Description
Citicoline 250mg a capsule, 60 servings, about 63 cents each. Citicoline is cytidine diphosphate-choline, usually shortened to CDP-choline, and it is one of the choline bearing compounds sold in milligrams where plain choline bitartrate is sold in grams. That difference in units is the first thing to understand, because a citicoline 250mg capsule and a 500 mg choline bitartrate capsule are not two versions of the same purchase.
What is in the capsule
| Active | citicoline 250 mg per capsule |
|---|---|
| Chemical name | cytidine 5′-diphosphocholine |
| Choline fraction | about 18 percent by weight, so roughly 46 mg per capsule |
| Other half | the cytidine moiety, which plain choline salts do not carry |
| Servings | 60, one capsule each |
| Cost | about 63 cents a serving, 0.25 cents per milligram |
| Testing | identity and assay on every lot |
The arithmetic behind a citicoline 250mg label
Compound weight and nutrient weight are different numbers, and this compound makes the gap vivid. Citicoline is roughly 18 percent choline by mass, so 250 mg of it supplies about 46 mg of choline. Choline bitartrate is about 41 percent, and alpha-GPC around 40. If you are counting choline intake against the adequate intake figure of 425 to 550 mg a day, those percentages decide which bottle is relevant.
If you are buying the compound for its own sake, the choline figure is beside the point and the cytidine half is part of what you are paying for. Both readings are legitimate, which is why both numbers are on the panel. The NIH choline fact sheet has the intake table and the food content list.
What the trials used
Published cognitive studies have mostly administered 250 to 500 mg a day over four to twelve weeks, measuring attention and psychomotor task performance, and a separate clinical literature used far larger amounts, 500 to 2,000 mg a day, in acute hospital settings. The endpoints there were neurological rating scales. Those are the doses administered and the instruments read in the literature, and neither set is a claim about this citicoline 250mg bottle.
Citicoline 250mg against alpha-GPC and choline bitartrate
All three are sold as choline sources and all three are priced differently per milligram of choline. Bitartrate is the cheapest by a wide margin and is taken in gram quantities. Alpha-GPC is sold at 300 to 600 mg and is strongly hygroscopic. Citicoline 250mg sits in the middle on weight and at the top on price per milligram of choline, and what you are paying the difference for is the cytidine half of the molecule.
Whether that half is worth the premium is a question the published comparisons do not settle, because head to head trials between the three forms are scarce. We stock all of them, print the choline fraction for each, and leave the choice where it belongs. The performance page lists the alpha-GPC version with the same arithmetic laid out.
Why citicoline 250mg is the figure on the bottle
Because it is the lower of the two amounts the cognitive trials used, and the one that divides cleanly into the 500 mg arm. A capsule at 185 mg or 300 mg would not map onto either, which is how a great deal of this market is packaged. Matching a label to a protocol is only possible when somebody chose the number on purpose.
Why the form is named rather than the letter
Choline is not a vitamin in the strict sense but it is dosed like one, and the forms are not interchangeable by weight. Our vitamins page names the chemical form on every label for the same reason it distinguishes methylcobalamin from cyanocobalamin and P-5-P from pyridoxine hydrochloride. A generic letter on a bottle hides the thing you are comparing.
Testing
Every lot of citicoline 250mg is identity tested and assayed by a laboratory with no ownership tie to this company, with heavy metals, residual solvents and microbials screened alongside, since this is a manufactured compound rather than a milled plant. Under strength lots are withdrawn from sale and the failing certificate stays published. Our certificate guide explains which lines to read first, and your report is linked above.
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