Boswellia serrata

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The short answer

Standardized extracts may reduce osteoarthritis pain over weeks, but formulations differ.

Evidence and scope: Conditional or population-specific
This status does not grade the ingredient for every goal, outcome, or person.
Important limitation: Benefit depends on the population, formulation, baseline status, and objective; results should not be generalized.
Before deciding: Key concern: Anticoagulants, anti-inflammatory medicines, pregnancy, reflux, and surgery require review.

01 / PRACTICAL GUIDE

Dose, absorption, and combinations

These are indication-specific reference or studied ranges—not a personalized prescription. Start with the objective, then check the form, label, medicines, and health conditions.

Reference range by objective

Joint symptoms100–250 mg/day enriched extract or product-equivalent

Reference or studied range—not a personalized prescription. The product label or a clinician may specify a different dose.

Dose source ↗

More is not automatically better. A clinician or product label may specify a different amount.

Absorption / solubilityFat-soluble / lipid-based

Fat-soluble or lipid-based. Absorption generally improves with a meal containing fat.

How it is commonly taken

Take with food; match the extract standardization.

Do not combine casually

Anticoagulants, anti-inflammatory medicines, pregnancy, reflux, and surgery require review.

Dose and use source ↗

Dose and use links lead to primary or official source material. Search links are discovery tools, not proof that every returned paper applies.

02 / EVIDENCE

What the research says

We keep supportive, mixed, negative, safety, and contextual findings together. The headline never replaces the underlying papers.

1research papers in this ledger

5unique primary studies represented

—unique participants represented

These are audited counts for this JIVANA collection, not search-result totals. Participants are counted once when multiple papers use the same cohort; review papers are not added again to participant totals.

Open the research timelineResearch timeline

Entries are ordered by publication year. A study period appears only when the source reports it.

2014

Mixed or qualifiedPMID 24848732 · CD002947

Oral Boswellia products for osteoarthritis

Two small trials provided high-quality evidence that one enriched 100 mg extract improved pain and function over 90 days. Other extracts had moderate-, low-, or very-low-quality evidence; long-term safety, quality of life, structural effects, and interchangeability remain unresolved.

Published: 2014Duration: Up to 90 days in the best-supported enriched-extract trials5 primary studies represented

Study design and methods

Design: Cochrane systematic review; 5 trials of 3 Boswellia extracts
Population: Adults with osteoarthritis; extract-specific participant totals were reported for subsets, not as one clean total
Intervention: Multiple enriched or standard Boswellia serrata extracts versus placebo or active control
Outcome: Pain, physical function, adverse events, quality of life, and structural change

Funding or conflict note: The review reported no known conflicts.

Open research record ↗

Unscreened discovery appendix—not evidence34 candidate publicationsSearch run: Aug 21, 2026

Complete for the displayed PubMed query at the search timestamp—not for all databases or every possible synonym. Candidates can be irrelevant, duplicate the same study, or report negative findings. They are never summed as evidence or participants until screened.

03 / SOURCES

Start with the source material

Official evidence overviewPubMed bounded human-evidence search Live PubMed discovery searchNational Library of Medicine

The live search is for discovery only. Search-result counts change and are not included in the audited totals above.

Recent PubMed discovery recordsDirect links to the first 12 records returned by the reproducible search. These are discovery candidates—not reviewed summaries or a count of supportive findings.

04 / EXPERT CONTEXT

Expert context—not evidence

Expert positions are dated context—not scientific evidence. They never raise the evidence status or become consensus by repetition.

No direct, source-verified endorsement is currently recorded. Research authorship or discussion alone is not treated as endorsement.