RAD-140 (testolone)

The verdict

Our read at a glance.

Whether a compound with no human efficacy trial and a growing published record of liver injury has any defensible use.

The signal

There is no completed human efficacy trial establishing what RAD-140 does to muscle mass or strength. What does exist in the peer-reviewed literature is harm: independent case reports of drug-induced liver injury in RAD-140 users, plus analyses characterizing SARM-associated liver injury as a class and comparing its presentation with anabolic-steroid liver injury.

The unknown

Its actual efficacy in humans, since no trial has measured it, and the true incidence of liver injury, since case reports capture only people who sought care and whose clinicians identified the cause. The denominator is unknown, which means the risk cannot be quantified, only demonstrated.

Our read

The clearest risk-without-evidence entry in the muscle category. Ostarine at least ran phase 3 trials and reported an honest miss. RAD-140 has no efficacy trial at all, and the human literature that does exist is a list of people whose livers were injured.