Walk down any supplement aisle and you'll see the same three words over and over: "proprietary blend." It sounds sophisticated. It's actually a legal way to hide how little of an active ingredient is in the product.
Here's how it works: a label can list a "Performance Blend" of five ingredients at a combined weight of, say, 1,000mg — without saying how much of each individual ingredient is in that blend. The brand could be putting in 900mg of the cheapest filler and 20mg each of four ingredients that only work at doses of 500mg+. You'd never know from the label.
What we do instead
Every HARDCODED LABS product lists every single ingredient with its exact milligram amount. No blends. No "and other ingredients." If OVERRIDE says 200mg of caffeine and 100mg of L-Theanine, that's exactly what's in the scoop — dosed at the levels used in the actual published research, not a fraction of it.
This costs us more. Full clinical doses of real ingredients are expensive. It would be cheaper to cut every formula by a third and call it a "proprietary matrix." We don't, because the whole point of training seriously is knowing exactly what you're putting into your body and why.
How to check any supplement, including ours
- Look for a "Supplement Facts" panel with each ingredient listed individually with its own mg amount — not grouped under a blend name.
- Compare the dose to the amount used in published research for that ingredient. A quick search for "[ingredient name] dose study" will usually tell you.
- Be skeptical of labels with 8+ ingredients in one blend under 1,000mg total — the math rarely works out in your favor.
These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease.