Cognitive support is a growing area of creatine research. The most recent results support this continued research, but an expert cautions the data is far from conclusive.
The International Society of Sports Nutrition is one of the leading authorities on creatine research. In a 2022 update of its position stand on creatine, the authors cited several studies that suggest creatine can beneficially affect specific aspects of cognitive performance and memory, both in general and for older subjects specifically. These include spatial memory, long-term memory and fatigue with repeated cognitive tasks.
Creatine combined with GAA
The most recently published study in this regard also appeared in the Journal of the International Society of Sports Nutrition. It was the work of a group of researchers associated with Texas A&M University.
The researchers were investigating the effect of guanidinoacetic acid (GAA) in combination with creatine and alone on markers of cognitive performance and general health. GAA is a naturally occurring amino acid that is a precursor to creatine synthesis in the body.
The researchers recruited 58 healthy men and women between the ages of 18 and 65 for the study. The blinded, placebo-controlled trial consisted of three arms: a placebo, 1 g of GAA plus a placebo filler twice a day, and 1 g GAA plus 5 g of creatine twice a day. The participants were required to refrain from alcohol and caffeine consumption within 48 hours of the cognitive tests, which were conducted at baseline and after six weeks of supplementation.
After assuring that the participants did not suffer from any form of cognitive deficit, they were put through a variety of cognitive tests, including immediate and delayed word recall, delayed word recognition, delayed picture recognition and a digit vigilance test. They also measured some secondary outcomes like mood states and sleep quality.
The researchers found that GAA plus creatine had the most effect on the cognitive scores, but the results were patchy.
“There was also evidence that the GAA + CrM group promoted more consistent results, with improvements in Word Recognition accuracy and reaction times, and some measures of perceived stress and sleep quality. However, most cognitive tests were not affected,” they wrote.
Expert: Cognition is multi-faceted, making simple conclusions difficult
Susan Hewlings, Ph.D., co-founder of Substantiation Sciences, said that measuring cognitive outcomes is notoriously tricky. She noted the authors themselves stated that “cognitive responses to creatine may be population-, task- and context-dependent.”
Nevertheless, she said the study “adds to the totality of evidence for creatine at that dose for some aspects of cognitive function but the findings should not be overstated. Overall, the literature is building to support that creatine at a higher dose of 10 g/day or more can improve some cognitive functions in some people.”
Another study from Texas A&M was published in JISSN a few weeks before the GAA study was published. This earlier study included an exercise protocol along with creatine supplementation, which was also set at a 10 g/day dose. Cognitive outcomes were among the things that were measured.
Their conclusion: “CrM supplementation with and without exercise and diet intervention may help middle-aged and older adults maintain muscle mass and strength while favorably affecting selected markers of health and cognitive function. Individual cognitive and biomarker findings should be interpreted as exploratory.”
As Hewlings said: “Cognitive function is so complex … it’s a multidimensional series of functions that overlap and that incorporates a series of individual outcomes all of which are impacted by so many things that it is very challenging to single out one ingredient as being the one thing that can improve it.”
Researchers seem undeterred
However, there is enough evidence of benefit to keep researchers returning to that well. A search on the PubMed database using the term “creatine and cognition” shows a steady rise in the number of studies each year starting in about the year 2002, when the number of studies exceeded 20 analyses. In 2025, 117 such studies were published, and there have been 111 such studies published so far this year.
Seeing as creatine monohydrate supplementation is safe, well tolerated by most consumers and relatively inexpensive, it seems that research into the subject of how creatine can boost cognition is on an upward trend.