Peptide Guides
Important
BPC-157 is not an approved medicine in any country. It holds no licence from the MHRA in the United Kingdom, the EMA in Europe, or the FDA in the United States. This guide explains product labelling and laboratory solution arithmetic. It is not medical advice, and nothing within it constitutes a recommendation to use BPC-157. Products supplied through this site are intended for laboratory research use only.
Quick answer
- The number on a BPC-157 vial is a weight. A 5mg vial contains 5 milligrams of peptide as freeze-dried powder, and a 10mg vial contains twice that weight.
- Weight is not strength. The concentration of a laboratory solution depends on the weight of peptide and the volume of liquid it is dissolved in.
- The same 5mg vial produces a 5mg/ml solution with 1ml of bacteriostatic water and a 2.5mg/ml solution with 2ml.
- The honest way to compare vial sizes is price per milligram, checked against the purity on the batch certificate.
What the number on a BPC-157 vial means
A research peptide vial is labelled with a weight. The figure states how many milligrams of peptide the vial contains as freeze-dried powder. A milligram, written mg, is one thousandth of a gram. BPC-157 is a peptide, a short chain of amino acids made in a laboratory, and our guide to what BPC-157 is covers the compound itself.
The weight on the label describes the powder in the vial and nothing else. It is not a strength, not a concentration, and not a statement about purity. Each of those is a separate question, and this guide takes them in turn.
The vial sizes BPC-157 is sold in
Research suppliers commonly list BPC-157 in 5mg and 10mg vials. Larger sizes exist, and blended vials pairing BPC-157 with TB-500 are also sold with a stated weight for each peptide.
The size difference is quantity, not quality. A 10mg vial from the same batch as a 5mg vial contains the same powder in twice the amount. Which size suits a buyer comes down to how much material their work requires, how quickly it will be used, and price per milligram. Storage life matters here too, because opened and reconstituted material has a shorter usable life than sealed powder, which our guide to lyophilised peptide storage covers.
Why 5mg and 10mg are weights, not strengths
Strength only has meaning once the powder becomes a solution. A solution's strength is its concentration, meaning how much peptide each millilitre of liquid contains, written mg/ml. Concentration is set by two numbers together. One is the weight of peptide, which the vial label gives. The other is the volume of liquid it is dissolved in, which the person preparing the solution chooses.
A 10mg vial is not a stronger product than a 5mg vial. It is a larger weight of the same product. Dissolved in enough liquid, 10mg produces a weaker solution than 5mg in very little liquid. The label weight and the prepared concentration are different things, and confusing them is the single most common misreading of peptide labels.
How solution concentration is worked out
Concentration is the weight divided by the volume. In laboratory preparation, a chosen volume of bacteriostatic water, which is sterile water with a preservative that our guide to reconstituting peptides explains in full, is added to the vial, and the resulting concentration follows from the arithmetic.
| Vial | Water added | Concentration | Per 0.1ml of solution |
|---|---|---|---|
| 5mg | 1ml | 5mg/ml | 0.5mg |
| 5mg | 2ml | 2.5mg/ml | 0.25mg |
| 5mg | 2.5ml | 2mg/ml | 0.2mg |
| 10mg | 1ml | 10mg/ml | 1mg |
| 10mg | 2ml | 5mg/ml | 0.5mg |
| 10mg | 4ml | 2.5mg/ml | 0.25mg |
The right-hand column shows the same arithmetic per 0.1ml, because laboratory measurements are commonly read in tenths of a millilitre. There is no single correct volume to add. The choice depends on the concentration a piece of research work calls for, and the table exists so that whatever is chosen, the resulting concentration is known rather than guessed.
What the milligram figure cannot tell you
The label weight assumes the vial contains what it claims at the purity it claims. Whether that is true is a testing question, not a labelling question. A 10mg vial at 85% purity contains less BPC-157 than a 9mg vial at 99%.
Purity comes from the batch certificate of analysis, the laboratory document our guide to certificates of analysis explains how to read. A vial weight without a certificate behind it is a claim, and the certificate is what turns the claim into a checkable number.
BPC-157 and TB-500 blend vials
Blend vials contain two peptides in one vial, each with its own stated weight. A vial marked 10mg as a blend commonly means 5mg of BPC-157 and 5mg of TB-500, and honest labelling states each weight separately rather than one combined figure.
The concentration arithmetic works the same way, run once per peptide. Dissolving a 5mg plus 5mg blend in 2ml of bacteriostatic water gives a solution that is 2.5mg/ml in each peptide. A combined figure of 5mg/ml would be true of the total powder but meaningless for either compound, because the two peptides are different substances with different research records. A blend also ties the two compounds to one shared solution and one shared storage life, which is a practical limitation of the format.
Comparing vial sizes on price per milligram
Price per milligram is the honest comparison across sizes and suppliers. It is the vial price divided by the milligrams on the label, checked against the purity on the batch certificate. Larger vials usually cost less per milligram, and that saving is only real if the material will be used while it remains in good condition.
A comparison worth making has three parts. The price per milligram, the purity that milligram figure is tested at, and whether a dated certificate of analysis for the specific batch is published. A low price per milligram with no certificate is a number with nothing underneath it.
Common questions about BPC-157 vials
What does 5mg mean on a BPC-157 vial?
It means the vial contains 5 milligrams of BPC-157 as freeze-dried powder. It is a weight, not a strength. The strength of any solution made from it depends on how much liquid the powder is dissolved in.
Is a 10mg vial of BPC-157 stronger than a 5mg vial?
No. It contains twice the weight of the same material. Strength belongs to solutions, and a solution's strength is set by the weight of peptide and the volume of liquid together, not by the vial size alone.
How much bacteriostatic water goes into a 5mg vial?
There is no single correct volume. The volume chosen sets the concentration of the resulting laboratory solution, and the table in this guide shows the arithmetic. With 1ml the solution is 5mg/ml, with 2ml it is 2.5mg/ml, and the full method is in our guide to reconstituting peptides.
Do BPC-157 and TB-500 blends change the arithmetic?
The method is the same, applied once per peptide. Each compound's stated weight is divided by the total volume of liquid, giving a concentration for each peptide in the shared solution.
Specification and supply
We supply BPC-157 as freeze-dried (lyophilised) powder in sealed vials labelled by peptide weight, purity-tested by HPLC with identity confirmed by mass spectrometry, and we publish the dated certificate of analysis for every batch so the label weight can be checked against a tested purity figure. Research-grade BPC-157 is listed with its batch documentation.
Supplied for laboratory research use only. Not for human consumption.