Supplement press release rules: claims, disclaimers and disclosures (with checklist)

Supplements are the busiest category we screen and the one with the highest rejection rate, because the rules come from three places and most drafts only know one of them. This guide puts the three together, with the wording regulators and outlets actually use. It is written for brands and for affiliates who publish releases about a brand; the affiliate-specific disclosures are in their own section.

Why the rules bite harder in 2026

• The audience is everyone. Pew found in July 2026 that 78% of US adults take at least one supplement; Nutrition Business Journal put 2025 US sales at $74 billion, up 7.1%.
• The FDA reads social posts as labeling. A June 2026 warning letter treated a brand's reposted Instagram testimonials about blood pressure, joint pain and glucose as disease claims. A press release is a far more visible document than a repost.
• The FTC is collecting. In April 2026 it took a $4 million judgment against TruHeight over a “clinically proven” claim and thousands of employee-written five-star reviews. Its rule on fake reviews and testimonials has been in force since October 2024, with civil penalties of up to $53,088 per violation, and it sent a round of warning letters in late 2025.
• The cheap wires have left. EIN Presswire, the $149 route to AP News, now states that it “does not allow any health supplement content”, whatever the claims. The outlets that remain read more carefully.

Rulebook 1: the FDA decides what you can claim

Structure/function, not disease

A supplement may describe how a nutrient or ingredient affects the structure or function of the body. It may not claim to diagnose, treat, cure, mitigate or prevent a disease, and the regulation defines a disease claim broadly: an effect on a disease or its signs or symptoms, stated or implied through the product name, the formulation, a citation, a picture, or a suggestion that the product replaces a therapy (21 CFR 101.93(g)). The FDA's own examples in its structure/function compliance guide draw the line clearly:

Two traps catch careful writers. A disease name anywhere in the release, even in a cited study title, can turn a safe sentence into a claim. And a product name can be a claim by itself: “CholesterolFix” is a disease claim before the first paragraph.

The disclaimer, exactly

Where a release makes a structure/function claim, it carries this sentence, with no edits:

This statement has not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease.

With more than one claim it begins “These statements have not been evaluated”. On a label the rule requires it adjacent to the claim or linked by a symbol and set off in a box, in bold type no smaller than one-sixteenth of an inch; in a release, put it at the end of the section that makes the claims, in full, and once. The regulation also requires the manufacturer to notify the FDA within 30 days of first marketing a product with a structure/function claim; a release does not need its own notification, but it cannot claim more than the label does.

Rulebook 2: the FTC decides what counts as proof

Substantiation

The FTC's Health Products Compliance Guidance (December 2022) expects health claims to rest on competent and reliable scientific evidence, defined as studies conducted and evaluated objectively by experts, and it calls randomized controlled human trials “the most reliable form of evidence”. Three of its examples settle common arguments:

• “Clinically proven” requires proof that matches the claim: a trial of the product, at the dose sold, showing the effect claimed.
• A study of an ingredient supports a statement about the ingredient, at the studied dose. If your product contains a quarter of that dose, the study does not support your claim.
• The DSHEA disclaimer does not cure a deceptive claim. Writing “not evaluated by the FDA” under a cure claim changes nothing.

The safe pattern is attribution: “Magnesium glycinate has been studied for its role in sleep quality, according to a 2021 review in the Journal of X,” followed by the label fact, “each serving contains 300 mg.” The release reports the study and the label; it does not promise the result.

Testimonials and typical results

The same guidance says testimonials that report results more dramatic than users can generally expect are likely to be deceptive, and that “results not typical” does not fix them. The revised Endorsement Guides go further: an ad with a testimonial must state the results consumers can generally expect. For a press release the practical rule is simpler: no customer testimonials. Outlets rarely run them, and a named spokesperson with a factual quote does the job.

Four more FTC examples worth memorising

• Implying FDA approval is deceptive; supplements are not approved, and the disclaimer says so.
• “Without the side effects” of a drug is itself a safety claim that needs proof.
• Weight-loss claims have a published list of always-false statements, such as losing two pounds or more a week for a month without diet or exercise.
• Reviews and testimonials must be genuine: no fabricated, bought or employee-written reviews, and no suppressing negative ones. That is a rule with per-violation penalties, not a guideline.

Rulebook 3: the outlet decides whether it will run it

Each wire publishes its own supplement policy, and they are far apart:

Headlines have a rule of their own. In our experience GlobeNewswire rejects “review” or “reviews” in a title, while national press-release sections accept the word in a factual frame. The way around it is to use a launch or label-disclosure headline on the wire and a reviews-style headline on the national outlet, which is how supplement brands rank for “[brand] reviews”. Our directory marks which outlets accept the category, and the supplement distribution page lists them.

Words that get a release rejected, or a letter sent

Disclosures for affiliates and sponsored placements

If the release or article is published by, or earns money for, someone other than the brand, two more rules apply. The FTC requires any material connection between endorser and marketer to be disclosed clearly and conspicuously; its own sample wording for affiliates is “I get commissions for purchases made through links in this post”, visible without clicking “more”; a “Disclosure” button that readers can skip does not count. And Google asks publishers to mark paid links with rel="sponsored", which is why outlets label sponsored content and set link attributes themselves; what you get is explained in dofollow or nofollow: what links you really get.

Links in the release itself follow the wires' arithmetic: about one per 100 words, to the brand's official domain. Affiliate tracking lives on that domain, where the outlet permits a redirect; a raw network link in the text is rejected at most outlets and marks the release as an affiliate review at the others. The channel-by-channel version of this is in how to promote supplements without Meta ads.

Two state rules worth a line

• California Proposition 65 requires a warning before exposing Californians to any of more than 800 listed chemicals; businesses with fewer than ten employees are exempt. It is a label and website matter, but a release that says “no warnings required” had better be right.
• New York bans the sale of supplements marketed for weight loss or muscle building to anyone under 18 (General Business Law §391-oo); the Second Circuit left it in force in November 2025. Releases that pitch those categories to students or young athletes are a problem beyond the wire.

The 14-point checklist

1. Every claim is structure/function: supports, helps maintain, promotes. No cure, treat, prevent, heal.
2. No disease name anywhere, including product name, study titles and image captions.
3. Every ingredient statement is attributed to the label (“each serving contains”) or to a cited study of the ingredient at a comparable dose.
4. No “clinically proven” unless a trial of this product supports this claim; the trial is cited.
5. The FDA disclaimer appears once, in full, unedited, at the end of the claims section; plural form if there is more than one claim.
6. No customer testimonials, before/after photos or results promises.
7. No implied FDA approval; “FDA-registered facility” only if true.
8. No safety claims: no “no side effects”, “100% safe”, “natural so safe”.
9. Superlatives (#1, best, doctor recommended) are cut or attributed to a named source.
10. The full ingredient list is in the release or one click away on the official site.
11. Links: about one per 100 words, to the official domain only; tracking handled on that domain.
12. Any paid or affiliate connection is disclosed in the FTC's plain wording, where readers see it.
13. The headline names the company and the news; “reviews” only on outlets that accept it.
14. The outlet accepts supplements in this sub-category (weight loss, sexual health and hormone products have their own exclusions) before the draft is written.