These days, being healthy goes way beyond going to a traditional physician once a year. I’ve found that taking my health into my own hands, including with biomarker testing, I get better outcomes than ever before. That’s where Superpower comes in!
Disclaimer: The information provided on this blog is for general educational purposes only and is not intended as a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of your physician or other qualified healthcare provider with any questions you may have regarding a medical condition.
Disclaimer: Superpower contacted me with a free year of their membership, including the first biomarker blood draw. Though I was able to do this for free, this review is my honest experience, with no input from Superpower.
What is Superpower?
Superpower has given me control over my own health, more than I’ve ever felt before.
It’s an annual subscription for testing of over 100 biomarkers to help me understand what’s actually going on in my body.
With the annual Superpower membership, you get a comprehensive blood draw each year which tests over 100 biomarkers to help you understand what’s going on and what to do. The results are provided within a week of testing and are easy to understand instead of filled with confusing medical jargon. Actually, when you’re completing the onboarding process, you can tell them how jargony you want the results to be, which is pretty awesome. With your results, you get a personalized plan to help you optimize your health, as well as your biological age based on your results, to track your health over a lifetime.
I have to say, the way they got started and their story is pretty amazing. They started this company “To transform the current healthcare system into one that is personalized, proactive, and performance enhancing. So that you can unleash your inner superpower.” As stated on the Superpower website.
The Superpower founding team consists of three men who want to help people gain control of their own health and live healthier, longer lives. They raised $30 million to start their company, the most comprehensive biomarker testing service on the market!
The company was founded in 2023 after one of the members spent $2 million in medical bills trying to figure out what was going on in his own body, beyond what conventional medicine could offer, including misdiagnoses, which almost cost him his life. The CTO lost his best friend to a brain tumor when they were teens, just two days before he was scheduled for an MRI. They know that these cases aren’t unique; this type of thing happens all the time. That’s why they started Superpower.
Other companies offer testing similar to this but what sets Superpower apart is that they provide a comprehensive care platform, which I’ll talk more about below, taking you beyond test results to how to optimize your health. Getting the same blood tests every year is great for tracking health over time.
Click the button below to learn more about why they created Superpower.
What Biomarkers are Tested?
When you go to a traditional doctor’s office, they may order a few tests, but nothing like this. For example, I went for my annual physical earlier this year and my doctor ran a comprehensive metabolic panel of about 10 markers. From that, she had me start Vitamin D supplements, though there were other markers that were out of range that aren’t being addressed. That test of just a handful of markers cost me more, even with insurance, than the annual fee of Superpower, which tests 10x what I had tested at my doctor’s office.
Here is what they test for with their basic 100+ biomarker package:
367 – Cortisol, Total [SERUM] [RT]
402 – DHEA Sulfate, Immunoassay [SERUM] [RT]
482 – Gamma Glutamyl Transferase (GGT) [SERUM] [RT]
905 – Uric Acid [SERUM] [RT]
4021 – Estradiol [SERUM] [RT]
5224 – Apolipoprotein B [SERUM] [RT]
5616 – Iron, TIBC and Ferritin Panel [SERUM] [RT]
6399 – CBC (includes Differential and Platelets) [BLOOD] [RT]
7286 – Bilirubin, Fractionated [SERUM] [RT]
7444 – Thyroid Panel with TSH [SERUM] [RT]
10124 – hs-CRP [SERUM] [RT]
10231 – Comprehensive Metabolic Panel [SERUM] [RT]
14966 – Testosterone, Free, Bioavailable and Total, MS [SERUM] [RT]
16802 – Hemoglobin A1c with eAG [BLOOD] [RT]
17306 – Vitamin D, 25-Hydroxy, Total, Immunoassay [SERUM] [RT]
19543 – Lipid Panel with Ratios [SERUM] [RT]
If you want more than those 100+ biomarkers, there are add-ons they’ll suggest to you throughout the onboarding process, based on the information you enter about your health. You can choose to add on more for an additional cost.
The add-ons are really great, if you choose to do that. There are so many different aspects of your health that you can look deeper into including:
- Autoimmunity Panel
- Female Fertility & Hormone Panel
- Advanced Panel
- Metabolic Health Panel
- Nutrients & Vitamins Panel
- Methylation Panel
- and more!!
Sign Up Process
First, I did my due diligence and researched Superpower as a company, what they stand for, and what all would be tested. Then I entered in my credit card information to purchase the first year of the service, basically getting me one test that will test over 100 biomarkers to help me understand what’s going on inside.
Then I answered a lot of health related questions including height, weight, symptoms, medical history, supplements and medications I’m on, family history, allergies, and so on, for them to get a better understanding of what’s going on in my body.
Then I was able to schedule a time to get my blood drawn at a local lab, or have them come to me for an additional fee. Since my local lab is quite a ways away, I decided to opt for them coming to me.
For having blood drawn at home, or wherever you choose, they give a 2-hour window. They suggest you get this done within a couple hours of waking as it’ll be more accurate for corisol readings, and you need to fast before testing.
As you go through the onboarding process, you’ll list all of the medications or supplements that you’re on. This information not only gets used for when they’re looking at your results, but also for your to-do list before the test. For example, I’m on thyroid medication, so they suggested that I don’t take it the day of the test until after the blood draw. Other supplements I’m on including one with biotin, they suggest to stop it at least 24 hours before the test, if not longer.
It’s really nice to have specific instructions for when to schedule your test, especially as a woman if you’re menstruating, and what to stop taking and when before your test. Other places that I’ve gotten tests like this through in the past, even my local doctor’s office, they don’t give any instructions other than fasting. So already I feel like my results are going to be more accurate though Superpower than elsewhere.
Other temporary limitations include 24 hours before testing to avoid strenuous exercise, alcohol, and heavy, fatty foods. Begin fasting 10 hours before your appointment, including food and caffeine. Still drink water though, including before your test to make it easier for the blood draw.
I ended up setting up my testing about a month in advance due to the availability of appointments and my cycle.
After you’ve scheduled your appointment, you can log into your Superpower dashboard and connect more services, if you’d like.
This is where you can see your next steps, what you’ve already done, and finish onboarding tasks such as syncing data from a wearable health tracker, verify your identity to import past medical data, and even give the gift of Superpower to someone else.
Superpower Concierge
In addition to the testing, results, and plan based on those results, there is a concierge you can chat with anytime. Either you can connect with their Superpower AI for simple questions, advice, and analysis OR you can contact your care team who will respond in under 24 hours on weekdays.
This is so great to have.
I’ve been through A LOT of programs over the years and the hardest thing is going it alone and not being able to ask questions to a qualified person. Often, I’d get generic answers from other services such as self-study programs, which really isn’t helpful.
That’s not the case with Superpower! You can actually get answers to your questions with a quick turnaround!
I actually had to contact them about my lab appointment, and they were able to help me within an hour. Not just the AI bot, but their actual care team. The day before I was supposed to go in for my blood draw, a Winter storm warning was issued, and it was clear that traveling to my blood test wasn’t going to be feasible. Not only that, with elevated stress levels of driving in a blizzard, my cortisol levels would have been so high that there wouldn’t be an accurate reading.
I wasn’t sure what to do, so I explained the situation to the concierge via text, and they got back to me within an hour to tell me that they surely don’t want me to jeopardize my health by driving in such conditions, and that the stress of driving in such conditions may affect the results. They said it was just fine to reschedule.
Again, other programs that I’ve tried in the past, don’t have the support that Superpower does. It’s amazing to have this great support included!
Why I Chose Superpower
As you may know, I have dealt with numerous health issues over the years, actually, basically my whole life. The health issues have gotten significantly worse in my late-20s when I had my first known autoimmune flare and was finally diagnosed with Hashimoto’s disease.
Since then, I’ve been making major diet and lifestyle changes, hoping to feel better, with little to no relief. I took a bit of a hiatus from 2016-2022 when I had my first child and then my twins, plus the stress and chaos of having three kids within 2 years.
Finally, I started taking care of myself again in 2022, as I detail in this blog post. I started working with different functional medicine providers and nutritionists to figure out how to not feel so fatigued every day and get out of the fog of depression I was in. I also have GI issues such as bloating and looking 4 months pregnant though I am not, that I really would love to have go away!
Anyway, I’ve done a lot to try and feel better and have had few visible results, so I wanted to look deeper with a more comprehensive test to see what’s going on in my body.
Actual Blood Draw Experience
Originally, I was going to drive to a lab about 30 miles from me to have the Superpower blood draw completed. However, I live in Minnesota, it’s winter, and there was a huge Winter storm that was going to arrive the morning I was supposed to drive there. As I mentioned earlier, I ended up chatting with the concierge to see their thoughts, and ended up cancelling my appointment.
Then I decided to schedule an in-home blood draw to help that not happen in the future, and I knew that my results would be more accurate. Note: There is an additional fee for the at-home blood draw.
Pre-Blood Draw
Once I set up the blood draw appointment, I got an email from Superpower confirming the appointment and a text message.
48 hours before the blood draw, Superpower sent me an email reminding me that my blood draw was in 48 hours, including instructions on how to prepare based on the blood test I had scheduled. The email included what to have ready, what to expect, and what to do beforehand, including fasting, drinking water, etc.
24 hours before the blood draw, I got another email and a text message, reminding me of my upcoming blood draw. This included some of the information from the previous email, as well as recommendations from their experts for at-home testing including setting a place for the blood draw with a table and chairs, wearing a short-sleeve shirt, and more.
12-hours before the blood draw, I received another text and email, with friendly reminders that I needed to start fasting soon (10-hour fasting for my tests), and repeating other things I needed to know before my test.
An hour before my blood draw, I received another text and email, this time reminding me that my blood draw window starts in 1-hour and that I needed to continue fasting and stay hydrated. They recommend drinking a lot of water because there are several vials of blood that will need to be filled at the appointment.
20 minutes before the blood draw appointment window started: I got an email and text message that my phlebotomist was on the way and when she’d arrive. I was really happy to see that she’d be there just 4 minutes into my blood draw window!
Actual At-Home Blood Draw
Once she arrived, I showed her where I set up the table and chairs for us, and she got the area ready for the blood draw. I should have counted, but there were about 7-10 tubes that needed to be filled with blood, so it took a little while for my body to be able to get that blood out. Still, the appointment was just about 10 minutes after she arrived.
Once she was done, she headed out, and we were all set! Then it was time to wait for the results.
My Results
Initial Reaction
This is amazing. Seeing the results of 100+ biomarkers, the easy-to-understand recommendations on how to improve the ones that are out of range, and the overall comprehensiveness of the Superpower test is amazing.
To be honest, as I’m typing this after looking over my results, I’m in tears. Good tears.
As I’ve blogged about extensively, I have felt so broken and ill for the past 10+ years, so seeing a clear action plan based on my actual blood results gives me hope!
Not only that, but to my surprise, it indicates my overall health score is optimal, and my biological age is 9 years lower than my chronological age! I did NOT expect that!
I’m completely blown away by these results, the comprehensiveness of it all, and the clear action/treatment plan moving forward. It’s all laid out really nicely and in an easy-to-understand way. They take you through the sections that are out of range, products to purchase, lifestyle interventions, and nutrition, as well as goals.
The goals section tells you what the goal is, why, the priority of the goal (I have 2 that are high priority and 3 that are medium), health impact, recovery time, and even what it means and potential causes based on your actual health data! This is impressive!! The goals area also shows the biomarkers to improve, recommended actions, and protocol items/supplements. You can purchase the supplements right there through Superpower.
What Sets Superpower Apart
I’ve been through a lot of non-traditional health programs in the past 10 years, and typically, they are based on suggestions and not actual blood or other bodily fluid results. Even the ones that have been, typically want me to start a health regimen of 15+ supplements at a time. It’s all so overwhelming. That is NOT the case with my Superpower results. Obviously, it all depends on your blood test, so I can’t say that you’ll have the same experience, but with this, there are 6 supplements they suggest, and with each one, they clearly explain why. I don’t have to do all of them, I am armed with the data to understand why I need them and the information to decide where or not I want to.
Personally, my biggest concern is my low ferritin, which is leading to my overwhelming fatigue (finally an answer to why I always feel half asleep and foggy!) I’m going to pick up the supplement to help with that, and the one to help with some of my cholesterol markers being higher than I’d like. My liver is also in trouble though I haven’t had a drink in over 13 years but it’s likely due to all the supplements/treatments over the years, and H.Pylori infection I’ve tried to get rid of twice now.
A huge thing that I have been putting off, but I know I need to do, is exercise. I am always so fatigued that getting up and exercising, even walking or going on a stationary bike we have in the basement, seems so hard.
This shows me though, with data from my actual blood test, that I need to be walking 20-30 mins a day and strength training 1-2x a week. It doesn’t say do intense workouts that make you sweat, it doesn’t say become a body builder, it says to go slow. Again, based on my actual results, not just my BMI or general advice.
Having the actual data helps me better understand the best treatment and make treatment decisions that support my goals.
Note on Reference Ranges
As I continued to examine my results and decide which supplements to purchase, while also trying to figure out how much of each to take, as they didn’t tell me that, I realized that the ranges that Superpower uses for their test results is different than conventional medicine.
I’m not saying this is necessarily a bad thing. It makes sense because typically ranges in conventional medicine are much broader than the optimal range which is where most people typically will feel better. However, the thing with Superpower, is even their overall normal reference range was different than conventional medicine.
For example, due to my results, I was very concerned about a few of my cholesterol markers being high, especially due to family history of heart disease (and subsequent death). However, when I look at conventional medicine reference ranges, I’m no where near high for any of my cholesterol results, I’m well within the normal range. I’m still going to use the supplements to improve, but I’m not as concerned about it as I was before I looked at other ranges. Note: Superpower DOES know my family history, that was part of the intake process, so they likely flagged my results as being a problem due in part to that family history. Basically, they want me to catch it before it’s too late and I need to be on pharmaceutical medications. Therefore, I’m not upset by the fact that they flagged my results as being high in their minds, because it is good to get ahead of this. I just wanted to point it out to others who may run into the same thing.
In terms of my liver function, I found similar results. According to conventional medicine, my liver is just a point or two over the conventional medicine reference range, but I’m still going to treat it with the supplement they recommend. I know I need to help it detox from the H.Pylori infection I keep trying to get rid of with supplements, and the supplement overload of trying to heal my body for the past 10+ years.
My ferritin levels being so incredibly low, that’s 100% justified. It is super low when looking at conventional medicine reference ranges and Superpower ones. Plus the overwhelming symptoms I have of low levels, so that I’m treating as well.
Note on their Support
We all know that even these days, we can’t trust AI, especially when it comes to medical situations. I initially felt that since they trained their AI concierge to know my results and other medical knowledge.
However, in talking with it, I realized, just like any other AI, I shouldn’t trust it. So I started contacting their actual human concierge to discuss how much of the recommended supplements I should take and when.
To be honest, this has been a bit frustrating as it’s taken them a while to get back to me, and when they do, not all of my questions are answered. Granted, some of my questions came around a holiday, but even when they got back to me days later, they didn’t fully answer my questions. So now I’m left being my own medical detective, yet again, which led me to look at the reference ranges for Superpower vs conventional medicine vs other non-traditional medical professionals online, as I needed to figure out dosing.
I ended up going back to my most trusted source, Dr. Izabella Wentz, since she is who I’ve gone to for everything related to my autoimmune disease, Hashimoto’s Thyroiditis. Luckily, she had articles about the supplements that Superpower recommended I start on, so I could see her general advice on dosing, etc. I still hope to hear a more clear answer from Superpower.
The other thing is figuring out WHEN to take the supplements. I cannot take most supplements within 4 hours of my thyroid medication, so I can only take these new ones with lunch or dinner. I take other supplements then as well, some of which may react with the new ones. So it’s this whole big thing right now trying to figure this out on my own until I hopefully get more support from Superpower.
My Overall Impression of Superpower
Overall, I’m beyond impressed with Superpower in terms of the amount of tests that were run for the low price they have them at. Had I gone to my primary care physician, it would have been hundreds, maybe even thousands of dollars, and that’s if I could even convince my doctor to have them run in the first place!
I’m thankful that I was able to try Superpower and get these tests run. I am even more thankful I could do it at home since after the blood draw I was rather woozy due to the amount of blood taken. Now that I know that my ferritin (type of iron in a sense) is low, it makes sense that I had that reaction.
I’m thankful that I was able to see that ferritin is so low, so now I can work on supplementing and hopefully feeling better soon. They suggest I retest in 3 months, which I plan on doing through my doctor, if she’ll order it for me based on these results, since she’s closer than driving to Quest Diagnostics to have more blood tested. We’ll see, though.
I’m also thankful that though I got a little more freaked out than necessary regarding my cholesterol and liver test results, that I am able to catch them now before things actually do get in the danger zone. Heart disease runs in my family, as well as needing to take medication for high cholesterol, so I’d love to do anything I can to avoid that. This is the place to start (as well as exercise, of course).
A couple of things I wish were a bit better are the communication from Superpower after testing. The results were laid out really nice, easy to understand, nice graphics, etc. BUT what’s lacking is the follow through in terms of how much of each supplement to take and when, as well as any supplement or prescription interactions with the recommended supplements. This would have saved me a lot of headaches and hours of research.
I also wish that I could download my results in a nicer format for future reference. They do have results that you can download but it’s just text results with only the numbers, not any explanation, like they offer online. As someone who has had to be their own medical detective for years, I like to have my own detailed records regarding what is recommended for me. I often go back and reference old results and recommendations over the years as my health changes, to see what worked before and what didn’t. It’s not a huge deal, but a nice-to-have.
As a mom of identical twins and a son two years older, I have gained invaluable experience in the realm, and chaos, of parenting. With a Master's Degree and Education Specialist Degree in School Psychology, I spent years as a school psychologist, helping children navigate through their educational and emotional challenges. Now as a stay at home mom and professional blogger, I combine my areas of expertise to help you in your parenting journey.