Ammonium glycyrrhizinate.
The sweet salt from licorice root, used to sweeten water-based products. Gut bacteria convert it to glycyrrhetinic acid, which changes how the body handles sodium and potassium.
- Category
- Compound
What Ammonium glycyrrhizinate is, and what it does.
- Does it work
- Worth knowing about whenever it is on a label, even as a sweetener, since the body handles it the same either way. If you watch your blood pressure or potassium, ask your doctor first.
- How much to take
- No dose figure is on record here. What matters more than a target is your total daily licorice intake across everything, because the effect tracks dose and duration.
- Time to feel it
- The sweetness registers immediately. The sodium and potassium effect builds over days to weeks of regular intake rather than after a single serving.
- The first dose
- A distinct sweet, faintly bitter licorice taste. One day's intake does not move sodium or potassium in any way you would notice.
- With regular use
- Weeks of regular intake can raise sodium retention and lower potassium, which shows up on a blood panel and in blood pressure readings.
- How well tolerated
- This is the part of licorice that carries the mineralocorticoid effect. Keep daily intake modest, and check with your doctor if you take a diuretic or watch your potassium.
- How it feels
- Sweet, with the unmistakable licorice edge. Some people notice mild puffiness with steady intake. At flavouring amounts most notice only the taste.
- The overlooked benefit
- Deglycyrrhizinated licorice is not a smaller dose of this. It is licorice with this molecule taken out, so the two behave differently at the same gram weight.
The proof, claim by claim.
These words describe the research, not the molecule's worth. Research strength is how much work stands behind one claim, and it is never a product score.
- Inhibition of 11-beta-hydroxysteroid dehydrogenase type 2Randomised trial
- Sodium retention and potassium loss with regular intakeRandomised trial
- Blood pressure response to licorice intakeMeta-analysis
- Gut bacterial conversion to glycyrrhetinic acidNarrative review
- Use as a sweetener and flavour in water-based productsNarrative review
Why these belong in the same formula. Each row says what the basis is, from settled biochemistry through to a trial that measured the pair.
Glycyrrhetinic acid inhibits 11-beta-hydroxysteroid dehydrogenase type 2 in the kidney, which lets cortisol act on the mineralocorticoid receptor and drives sodium retention with potassium loss. Sustained intake can lower serum potassium. Anyone taking this alongside a potassium-depleting diuretic, or with low intake to begin with, should have the level checked. This is settled pharmacology, not a theoretical concern.
The same enzyme inhibition promotes renal sodium and water retention, which raises blood pressure in a dose-related way. High salt intake pushes in the same direction. People with elevated blood pressure should count this as one of the ingredients that matters most.
Ammonium glycyrrhizinate is the ammonium salt of the principal active in licorice root. Taking both means taking the same molecule twice, and the total is what determines the mineralocorticoid effect. Blends and teas make this easy to miss because only one of the two may be listed by name.
Renal potassium wasting is frequently accompanied by magnesium losses, and low magnesium makes potassium harder to restore because it impairs renal potassium retention. When glycyrrhizin intake has pushed potassium down, magnesium status is part of the picture. This is standard electrolyte physiology.
Dandelion root is used for its diuretic effect and shifts fluid and electrolyte handling. Layered on top of glycyrrhizin-driven potassium loss, the combined direction of travel is downward potassium. Anyone combining herbal diuretics with licorice constituents should be aware of the overlap.
Both raise blood pressure through different routes, caffeine acutely through sympathetic and vascular effects and glycyrrhizin sustainedly through sodium retention. In someone already at the upper end of normal, the two add. The size of the combined effect depends heavily on dose and habituation.
Both appear in the same throat and upper digestive soothing preparations, where mucilage and licorice constituents are combined by long convention. The pairing is formulation tradition rather than a demonstrated interaction. Note that the licorice constituent is the one carrying the electrolyte consequence.
Slippery elm mucilage and licorice constituents are combined in soothing gut and throat blends. Their mechanisms do not overlap, the pairing simply covers two registers of the same complaint. The combination is convention.
Glycyrrhizin is intensely sweet with a long lingering profile. It is used in lozenges and liquids specifically to mask bitterness alongside mint flavouring. When it appears at that level it is a formulation aid, though the mineralocorticoid effect does not switch off just because the intent is flavour.
Nothing specific on file for Ammonium glycyrrhizinate. Match the label to the daily amount above, and tell your doctor what you take.
Not medical advice. Show the label to your pharmacist.What Ammonium glycyrrhizinate actually does.
Ammonium glycyrrhizinate is a salt form of the sweet-tasting compound found in licorice root. The salt form exists mainly to make the otherwise poorly water-soluble compound usable in water-based products.
Gut bacteria break down glycyrrhizin by removing two sugar units, releasing a smaller compound. That smaller compound, not the original one, is what's responsible for the effects felt throughout the body.
That breakdown product blocks an enzyme in the kidney that normally deactivates cortisol. With that enzyme blocked, cortisol acts on a receptor it shouldn't, leading to sodium retention, potassium loss and higher blood pressure.
The effect is dose and duration dependent and reversible on stopping, though the half-life of the effect is long enough that blood pressure and potassium can take weeks to settle back.
Where Ammonium glycyrrhizinate comes from.
It is the sweet part of licorice root, pulled out and turned into a salt so it dissolves in water. It is worth knowing it is in a product even when it is there only for sweetness, because the body handles it the same way either way.
Made from a plant. What ends up in the capsule tracks the harvest, so batch testing and a stated marker matter more here than with a made molecule.
Dried roots and stolons of Glycyrrhiza glabra, Glycyrrhiza uralensis or Glycyrrhiza inflata. Glycyrrhizin content varies by species, growing region and root age.
Milled root is extracted with hot water or dilute ammonia, pulling the glycoside into solution along with flavonoids and polysaccharides.
Acidification precipitates crude glycyrrhizic acid, which is washed and recrystallised to remove flavonoid and polysaccharide co-extractives.
The purified free acid is neutralised with ammonia to form the mono or diammonium salt, then dried.
Content is specified as percent glycyrrhizinate, typically at high purity for pharmaceutical grades and lower for food grades.
Supplied as a white to pale yellow water-soluble powder for liquids, lozenges, topicals and food.
Getting Ammonium glycyrrhizinate from food.
The whole-food sources on file. A supplement closes the gap, it does not replace dinner.
A gram-for-gram figure (how much of each you would eat to match a dose) will appear here once it is sourced and reviewed. This page will not print a number it cannot cite.
The forms it comes in.
The essence, in one line each.
- Narrative review of glycyrrhizin preparations used in liver conditions, surveying proposed mechanisms and reported clinical use.Narrative review. Ma T et al., 2026 (Frontiers in Pharmacology). PMID 42147312 ↗
These are the studies our verdict leans on, chosen from the 1 we read for Ammonium glycyrrhizinate. The full linked list is below.
The studies, linked.
1 source behind our Ammonium glycyrrhizinate verdict: peer-reviewed studies and registered clinical trials. Every one links straight to PubMed, the journal, or ClinicalTrials.gov. Read them yourself.
- Clinical trialThe Effect of Administration of Glycyrrhizin During Induction Period on the Occurrence of Postoperative Nausea and Vomiting After Breast SurgeryClinicalTrials.gov ↗224 participants, Completed
Evidence surfaced via Semantic Scholar (Allen Institute for AI) and ClinicalTrials.gov. Ranked by study type and citation weight, not cherry-picked.
Problems people have reported.
Read this carefully. These are 152 voluntary, unverified reactions reported to the FDA (openFDA). The number mostly reflects how popular Ammonium glycyrrhizinate is, not how risky it is. A report is not proof Ammonium glycyrrhizinate caused anything. It is a signal of what to watch for, nothing more.
Source: openFDA adverse-event reports. Voluntary reporting, not an incidence rate.
FDA Disclaimer: These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. This information is for educational purposes only and is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease. Consult your healthcare provider before starting any supplement regimen.