How to Choose the Best Hydrogen Tablets for Water

If you’re about to spend money on hydrogen tablets for water, it’s only natural that you’d want the best available.

Or, perhaps more accurately, hydrogen tablets that actually infuse your water with those beautiful, health-beneficial H₂gas molecules — instead of smoke and mirrors, like simply creating bubbles filled with carbon dioxide (as you’d see with any regular vitamin effervescent).

So, how do you separate the wheat from the chaff? We’ll tell you, but first, it’ll help if you understand:

The 3 types of hydrogen tablets for water

There are three types of hydrogen tablets for water on the market: closed-container, open-cup, and ingestible hydrogen tablets. Before discussing their differences, let’s discuss their commonality — how they produce hydrogen water.

Hydrogen water production

All hydrogen tablets for water contain a base metal and an edible acid:

Base metal: “Kickstarts” the production of molecular hydrogen gas by reacting with water. [Me + H₂O → xH₂+ Me_y(OH)_x]
Edible acid: Prevents the passivation (i.e., “stopping”) of the reaction between the base metal and water by reacting with the resulting metal hydroxide.

How the hydrogen tablets differ

Now that that’s out of the way, here’s how the 3 types of hydrogen tablets for water differ.

Closed-container hydrogen tablets

These require you to drop the tablet in a bottle of water, screw it shut (explaining the term “closed-container”), then wait.

Most tablets produce around 1 ppm (1 mg in 1 liter of water) of H₂ in 473.2 ml of water in 15 minutes and 2 ppm of H₂ in 8 hours.

That said, closed-container hydrogen tablets aren’t all that popular these days because:

The reaction takes a long time
You'd need to use an aluminium bottle (H₂is so small that it’ll leak out of any other material), and
Open-cup hydrogen tablets give you a higher molecular hydrogen ppm in less time

Open-cup hydrogen tablets

Grab a regular cup. Fill it with water.

Drop your open-cup hydrogen tablet in, and indulge in hydrogen water that may contain up to 10 ppm of molecular hydrogen in minutes.

That’s a five-fold increase from what you’d get from an excruciating 8-hour wait with closed-container hydrogen tablets. Plus, those precious hydrogen molecules would be in your body quicker than they can escape.

Ingestible hydrogen tablets

Technically speaking, these are capsules you swallow with a gulp of water.

The main concern with these is that you may not be drinking enough water to allow for the maximal reaction of the base metal.

In other words, you may get way less molecular hydrogen than marketed.

OK, so that gives you the first thing to look out for when choosing hydrogen tablets for water.

Go for the right type, which gives you the highest molecular hydrogen concentration in the least time without leakage concerns: open-cup hydrogen tablets.

What else is important?

Molecular hydrogen concentration

Remember when we said open-cup hydrogen tablets for water could produce up to 10 ppm of molecular hydrogen? Yeah, unfortunately, that doesn’t apply to all open-cup hydrogen tablets — but only the very best.

That’s because the amount of base metal and acids in a tablet can differ from brand to brand, which affects the chemical reactions.

Now, of course, you don’t need to go to the extreme of:

Demanding the exact composition of a company’s hydrogen tablet, then
Getting a chemistry professor to work out the resulting molecular H₂ concentration

We mean, you could if you wanted to.

But it just sounds like a lot of hassle — especially when there’s the easier alternative of seeing whether a company has subjected its resulting molecular hydrogen concentration claims to reliable third-party testing and certification.

For the uninitiated, third-party testing and certification is a quality control process where an independent organization reviews a product to see if it meets certain standards.

But the keyword here is reliable. Not all third-party organizations are trustworthy.

Watch out for ISHA-certification

The third-party certification worth looking for in the hydrogen tablets industry is from the International Hydrogen Standards Association (ISHA).

The ISHA is a group of prominent researchers studying molecular hydrogen as a therapeutic agent, including Tyler W. LeBaron, MSC, Ph.D., the founder of the science-based, nonprofit Molecular Hydrogen Institute. To receive IHSA certification, a hydrogen tablet will need to:

Provide at least 0.5 ppm regardless of source water composition
Be free of toxins, heavy metals, and contaminants
Stay true to its marketing claims (i.e., produce however much ppm it said it does)

A note on therapeutic dosage: 0.5 ppm is the lowest threshold in which any evidence shows that it could provide any benefit.

In most cases, a higher dose will be necessary for most people to reap the health benefits of hydrogen water, from glycemic management to weight management to optimal gut health.

Well, how much higher, exactly?

Research suggests an optimal therapeutic dose of 1.6 to 7.2 mg of molecular H₂ daily. To convert that to ppm terms, you’ll first need to determine how many liters of hydrogen water you wish to drink daily.

For example, let’s peg it at 500 ml (that’s roughly 2 cups of water).

To get 1.6 mg of molecular H₂, you’d need a tablet with at least 3.2 ppm in 2 cups. And to get 7.2 mg of molecular H₂, you’d need a tablet with at least 14.4 ppm* in 2 cups.

*Unfortunately, no hydrogen tablet has yet to produce such a high concentration; the highest available on the market is 10 ppm, which is already way higher than what you’d get from a hydrogen water machine.

Other bioactives

Depending on the specific base metal and acids used, hydrogen tablets for water may also produce other health-beneficial compounds. Think of them as a nice little bonus.

So, using Nutrionic™ H₂Energizer tablets as an example, you’d get magnesium, malic acid, and tartaric acid.

“Um, so how are those good for me?” Great question; here’s the answer:

Magnesium: Up to 50% of the US population is magnesium deficient, which is concerning given the mineral’s role in maintaining healthy cellular functions, bone strength, muscle contractions, nervous system function, and more. So, the magnesium by-product from Nutrionic^TMH₂ Energizer tablets’ reaction with water could potentially plug any dietary gaps you may have.
Malic acid: Your body uses it for energy production.
Tartaric acid: A naturally occurring antioxidant found in grapes and wine. Linked with beneficial effects on blood pressure and blood glucose levels in animal studies.

So, look at the list of ingredients for the hydrogen tablet and ask yourself what else it provides in addition to molecular hydrogen.

And if you’re sick of screening through plenty of other hydrogen tablets for water alternatives that made you go, “Ugh, nothing else”, as mentioned earlier, here’s 1 that bucks the trend: Nutrionic™ H₂Energizer tablets.

They tick everything you’re looking for: