FreePeptideCalc

GHK-Cu Peptide Dosage Calculator and Injection Chart

Copper tripeptide with genuinely good evidence applied topically — and no human data at all for the injectable use it is sold for.

Written by , who builds and maintains this site and is not a clinician. Every figure links to its primary source.

Not approved

Category 1 for non-injectable routes only

GHK-Cu is the one compound here with a favourable FDA list position, and it is route-limited. The entry on the list updated 14 May 2026 reads, in full, “GHK-Cu (except for injectable routes of administration)”, in Category 1. Injectable GHK-Cu was in Category 2 from September 2023, was removed in April 2026 when nominations were withdrawn, and on 5 May 2026 a nominator clarified it had withdrawn only the injectable route and wished to keep its nomination for non-injectable routes. Category 1 is interim enforcement discretion — it is not inclusion on the 503A bulks list and it is not FDA approval. The FDA has said it intends to consult its advisory committee before the end of February 2027. Read plainly: the one route carved out of the favourable position is the route GHK-Cu is sold online for.

No approved human dose exists for this compound in any country. The figures below are the doses used in named published studies, reproduced for reference only. Doses given to rats or mice do not convert to a human dose. The FDA has stated that labelling a product “research use only” or “not for human consumption” does not change its legal status when the seller's own marketing shows it is intended for people.

Calculator inputs

Set up your vial

Enter the label, dilution and dose. The result updates as you type.

Syringe volume
Syringe volume
GHK-Cu in the vial
GHK-Cu in the vial
Vials sold online are commonly 50–200 mg
Bacteriostatic water to add
Bacteriostatic water to add
Dose per injection
Dose per injection
No approved human dose exists for this compound. The dose shown is only a calculator input, not a recommendation or starting point.
More optionsReverse calculation, schedule and cost

Enter the bacteriostatic water you added and get the volume to draw.

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10units(0.1 mL)
10 units01020304050Drag the plunger, or focus it and use the arrow keys
Draw to 10 units on a 50-unit U-100 syringe.
Concentration
20 mg/mL
Water added
5 mL
Doses in vial
50
How the concentration is calculated

This divides the peptide by the water you add. The powder occupies a little volume of its own, which is negligible on a typical vial but not on one with a heavy bulking agent. When a product label states a concentration, use the label’s number.

5 mL may exceed the capacity of a typical 3 mL vial. Check the vial before adding this much.

Key facts

Molecular weight
402.92 DaCopper-free GHK is 340.38 Da, so copper is roughly a sixth of the mass of the complex. Several GHK-Cu species exist depending on protonation, so state which one you mean before doing mole maths.
Half-life
Not published. No accessible human pharmacokinetic study reports one, so any specific figure quoted elsewhere has no primary source behind it.
Also sold as
copper peptide, copper tripeptide-1

Doses used in published studies

These are reproduced for reference. They are not recommendations, and an animal dose in mg/kg does not convert to a human dose.

humantopical, once daily for 14 days

0.1% w/w gel, about 0.5 g as a thin film

NCT07437586, a phase 2 split-wound trial: each of an estimated 60 healthy adults receives two standardised punch-biopsy wounds on the upper arm, one randomised to GHK-Cu gel and one to matching vehicle. Started February 2026, still recruiting, no results posted. This is the only human GHK-Cu dose anywhere that states a concentration, and it is topical.

humantopical, twice daily for 12 weeks

GHK-Cu facial cream — concentration not stated in the published reports

Four controlled studies in women with photoaged skin: 71 women on a facial cream; 67 women aged 50–59 on a twice-daily facial cream; 41 women on an eye cream, which beat both placebo and a vitamin K cream; and a one-month thigh study in which 70% of women on GHK-Cu increased collagen production against 50% on vitamin C and 40% on retinoic acid. All reported improvements in skin density, thickness, laxity and wrinkle depth. None of the four reports the concentration of GHK-Cu used, and three of them are conference proceedings or a book chapter rather than peer-reviewed papers.

ratinjected — the review does not state which injection route

0.5 µg/kg of GHK, as one component of a three-peptide mixture totalling about 2.2 µg/kg

A bone-fracture healing study in rats, in which GHK was given with dalargin (1.2 µg/kg) and thymogen (0.5 µg/kg), so no effect can be attributed to GHK alone. It is worth seeing the magnitude: 0.5 µg/kg is 0.0005 mg/kg. This is the only injected GHK dose with a number attached anywhere in the review literature, and a rat µg/kg does not convert to a human dose.

How good is the evidence?

Split down the middle by route, and the split is the whole story. Topically, GHK-Cu has more human data than most things on this site: four controlled studies in women with photoaged skin, and a phase 2 wound-healing trial recruiting now. But those cosmetic studies are weaker than their reputation — three of the four are conference proceedings or a book chapter rather than peer-reviewed papers, none of them publishes the concentration of GHK-Cu in the cream, and the review that collects them is written by the founder of a company that sells copper peptides. Injected, the evidence is not weak, it is absent: no published human study, no registered human trial, and no pharmacokinetic data of any kind. Injection is precisely the route the FDA carved out and the nominator abandoned. One caution about the trial registry itself: entries are submitted by the sponsor and are not reviewed before they appear, so a listing is evidence that someone registered a study, not that one ran. The same sponsor behind the trials cited here has filed at least one other record whose description is ClinicalTrials.gov's own template boilerplate.

Common questions

Sources

Every number on this page comes from one of the documents below. Where no reliable source exists, the page says so instead of filling the gap.

  1. RegulatorFDA· 2026-05-14
    Bulk Drug Substances Nominated for Use in Compounding Under Section 503A
  2. RegulatorFDA
    Certain Bulk Drug Substances for Use in Compounding May Present Significant Safety Risks
  3. Published studyBioMed Research International 2015;2015:648108· 2015-07-07
    Pickart L, Vasquez-Soltero JM, Margolina A. GHK peptide as a natural modulator of multiple cellular pathways in skin regeneration (authors declare affiliation with Skin Biology, a copper-peptide manufacturer)
  4. Published studyClinicalTrials.gov / Hudson Biotech· 2026-02-02
    NCT07437586 — Phase 2 split-wound study of topical GHK-Cu gel to accelerate re-epithelialization of standardized acute skin wounds (recruiting)
  5. GuidelineInstitute of Medicine Panel on Micronutrients / National Academies Press· 2001
    Dietary Reference Intakes — Copper: Recommended Dietary Allowance 900 µg/day and Tolerable Upper Intake Level 10 mg/day for adults, set on liver damage as the critical endpoint
  6. ReferenceNIH / National Center for Biotechnology Information
    PubChem compound records (molecular weights and formulae)
  7. ReferenceU.S. National Library of Medicine
    ClinicalTrials.gov trial registry