7 NAD⁺ Boosting Compounds (and Which One Works Best)

If you’re interested in slowing down the signs of aging, increasing your energy, and improving your long-term vitality, NAD+ should be on your radar. This crucial molecule powers everything from your metabolism to DNA repair, but unfortunately, it declines steeply with age.


As NAD+ levels drop, so does your energy, mental sharpness, recovery capacity, and overall resilience.
 

The good news? NAD+ can be replenished, either through precursors your body converts into NAD⁺ or by slowing its breakdown. In this guide, we’ll walk through the key compounds known to influence NAD⁺ levels, how they work, how they compare, and why AVEA’s Vitality Bundle, combining NMN and the Booster, is one of the most comprehensive NAD⁺ support strategies available today.

In this article

Why NAD⁺ Declines and Why It Matters

How Your Body Makes NAD+: A Quick Overview

The Main Compounds That Boost NAD+

Supplements vs Diet: Why Supplementation Makes Sense

The Synergy Between NMN and the Booster: More Than the Sum of Parts

How to Test Your NAD+ Levels (Yes, It’s Possible)

Final Takeaway: What’s Worth Taking Now

Why NAD⁺ Declines and Why It Matters

NAD+ (nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide) is a coenzyme present in every cell in your body. It acts as a crucial catalyst in metabolic reactions, helping convert nutrients into energy, supporting DNA repair, maintaining mitochondrial function, and regulating cellular aging through proteins like sirtuins and PARPs.


But starting around age 30, NAD+ levels begin to fall, often by more than 50% by midlife. This decline compromises your body’s ability to generate energy and repair itself, leading to visible signs of aging, weaker immunity, brain fog, fatigue, and greater vulnerability to age-related diseases.
 

How Your Body Makes NAD+: A Quick Overview

Your body has three main biochemical pathways for generating NAD+:

  1. The de novo pathway, which starts from the amino acid tryptophan and converts it into NAD⁺ through a multi-step process
  2. The Preiss–Handler pathway, which uses niacin (nicotinic acid) as its entry point
  3. The salvage pathway, which recycles nicotinamide (NAM)—a byproduct of NAD⁺ usage—back into usable NAD⁺

The salvage pathway is dominant in most tissues, especially in high-demand organs like the brain and muscles. It’s also the fastest and most efficient route for maintaining NAD+. That’s why NMN and NR, which feed directly into this pathway, are considered the most practical and effective precursors.

The Main Compounds That Boost NAD+

Now that we understand how NAD+ is made, let’s explore the compounds that support or enhance these pathways—and how they compare in terms of effectiveness, bioavailability, scientific backing, and typical dosages.

1. NMN (Nicotinamide Mononucleotide)

NMN is a nucleotide derived from vitamin B3 (niacinamide). It is a direct precursor to NAD+, meaning it only takes one enzymatic step to convert NMN into NAD+ inside cells. This makes it one of the most efficient ways to restore NAD+ levels, especially in tissues like the liver, brain, heart, and skeletal muscle.


Numerous studies have shown NMN supplementation increases NAD+ levels, enhances energy metabolism, improves mitochondrial function, supports cognitive health, and improves sleep quality.


Typical dosage used in studies:
250–500 mg/day. Some clinical trials use up to 900 mg/day. AVEA’s NMN delivers 250 mg per capsule—aligned with evidence-based, effective ranges.


Why Longevir™ NMN is superior:
AVEA’s NMN uses Longevir™, a pharmaceutical-grade NMN produced in Europe and tested in Swiss labs. It’s over 99% pure, stable at room temperature, and has been shown to raise intracellular NAD+ levels, not just in the bloodstream. This matters because energy and repair happen inside your cells, where NAD⁺ is truly needed.

2. NR (Nicotinamide Riboside)

NR is a form of vitamin B3 and another NAD⁺ precursor that feeds into the salvage pathway. It is converted into NMN, and then into NAD⁺. Like NMN, it has been shown to increase NAD⁺ levels in humans—but some studies suggest it’s less stable in circulation and may not reach certain tissues as effectively.

Typical dosage used in studies:
250–1000 mg/day. Many studies use 300–500 mg/day. Higher doses (up to 2000 mg/day) have been shown to be safe.

3. NAM (Nicotinamide)

NAM is a basic form of vitamin B3, found in food and in many multivitamin supplements. It’s a byproduct of NAD+ consumption that your body can recycle into NAD+ via the salvage pathway. However, high doses of NAM can inhibit sirtuins, longevity-related enzymes that require NAD+, so it may blunt some of the benefits you’re trying to achieve.


Typical dosage used in studies:
250–500 mg/day. Higher doses (1000–3000 mg/day) have been studied, but may interfere with sirtuin activity.

4. Niacin (nicotinic acid)

Niacin is another form of vitamin B3, used in the Preiss–Handler pathway. It was one of the first compounds shown to increase NAD⁺ levels. While effective, it often causes a “niacin flush”—a harmless but unpleasant reddening of the skin due to blood vessel dilation.


Typical dosage used in studies:
100–500 mg/day for NAD⁺ support. Doses above 1000 mg/day are used in cholesterol-lowering studies but often trigger flushing.

5. Tryptophan

Tryptophan is an essential amino acid found in protein-rich foods like turkey, eggs, and soy. It feeds into the de novo pathway for NAD+ synthesis. However, this pathway is long, inefficient, and tightly regulated—meaning it doesn’t significantly increase NAD+ levels, even when tryptophan intake is high.


Typical intake:
250–425 mg/day from diet. Supplementation can reach 1000–3000 mg/day but has minimal effect on NAD⁺ levels.

6. NMNH (Reduced Nicotinamide Mononucleotide)

NMNH is a chemically reduced form of NMN that may increase NAD⁺ more efficiently by bypassing some oxidation steps. It’s promising in preclinical studies, but we don’t yet know how it behaves in humans—or whether it’s safe and stable long-term.


Dosage guidance:
No established human dosage. Research is ongoing.

7. DNR (Dihydronicotinamide Riboside)

DNR is an experimental NAD⁺ and NADH precursor with potential antioxidant effects. Like NMNH, it’s still in the early stages of research. No clinical trials have yet been conducted in humans.


Dosage guidance:
Not yet available for human use.

Supplements vs Diet: Why Supplementation Makes Sense

Some NAD+ precursors exist naturally in food such as edamame, broccoli, and avocado, for example, contain small amounts of NMN. But you’d need to eat several kilograms per day to reach even a single 250 mg therapeutic dose.


On top of that, the body becomes less efficient at converting nutrients into NAD+ with age. Methylation slows, mitochondrial function declines, and enzymes that degrade NAD⁺ become more active.


This is why supplementation makes sense, especially when done strategically. A good NAD+ protocol compensates for these age-related losses and provides targeted, clinically validated compounds at effective doses.

The Synergy Between NMN and the Booster: More Than the Sum of Parts

Taking NMN alone boosts NAD+ availability. But unless you also address how NAD+ is used, recycled, and lost, your levels may plateau.


That’s why AVEA created the Booster, designed to enhance NMN’s effects and support NAD⁺ metabolism from every angle.


Think of NAD⁺ like water in a reservoir. NMN fills the reservoir, but over time water leaks (due to CD38 enzyme activity), evaporates (oxidative stress), or gets diverted inefficiently. The Booster acts like an infrastructure upgrade: plugging leaks, improving flow, and recycling used water back into the system.


How the Booster works:

  • Prevents NAD+ loss: Apigenin inhibits CD38, an enzyme that depletes NAD⁺ faster with age
  • Supports recycling: Betaine supports methylation, enabling your body to convert NAM back into NAD⁺
  • Improves usage: Resveratrol, Pterostilbene, and CoQ10 optimize mitochondrial function and ensure NAD⁺ is used efficiently in energy production

The result: greater and more sustained energy, improved focus, better recovery, and long-term cellular health.

How to Test Your NAD+ Levels (Yes, It’s Possible)

Want to know if your NAD+ levels are actually improving? Now you can test them, without a lab visit.


In partnership with Biostarks, AVEA offers an at-home NAD+ test that measures intracellular NAD+ levels from just a few drops of blood. This means you’re not just guessing, you can track how your body responds over time.


→ Order your test here and get personalized insights into your cellular vitality.

Final Takeaway: What’s Worth Taking Now

Of all the NAD+ boosters available today, NMN offers the strongest combination of bioavailability, safety, and cellular-level efficacy. When paired with a formula like the Booster, which protects, recycles, and enhances NAD+, you get a comprehensive solution designed for real-world results.


Emerging compounds like NMNH and DNR may become more important in the future. For now, the most proven way to boost and maintain NAD+ is a targeted protocol that combines precursor supply with intelligent preservation, just like AVEA’s Vitality Bundle.
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