Amla

Phyllanthus emblica L. was named by Linnaeus in Species Plantarum in 1753. Kew’s Plants of the World Online (POWO) accepts it in the family Phyllanthaceae, order Malpighiales, although the Flora of China and many research papers still place it in the spurge family, Euphorbiaceae. POWO lists 13 synonyms. The most important is Emblica officinalis Gaertn., published in 1790 and still used in many clinical trials and Ayurvedic texts; others include Cicca emblica (L.) Kurz and Diasperus emblica (L.) Kuntze. POWO gives the native range as Pakistan, India, the western and eastern Himalaya, Assam, Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka, east through Myanmar, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnam to south-central and southeastern China, Hainan, and Taiwan, and south to the Malay Peninsula, Sumatra, Java, Borneo, and the Lesser Sunda Islands. It has been introduced to the Andaman Islands, Mauritius, Cuba, Puerto Rico, Trinidad and Tobago, and the Windward Islands. Brown and colleagues give its common names as Indian gooseberry in English, amla in Hindi, and amalaki in Sanskrit, and the Flora of China records the Chinese name yu gan zi.

The Flora of China describes a monoecious, deciduous tree usually 3–8 m tall but occasionally 23 m, with a trunk up to 50 cm across and brownish bark; Brown’s review gives a height of 5–25 m. The leaves are small and narrow, 8–23 mm long and 1.5–6 mm wide, set in two flat rows along slender leafy shoots, and at the start of the growing season these shoots often flower heavily while their leaves are still poorly developed. The tiny flowers sit in clusters of many male flowers, each with six yellow sepals and three stamens fused into a column, sometimes joined by one or two larger female flowers. The fruit is a round drupe with fleshy pale green or yellowish-white flesh around a hard stone holding reddish seeds. The Flora of China gives wild fruits as 1–1.3 cm across, while Brown describes fruits 2–5 cm across that turn from pale green to yellow as they ripen. Cultivated trees bear much bigger fruit: Sharma and colleagues (Biomolecules 2019) note that 500 fresh fruits can weigh anything from 2.5 kg to more than 25 kg. In China the tree grows in dry, open forests, scrub, and village groves from 200 to 2,300 m, flowering from April to June and fruiting from July to September.

The fruit is mostly water, about 81–88 g per 100 g in the analyses compiled by Gul and colleagues (Antioxidants 2022), and its dry matter is mainly carbohydrate and fiber. What sets it apart is its polyphenols. Gul’s review lists a long series of ellagitannins, a class of hydrolysable tannins, including chebulinic acid, chebulagic acid, corilagin, geraniin, pedunculagin, punigluconin, emblicanin A and B, and phyllanemblinins A–F, together with gallic acid and ellagic acid, and Variya and colleagues (Pharmacological Research 2016) add flavonoids such as rutin and quercetin. Vitamin C is the other headline constituent, but published amounts vary several-fold. Gul’s review cites 193 to 720 mg per 100 g across varieties, the Flora of China says the mature fruit contains 1–1.8% vitamin C, and Scartezzini and colleagues (Journal of Ethnopharmacology 2006) measured about 0.4% by weight. Some of that spread reflects variety and processing, and some reflects the analytical method, as the next section explains. Amla shares gallic, ellagic, and chebulinic acids with the two Terminalia fruits of triphala; Peterson and colleagues name tannins and these three acids as the formula’s major constituents.

Amla runs deep in Indian medicine. Guruprasad and colleagues (Journal of Ayurveda and Integrative Medicine 2017) describe it as the herb most often mentioned in the Charaka Samhita, a foundational Ayurvedic text, where it is recommended as a rejuvenating herb. They explain that rasayana preparations were said to increase longevity, memory, comprehension, health, youthfulness, and complexion, and that Amalaki Rasayana, a preparation of the fruit, was credited with promoting longevity, preventing ill health, holding back the signs of age, and increasing fertility. Peterson and colleagues (Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine 2017) explain that triphala means three fruits in Sanskrit and that it has been used in India for over 1,000 years according to the Charaka Samhita and the Sushruta Samhita. Charak wrote that a daily Triphala Rasayana taken with honey and ghee could let a person live a hundred years free of old age and disease, and Sushrut recommended the formula for ulcers and wounds. The fruit’s reputation reached beyond Ayurveda: Akhbari and colleagues (Journal of Ethnopharmacology 2024) note that Traditional Persian Medicine emphasized amla as a hair tonic, taken by mouth and applied to the scalp, and Prananda and colleagues (Frontiers in Pharmacology 2023) record that its fixed oil was used in traditional formulations to encourage hair growth and pigmentation.

Chyawanprash carries amla’s best-known legend. Sharma and colleagues (Biomolecules 2019) explain that the name comes from the sage Chyawan and that the Mahabharata and the Puranas tell how the twin Ashwini Kumar brothers, physicians to the gods, created the preparation to rejuvenate him. The earliest recorded recipe is in the Charaka Samhita. In the classical method, whole amla fruits are boiled in a cloth bundle suspended in a decoction of dozens of herbs, the pulp is separated and fried in ghee and sesame oil until it turns brownish-red, and it is then cooked in the sugared decoction until thick, before honey and spice powders such as clove, cardamom, and cinnamon are stirred in. Amla makes up about 35% of the product, and the Ayurvedic Formulary of India specifies 500 fresh fruits, weighing 2.5 kg, with 2.4 kg of sugar. Eight classical ingredients, a group of Himalayan herbs known as the Ashtavarga, are not commercially available, so manufacturers substitute other herbs, and a 2021 commentary in the Journal of Ayurveda and Integrative Medicine criticized sugar-free versions, cookies, and fruit flavors as departures from the classical recipe.

Outside the pharmacy, amla is everyday food. The Flora of China notes that the fruits are eaten raw, sweetened, or preserved, that the seeds, roots, and leaves are also used as medicine, and that dried leaves sometimes fill pillows. A survey of Indian amla products by Choudhary (Ancient Science of Life 2011) lists dried fruit, murabba, pickle, candy, confectionery, sauce, powder, chutney, tablets, juice, syrup, and hair oil. Scientists took an early interest in its vitamin C: in 1936, Damodaran and Nair described in the Biochemical Journal a tannin from the fruit with a protective action on ascorbic acid. In recent decades, ingredient companies have developed standardized extracts for the global supplement market, among them Capros from Natreon, an extract sold as TRI-LOW by Arjuna Natural, and an extract standardized to β-glucogallin from Sabinsa, each tested in trials that the company supplied, sponsored, or ran. Chyawanprash, meanwhile, has become one of the best-selling health supplements of Ayurveda, according to a 2022 review by Sharma and colleagues that nonetheless titled its verdict “Golden Ager Chyawanprash with Meager Evidential Base from Human Clinical Trials.”

Amla’s antioxidant chemistry is real, but the details are contested. Extracts of the fruit are strongly antioxidant in laboratory tests, more so than ascorbic acid itself according to Majeed and colleagues, and the argument is over which molecules deserve the credit. One view attributes much of the effect to small hydrolysable tannins, especially emblicanin A and B, punigluconin, and pedunculagin; Natreon’s Capros extract, used in several trials, is standardized by HPLC to at least 60% of these low-molecular-weight tannins and no more than 4% gallic acid (Usharani and colleagues 2013). Majeed and colleagues at Sami Labs (Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry 2009) challenged both halves of the story. They found no evidence of emblicanins A and B in the extract they analyzed, and they questioned the high vitamin C figures reported earlier, because mucic acid gallates elute alongside ascorbic acid in older HPLC methods and may have been counted as vitamin C. Scartezzini and colleagues (2006) did find ascorbic acid, about 0.4% by weight in the fruit and 1.28% after svaras bhavana, an Ayurvedic process in which the fruit is treated with its own juice, and estimated that vitamin C accounted for roughly 45–70% of the antioxidant activity. The emblicanin standard and the critique of it both come from companies that sell competing amla extracts, and the question is not settled.

For cholesterol and blood vessels, proposed mechanisms come mainly from animal and laboratory work. Acampado and colleagues (Acta Medica Philippina 2023) summarize evidence that flavonoids from the fruit lower blood and tissue lipids by inhibiting HMG-CoA reductase in the liver, the same enzyme that statins block. Upadya and colleagues reported that their extract lowered cholesterol without lowering coenzyme Q10, which statins can deplete, but they did not test a statin, so the comparison is indirect. In human trials of Capros, Usharani and colleagues measured endothelial function, the ability of the artery lining to relax, through the change in a pulse-wave reflection index after a salbutamol challenge, and reported improvement together with higher nitric oxide and glutathione and lower malondialdehyde, a marker of oxidative damage, and lower hsCRP. In a 12-person crossover study, the same group found that two weeks of extract blunted the stiffening of the arteries normally seen when a hand is plunged into ice water (Fatima and colleagues, Pharmacognosy Research 2014). These are surrogate markers: plausible signs that amla affects processes linked to atherosclerosis, not evidence that it prevents heart disease.

Amla also acts on platelets, the cell fragments that start blood clots. In an open-label crossover study of ten people with type 2 diabetes, Fatima and colleagues (Phytomedicine 2014) found that 500 mg of extract, taken as a single dose or twice daily for ten days, reduced platelet aggregation from baseline, as did 75 mg of clopidogrel or aspirin, and that bleeding and clotting times lengthened with every treatment and combination. Khanna and colleagues (Journal of Medicinal Food 2015) saw less platelet aggregation in response to ADP and collagen after 12 weeks of Capros in overweight American adults. How amla might lower blood glucose in people has not been established, although Setayesh and colleagues note its purported hypoglycemic properties alongside anti-inflammatory and lipid-lowering ones. Triphala adds another layer. Peterson’s review describes how its polyphenols are transformed by gut bacteria, promote Bifidobacteria and Lactobacillus while inhibiting less desirable microbes, and give rise to anti-inflammatory compounds, findings that apply to the three-fruit formula. Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center (MSKCC) adds that triphala inhibits CYP3A4 and CYP2D6, two liver enzymes that break down many medicines.

Cholesterol and triglycerides are amla’s best-studied modern use, and three meta-analyses published in 2023 point in the same direction. Brown and colleagues pooled nine randomized trials (535 participants) of fruit powder or extract at 500–1,500 mg a day for 14 to 84 days. Compared with placebo, LDL cholesterol fell by an average of 15.1 mg/dL (95% confidence interval 4.7 to 25.4 mg/dL), VLDL cholesterol by 5.4 mg/dL, triglycerides by 22.4 mg/dL, and hsCRP by 1.7 mg/L, with no significant change in HDL cholesterol or blood pressure. Heterogeneity was high, and the prediction interval for LDL ran from a 48 mg/dL fall to an 18 mg/dL rise, meaning a future trial could plausibly find no benefit. Acampado and colleagues, pooling four trials of aqueous extract in 227 adults with dyslipidemia, found total cholesterol about 21 mg/dL and LDL about 25 mg/dL lower and HDL about 5 mg/dL higher after 12 weeks, with no significant effect on triglycerides, and rated the certainty of the evidence as low. Setayesh and colleagues (Diabetes and Metabolic Syndrome 2023), with five trials, reported significant falls in LDL, total cholesterol, triglycerides, fasting glucose, and CRP and a rise in HDL.

The largest single placebo-controlled lipid trial is by Upadya and colleagues (BMC Complementary and Alternative Medicine 2019). Ninety-eight adults with dyslipidemia at several Indian centers took 500 mg of an extract of whole fresh fruit, seeds included (TRI-LOW), or placebo twice daily for 12 weeks. Total cholesterol fell from about 232 to 177 mg/dL on amla and from 226 to 213 mg/dL on placebo; LDL from 140 to 112 mg/dL versus 132 to 126 mg/dL; and triglycerides from 261 to 172 mg/dL versus 248 to 210 mg/dL, all significant differences between the groups, while HDL did not differ. The extract’s maker sponsored the study, which was registered retrospectively. Gopa and colleagues (Indian Journal of Pharmacology 2012) gave 40 people with high cholesterol 500 mg of amla daily and 20 others 20 mg of simvastatin for 42 days and reported significant improvements in both groups, but with no placebo group the study cannot show that amla works as well as a statin. In the United States, Khanna and colleagues gave Capros 500 mg twice daily for 12 weeks to overweight adults and compared the results with two baseline visits rather than a placebo; calculated LDL, the cholesterol-to-HDL ratio, and hsCRP fell, but each analysis involved only 9 to 15 people.

Results for blood vessel function and blood pressure are mixed. In Usharani and colleagues’ 2013 trial in type 2 diabetes (Diabetes, Metabolic Syndrome and Obesity), 80 patients completed 12 weeks of Capros at 250 mg or 500 mg twice daily, atorvastatin 10 mg, or placebo. Both amla doses improved the reflection index about as much as atorvastatin, and lipids and HbA1c improved compared with placebo. The same group’s 2019 trial in 59 people with metabolic syndrome found similar marker changes, with LDL down about 22% on the higher dose. Both trials used capsules and biomarker kits supplied by the manufacturer. For blood pressure, Ghaffari and colleagues (Evidence-Based Complementary and Alternative Medicine 2020) added 500 mg of fruit powder three times daily to the medicines of people with uncontrolled hypertension; among the 81 who finished eight weeks, systolic pressure fell 15.6% on amla against 6.3% on placebo. But Shanmugarajan and colleagues (Phytotherapy Research 2021), in a larger trial of 150 patients with essential hypertension, found that 500 mg of aqueous extract twice daily for 12 weeks added nothing to blood pressure, lipids, HbA1c, arterial stiffness, or hsCRP. Brown’s pooled analysis found no overall effect on blood pressure.

Blood sugar evidence is thinner. Setayesh’s meta-analysis reported lower fasting glucose across five trials lasting 3 to 12 weeks in adults with an average age of 40 to 58, but its abstract reports no result for HbA1c, the measure that matters most in diabetes care. Akhtar and colleagues (International Journal of Food Sciences and Nutrition 2011) reported lower fasting and two-hour glucose after 21 days of 1–3 g of fruit powder a day in healthy and diabetic volunteers, compared with their own starting values. In an open-label study by Sabinsa scientists (Food and Function 2022), people newly diagnosed with type 2 diabetes and abnormal blood lipids took 1 g or 2 g a day of a β-glucogallin-standardized extract or 500 mg of metformin for 90 days, and the 2 g dose lowered glucose and HbA1c more than that low metformin dose. In Upadya’s lipid trial, only eight people on amla had raised fasting glucose, too few to judge. Amla is not a diabetes treatment, and for now these findings matter mainly as a reason to watch for additive effects with diabetes medicines.

Other uses rest on single trials. In 68 adults with non-erosive reflux disease, the form of reflux in which the esophagus shows no visible erosion on endoscopy, two 500 mg amla tablets twice daily after meals for four weeks reduced the frequency and severity of heartburn and regurgitation more than placebo, although symptoms improved in both groups (Karkon Varnosfaderani and colleagues, Journal of Integrative Medicine 2018). In 60 women with female-pattern hair loss, 10 ml of amla syrup three times daily for 12 weeks increased the ratio of growing to resting hairs compared with placebo (Akhbari and colleagues 2024). Triphala’s evidence is separate. Phimarn and colleagues (Journal of Evidence-Based Integrative Medicine 2021) reviewed 12 randomized trials with 749 patients and concluded that triphala might improve lipids, weight in people with obesity, and fasting glucose in people with diabetes under certain conditions, but called for large, well-designed trials. MSKCC notes that several studies suggest triphala mouthwash may reduce dental plaque, but that it is not clear whether it works as well as chlorhexidine, and that a double-blind trial of triphala combined with guggulu found no benefit for cholesterol. Those results belong to the formulas, not to amla alone.

Amla is eaten in many forms, and there is no single agreed medicinal dose. The fresh fruit is very sour, so it is commonly juiced, dried and powdered, pickled, candied, or cooked in sugar syrup as murabba. Trials have used a range of amounts: 1–3 g of dried fruit powder a day for three weeks (Akhtar), 500 mg of fruit powder three times a day for eight weeks (Ghaffari), 500 mg to 1,500 mg of extract a day across the trials Brown pooled, and 2 g a day of amla tablets in the reflux trial. Classical preparations involve much larger amounts: Amalaki Rasayana was given at 45 g a day for 45 days to healthy volunteers aged 45 to 60 in the study by Guruprasad and colleagues, after a traditional cleansing regimen that included purgation, and it increased telomerase activity without changing telomere length. Cooking and storage affect vitamin C. Sharma and colleagues (2019) cite one report of 34 mg of vitamin C per 100 g of chyawanprash and another finding that older samples held about half as much as fresh ones, so sweet preserves should not be relied on as a vitamin C source.

Standardized extracts are not interchangeable, because each company standardizes to different markers. Capros (Natreon), used in the endothelial, platelet, and US trials, is an aqueous extract standardized to at least 60% low-molecular-weight hydrolysable tannins and no more than 4% gallic acid, usually taken at 250 mg or 500 mg twice daily. TRI-LOW (Arjuna Natural), used in Upadya’s dyslipidemia trial, is an ethyl acetate extract of fresh fruit pulp and seeds standardized to at least 35% polyphenols, 8% triterpenoids, and 10% oil containing omega-3 fatty acids, given at 500 mg twice daily. Sabinsa’s extract is standardized to 10% β-glucogallin and was given at 1–2 g a day. A capsule labeled simply “amla” or “Indian gooseberry” may contain plain dried fruit powder, which is not what most of the extract trials tested. Because most trial products were supplied by, sponsored by, or studied by their manufacturers, results for one extract should not be assumed for another, and a product’s marketing claims are worth checking against the trial that actually used it.

Triphala is usually sold as a powder or tablets of the three dried fruits, generally in equal proportions (Peterson; MSKCC). Classical Ayurvedic descriptions quoted by Peterson call it a mild laxative at normal doses, a bowel tonic at low doses, and a purgative at high doses, so it is not a neutral daily supplement. Chyawanprash is a jam taken by the spoonful: Sharma and colleagues (2022) report that the Ayurvedic Pharmacopoeia of India gives a standard dose of 12 g twice a day and that it is generally taken at 12–28 g a day with lukewarm milk or water by people over three years old. Each spoonful brings sugar, honey, and ghee. Whatever the form, choose products that name Phyllanthus emblica or Emblica officinalis fruit, state the amount and any standardization, and show independent testing for heavy metals and microbial contamination. In Saper’s study, 75% of the products that contained lead, mercury, or arsenic claimed to follow Good Manufacturing Practices, so that label alone is not reassurance. Stop any product that causes new symptoms and seek advice.