Can L-Glutamine help with bloating?

Feel your waistband digging in? Or find yourself getting gassy in less-than-ideal moments?

According to our 2023 Gut Health Report, over half of us experience bloating and gas.

Poor gut health can move into our relationships with food, friends, and work, to name just a few. And, with #guthealth widely trending on TikTok, it’s not surprising that we’re after more potential ways to ease our tummy troubles.

One name you might have seen is L-glutamine... but what is it? And can it really help with bloating?

What is L-glutamine?

L-glutamine is one type of glutamine, the most abundant amino acid in our bodies.¹ Glutamine is thought to support a wide range of our bodily functions, including digestion, immune function, and transporting nitrogen around the body.^2,3,4 As an amino acid, it also helps the body make the proteins it needs to function.⁵

Does it help with bloating?

As we heard from the UK, over half of us experience bloating.

Research suggests glutamine can support our normal digestive function, and one important job it has is to help maintain a strong and healthy mucus barrier in the gut.²

The mucus barrier is one of many layers in the gut barrier. Disrupting the gut barrier (increasing intestinal permeability) may trigger a range of unhappy gut symptoms, including bloating.⁶

There are dozens of reasons you might feel bloated – including digestive conditions, food intolerances, your diet, and more – so it’s always best to find the root cause before trying a new supplement.⁷

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Is L-glutamine good for overall gut health?

Yes and no!

Glutamine plays a crucial part in our normal intestinal health. But most of us produce all the glutamine we need, plus we get a small amount through foods like meat and fish, dairy products, leafy greens, and nuts.⁸

It’s what’s called a 'conditionally essential' amino acid, meaning our body produces it, but we may need more than usual if we’re very stressed or ill.⁹ In these cases, glutamine supplements may help, but they’re not likely to have many benefits if you already produce enough glutamine.

There's a small amount of evidence to suggest that glutamine may alter the gut microbiome in some people. One 2014 pilot study on 33 overweight and obese adults found that L-glutamine supplements reduced the ratio of Firmicutes to Bacteroidetes bacteria in the gut. ¹⁰

Benefits of L-glutamine

As we already know, L-glutamine plays a huge role around our bodies.

As well as our intestinal health, it can play a part in:

• immune function: Glutamine is needed to increase the production of lymphocytes, a type of white blood cell found in our immune systems.³
• transporting nitrogen: L-glutamine helps to transport nitrogen around the body.⁴ Nitrogen is an important component of protein, which makes up the structure of all the cells and tissues in the body. For example, it helps our organs function properly and our muscles grow.
• muscle repair: Muscles grow by tearing very slightly and then repairing themselves with more muscle tissue. Because L-glutamine is a building block of protein, it’s needed to help our muscles grow and repair.

What about magnesium or probiotics with L-glutamine?

If you’ve heard about glutamine through social media, you might have seen a few popular pairings.

Magnesium and glutamine have become popular, since magnesium may also help an uncomfortable gut. It draws water into the intestines, producing a laxative effect which may help ease discomfort and bloating if you’re constipated. Plus, it may relax the muscles in the intestines.¹²

Probiotics are another popular name when it comes to gut health, and more recently they’ve been talked about online as a potential pair with glutamine for bloating.

According to the NHS, there’s some evidence that probiotics may help ease some symptoms of irritable bowel syndrome (IBS).¹³

How to take L-glutamine

If you’re thinking about L-glutamine for bloating, it’s worth remembering that your body usually makes enough for you to function normally.

Conditionally essential amino acids like glutamine usually only run low if your body experiences stress, such as when you’re ill. However, you can also be low in glutamine if you exercise often or particularly intensely, so it also might be worth considering if this is the case.

If you think your gut health issues may be down to low glutamine, you should speak to your doctor before taking any new supplements.

L-glutamine is most often found as a tablet or powder. Most people get about 3-6g of glutamine per day from the protein they eat.¹⁴ 

Some research has shown no ill effects of glutamine when given in doses as high as 50-60g per day. However, this was only a short-term study and took place on hospital patients, so this may not reflect results on healthy subjects of different ages or different periods of use.¹⁵

The final say

While it’s seemed to be a winner for some people on TikTok, we can’t say for certain that L-glutamine will help reduce bloating – especially if you already produce enough.

But it does play some crucial roles in our gut, including keeping our intestinal lining strong.

If you’re having trouble with bloating, low L-glutamine might be one of the many reasons – but it’s always worth talking to your doctor to find out.

Last updated: 14 April 2023