
40 women aged 40 to 65 put a serum with copper tripeptide-1 on one side of the face, twice a day for 8 weeks. The other side got the same serum without it. Wrinkle volume went down more on the copper peptide side. 🙌
The paper doesn't say how much copper peptide was in the serum, and a skincare company paid for the study. So it's a good sign, with a question mark next to the amount. 🤔
Reference: Badenhorst et al., 2016
Did copper peptides help skin after a laser treatment?
Not in a way the tools could measure. 🔬 In a small trial, 13 people finished a care plan after a CO2 laser treatment, with or without a copper tripeptide product.
Measured redness and wrinkles didn't differ clearly between the groups. People using the copper product did rate their skin quality better on a questionnaire.
Reference: Miller et al., 2006
The tools saw no clear change, but people felt their skin was better. 📝 The study was about care after a laser treatment, so it says little about an everyday serum. The wrinkles page shows which ingredients have the most study for lines.
What about the other copper peptides?
Labels can also say things like copper tripeptide-34 or copper palmitoyl heptapeptide-14. 🔍
Searches of the big paper libraries haven't turned up a published skin study on people for those yet. That is different from "they don't work". It means nobody has shown it in a paper so far.
So the face study above belongs to copper tripeptide-1 only.
Is palmitoyl tripeptide-1 a copper peptide?
Nope! 🙅 The names sound alike, but palmitoyl tripeptide-1 has no copper in it. It's the peptide in lots of "peptide" serums.
A study on copper tripeptide-1 says nothing about it, and the other way around.
How do you read a copper peptide label?
Three quick checks do it. 🏷️ Find the exact name, look at where it sits in the ingredient list, and make sure two products in your routine aren't doing the same job.
Everything you need is printed on the box.
1. Find the exact name
Look for "copper tripeptide-1" in the ingredient list. 🏷️ A different name is a different ingredient.
2. Check its spot on the list
Ingredients are listed from the biggest amount down. The tiny ones, at 1% or less, can go in any order after that. So the spot is a hint about the amount. It can't tell you the percent.
Reference: US Food and Drug Administration, 2016
3. One is enough
Two products in your routine both carry a copper peptide? 👀 You're probably paying for the same job twice. Keep the one you like better.
Is there a shortcut?
Reading every label takes time, and that's okay! ⏳
The free skin quiz asks about your skin and picks a routine of 3, 5 or 7 steps, with every ingredient checked.