Dr. Mercola Multivitamin Review – A Proper Waste Of Money?

In this Dr. Mercola Multivitamin review (which is short for Dr. Mercola Whole Food Multivitamin Plus review), we will do a proper dive into all of the specifics as far as the particular supplement goes.

Hence, this article is about starting out with the manufacturer’s claims and promotional materials. That we will continue with going into the quality of the specific vitamin and minerals. Then it will be the turn of looking at all the other added beneficial substances. That we will continue with additives, a look at customer reviews, and global success rates.

Dr. Mercola Multivitamin Review – Initial Thoughts & Overview

I don’t do this often, but I would want to address the proper name of the Dr. Mercola Multivitamin first. Personally, I found it somewhat confusing and distracting how it should be properly addressed. And as far as I can tell, people pretty much search for every variation imaginable when it comes to this [R, R].

So, the label says Dr. Mercola Whole Food Multivitamin. They themselves on their product pages address it as Dr. Mercola Whole Food Multivitamin Plus. Which to me, doesn’t quite make sense given that if we say, “plus” then, on one hand, we should commit to the lengthiest possible version of Dr. Mercola Whole Food Multivitamin Plus Vital Minerals or on the other hand, it implies that there is another Dr. Mercola Whole Food Multivitamin that isn’t a “plus.” Which is not the case.

And so, I think many rightfully just don’t bother and simply call it the Dr. Mercola Multivitamin. And to me, that does make sense because it’s their only multivitamin (apart from the women adaptation of it). And so, why bother with the long name? What I’m trying to say here it does not matter how you, me, or anyone else tend to refer to it. We’re all meaning the same thing. And this article is about it.

So, according to the manufacturer, the Dr. Mercola Whole Food Multivitamin Plus is “the multivitamin you can trust for completeness and quality.” As they put it, “Don’t waste your time and money on multivitamin supplements that miss the mark.” Instead, we should all choose this one [R, R].

The product page and another it accompanying page pretty much infinitely go on and on about how there are so many bad supplements out there and how this one fixes and properly addresses everything. Everything from proper nutrient forms, proper nutrient amounts, as well as added extra beneficial substances.

With that in mind, while the supplement doesn’t promise anything along the lines of general health and well-being, it does, however, sound extremely promising, especially when it comes to the reasons they list in how it stands apart. Plus, it’s GMO-Free.

But what I like the most from the initial look, it’s the fact that they are not promising to be a solution to a bad diet in any way like so many other products I feel to an extent are. Instead, they’re all about emphasizing the making of “significant difference in complementing your healthy diet.” Thus, implying that this is no replacement. It’s something to complement our diet. Which I strongly believe is the correct way how to go about any supplement [R].

So, is this Whole Food Multivitamin of Dr. Mercola truly what it paints itself to be? Let’s move to ingredients.

The Nutrient Diversity & Their Forms Are Simply Amazing

There are a ton of different multivitamin supplements that kind of go completely wrong with the aspect of nutrient diversity. Smarty Pants Adult Complete and Olly Women Multivitamin are great examples of this. Then there are also a bunch of supplements that truly underdeliver when it comes to nutrient forms. Here Centrum Silver (both for men and for women) and One A Day multivitamins (again, both for men and women) come to mind.

But the Dr. Mercola Whole Food Multivitamin Plus is no supplement like that. It pays the utmost attention to this.

Nutrient diversity is important because most of the vitamins and minerals work together to ensure various functions get carried out in the body. Whereas nutrient forms are paramount because bad ones can provide extremely little benefit despite appearing to be in decent amounts. Bad forms have low absorption rates (like Magnesium Oxide) or sometimes can’t be absorbed at all (Cupric Oxide).

All in all, it’s hard to find a nutrient that’s missing. Vitamins B1, B2, B3, B5, B6, B7, B9, B12 – all are there, and a bunch of others, of course. Calcium, Magnesium, Selenium, Chromium, Molybdenum, and even Potassium, Boron, and Vanadium. Every single vitamin and mineral we need for awesome health, everything’s there. Well, almost everything.

One thing I noticed they aren’t adding is the preformed vitamin A form. Which is an extremely important one and no amount of Beta-Carotene can ever replace it. I reckon this is because it’s a whole-food multivitamin, in which case it makes total sense. But the best part about this is that it’s easily fixable with a singular vitamin A addition (supplement).

As for nutrient forms, I struggled to find a bad one. I mean, Thiamin HCl probably and Choline Bitartrate – not the most optimal forms. But apart from that, absolutely commendable. They even do the superior approach to vitamin C, as well as ensure vitamin B6, B9, and B12 are their greatest versions. And amino acid chelates are truly the way to go with minerals, I couldn’t agree more (they are bragging a lot about that in the promotional materials).

However, a thing worth noting here is that various amino acid chelates have different absorption rates. And mostly with Dr. Mercola Whole Food Multivitamin they often don’t exactly specify those. This may be splitting hairs here but still, I feel something worth noting.

Overall though, as far as these two aspects go, it doesn’t underdeliver in any way.

As Far As The Amounts Go, 100% Daily Values Is What It More Or Less Follows

When it comes to nutrient amounts, there are at least two different approaches we can take. The more traditional and most common one is that of equal to or reasonably above 100% Daily Values (examples of this include the Amway Nutrilite Double X and Garden of Life Vitamin Code Women). And then there’s the lesser-known, far less common approach of following the best practices for nutrient amounts (examples of this include Douglas Laboratories Ultra Preventive X and Optimum Nutrition Opti-Men).

When it comes to this Whole Food Multivitamin of Dr. Mercola, it’s more about that typical approach (though, frankly, it doesn’t exactly fit the mold of either). So, how does it do?

Quite well, actually. Generally speaking, everything is of at least 100% Daily Values. Everything apart from a few exceptions.

Copper is probably the biggest issue here. It’s a paramount mineral to have but this one only offers 6% of Daily Values. Which utterly miserable. Here to fix that, there is just no way around it; nuts, beans, and chocolate with high cocoa amounts is probably our best option to counter that.

Maganese is slightly off 100%. But that’s fine. Choline is also quite off – just 11% in this Dr. Mercola multivitamin. But that’s fine too given that most supplements don’t contain it at all and it’s somewhat universally considered unnecessary to supplement (though I and some high-profile doctors would beg to differ). Still, 60 milligrams is not that far off from what the best practices for nutrient amounts say we should have.

And so, speaking of nutrients that we don’t need to actually be 100% Daily Values in a supplement, another one is Potassium. If you were to get that in 100%, an overdose is, as I see it, pretty inevitable. And we wouldn’t ever want that because that stuff is monstrous if overconsumed. Furthermore, it’s generally considered that we’ll likely get enough from a healthy diet. Hence, 100 milligrams or 2% is more than enough.

One another such exception is Calcium. It’s a common one in so many products. To illustrate, Vitafusion Men’s and Smarty Pants Adult Complete are, again, just a few examples here.

So, for one, going with 100% Calcium is absolute overkill. We don’t ever need that from a supplement. It’s estimated that people shouldn’t ever cross 600-800 milligrams a day through supplementation, otherwise it can become quite harmful. But for two, it is mostly between 200-300 milligrams in supplements because Calcium takes up a lot of space in the capsule or tablet and so the daily serving size would be considerably larger if it was in full here. Which brings me to the serving size.

I love what they say about that aspect on their product page. I absolutely subscribe to that. Or in other words, it’s long overdue to still think that it’s possible to get everything we typically need from supplementation in just one or two capsules or tablets. It’s just not physically possible; physics doesn’t work that way here. Or alternatively, they would have to make them so incredibly large that people without swallowing issues would struggle or have it be painful.

I reckon there are a couple of nutrients that go beyond “reasonably above 100% Daily Values.” At least I feel that considering them fitting that framework would be a complete joke.

So, we have 556% of vitamin C (500 mg), 625% of vitamin D (5000 IU), 893% of vitamin E (134 mg), 600% of vitamin B5 (30 mg), 3000% of vitamin B7 (900 mcg), 4167% of vitamin B12 (100 mcg), and 571% of Chromium (200 mcg). Some may be repelled by these values. And that will typically be because they’ll fear that this will cause them to overdose on either or a number of these specific vitamins and minerals.

But that wouldn’t be accurate at all. Here’s why.

For vitamin C to be harmful, we would need to consume more than 2000 milligrams daily through supplementation for years instead of 500 milligrams. For vitamin E, that would be 1000 milligrams daily through supplementation for a prolonged period instead of 134 milligrams. Whereas for vitamin D, that’s an extremely common total supplementation dosage that rules out the need for a separate vitamin D supplement, and it’s a vitamin kind of paramount given how common a deficiency for it is.

Vitamin B5 may seem a lot (600%, right?) but the best practices for nutrient amounts recommend 100-500 milligrams. For B7 it’s 1000 micrograms, for vitamin B12 that’s 500-1000 micrograms, whereas Chromium values should ideally fall between 100-200 micrograms. Moreover, vitamins like the B12 we could even do 5000 micrograms daily for years, and it would still fail to backfire on our health.

Hence, although this may not seem intuitive and safe to do for some, it actually is safe. Quite frankly, the amounts that these vitamins and minerals are present in this Dr. Mercola’s supplement are very far from what could be considered harmful in any way. And that’s the case even if we were to consume this one daily for the rest of our life. I’m beyond confident about that.

This Whole-Food Thing Is An Absolute Marvel As Far As Extra Stuff

Vitamins and minerals are just a small part of what Dr. Mercola Whole Food Multivitamin Plus Vital Minerals in its completeness is. To that end, it does remind earlier versions of both Rainbow Light Men’s and Women’s multivitamins. In a few words, it’s somewhat of a nutritional marvel as far as added beneficial substances go.

It all starts off with Dr. Mercola’s Fruit and Vegetable Blend. It’s a 1,134-milligram blend of some of the most capable vegetables and fruits, like Kale, Brocolli, Cauliflower, Blueberry, Blackberry, Garlic, and a number of others. Hence, it’s a blend not only combining the beneficial characteristics of these but also a great source of dietary fiber which has a plethora of positive effects including that of improving gut health.

Then there are also superfoods like Chlorella and Spirulina for general health and more nutrients along with a number of other potential benefits. Then there’s Lemon Bioflavonoid Complex, Rose Hips, and Rutin to boost immunity and all that it is related. As well as there are Inositol and Hesperidin to boost brain function and protect from various brain-related ailments.

L-Cysteine and N-Acetyl L-Cysteine help liver health and detoxification among many other benefits. There’s also Betaine, Papain, and Bromelain to contribute to gut health and a number of other stuff. PABA to contribute to skin health. And among a few other things, there are even considerable amounts of both Lutein and Zeaxanthin to boost visual processing speed. And let’s not forget the sexual health improving Lycopene.

Granted, I feel I’ve just scratched the surface of what each of these substances can potentially deliver. But it actually might take forever to list everything. And so, to not make this Dr. Mercola Multivitamin review painfully long, I believe this will do for now. However, I do plan on adding a more thorough walk-through at some point in the future.

The main idea won’t change still. It’s a really high-quality, promising, full of potential gains type of set of substances that this multivitamin is comprised of.

Additives Raise No Concern; Really, Really Good Choices Here

Additives are often a pretty misunderstood beast. Some never pay any attention to them as if they did not matter, others deem anything that’s not “natural” avoidable. But neither is what I feel is the truth. There are those that are harmful and those that aren’t. If there are a ton, like 18-19 additives as we’ve seen with Centrum Men and Centrum Women, then it’s pretty likely that something in there will be harmful. If, however, there’s only 3-4, there’s a good chance they may all be harmless.

Obviously, this is not the ideal approach as there is a lot of room for error. It can also work out in a way that a supplement that contains 18 or 19 of those other ingredients has them all harmless and the 3 or 4 one doesn’t. It’s really all about doing the research.

And doing just that for those three present in the Whole Food Multivitamin of Dr. Mercola, revealed that they have been very mindful about what they’ve put in it.

The supplement uses Cellulose, Hydroxypropyl Cellulose, and Vegetable Glycerin. All of these are safe and harmless for long-term use. Moreover, the Hydroxypropyl Cellulose is considered to also possess some beneficial characteristics, hence, even beyond harmless.

So, it’s pretty much all gains and benefits with no real concern for any side-effects or adverse reactions (unless one has an allergy).

I Liked Their Transparency & Disinterest In Adjusting Customer Reviews

So, let’s shift gears a little bit. What if we went beyond just the ingredients and all of the factors associated with them? What if we looked at how it performs in real life? But how would do that?

Through analyzing customer reviews and their experiences. Personally, I believe it’s one of the best ways how to assess how a product is actually performing in real life.

With Dr. Mercola Whole Food Multivitamin Plus, we get a product page that also holds customer reviews. These usually are a place quite biased in the sense that manufacturers have full control over them and they are not interested in having bad ratings there. So, those typically get either adjusted, modified, or deleted. Not the case with Mercola’s supplement, as far as I can tell.

Given that there are only nine Dr. Mercola Whole Food Multivitamin reviews on the page, of which two are 1-star, one 3-star, one 4-star, and rest 5-star, I think it’s pretty clear. Mercola brand does not adjust the left ratings, otherwise, we would probably be looking at nine 5-star reviews. Which is actually the case for so many other supplements.

So, with that in mind, I really appreciate their transparency and honesty about the feedback they’re getting. But to get a more complete look (it’s not quite enough with just nine reviews to conclude anything), I also embraced all of the pieces when it came to other sellers and retailers offering this product.

In total, I managed to find 290 reviews, of which 45 were negative and 245 were positive. Summing that with the nine of their product page leaves us at 47 negative ones and 252 positive ones. And hence, an 84.3% global success rate. This, however, is likely higher than that given that people are more prone to report bad experiences over good ones.

But still, 84.3% feels kind of low, doesn’t it?

And that definitely is quite low. People are expecting a lot from this, as I see it, mainly because of the price tag this comes with. And can you blame them? I mean, this costs more than most of the very best multivitamins. So, generally speaking, while it does deliver high value what regards the ingredients, it also feels at least a bit overpriced.

I Feel Dr. Mercola Has Truly Done Well With This; Definitely Worth Shortlisting

Overall, I feel the Whole Food Multivitamin Plus of Dr. Mercola is a great supplement. It offers a bunch of great nutrients in great forms that get coupled with a ton of various beneficial substances. Furthermore, they are very careful with the choice of additives, and truly the ones they’ve chosen rise no concern for side-effects or anything along those lines.

Still, it’s a supplement that costs quite a lot. And so, its price for value is not that high. Many multivitamins that I consider the best according to 100% Daily Values offer much higher value for the price. Plus, there are some insignificant flaws like almost no Copper and no preformed vitamin A.

At the end of the day, if the price is a non-factor for you, then do seriously picking this one. Other than that, there are better options both on the list of the best multivitamins for men and that of the best multivitamins for women.

Other than that, I hope this Dr. Mercola Multivitamin review helped you find the information you were looking for. In your opinion, what is this one’s strongest suit? Would you get it despite the rather high price tag? Let me know below.