If you read that subject line and thought, huh? You're not alone–it's only recently I came across the term "maxxing," and immediately had the urge to smash my head against my laptop. Repeatedly.

And seeing as I had to suffer through it, it's only fair you do too. So, here's a quick primer.

"Maxxing" is the new shorthand for obsessing over a single trait until you've squeezed every drop of optimisation out of it. Looksmaxxing started it, then sleepmaxxing, then gymmaxxing, then heightmaxxing (this one includes leg-lengthening surgery, in case you were wondering), and, inevitably, T-maxxing.

As the name suggests, T-maxxing is all about encouraging young men to try and increase their natural testosterone levels. Well, that's the PG version of it, and it tends to get pretty dark depending on how deep down the rabbit hole of fuckery you want to go.

But this obsession with trying to "boost" testosterone isn't anything new, and it's understandable considering the important role it plays in things like muscle growth, bone density, libido, recovery, and even aspects of motivation and behaviour.

So naturally, the question a lot of men might have is whether there's anything you can do to boostmaxxx™ testosterone in a meaningful way?

The internet would be quick to tell you that of course you can. All you need is a particular biohack, an assortment of specific supplements, cold plunge your balls at 3am, or eat nothing but meat all day.

The problem with most of these claims, however, is the severe lack of evidence. And don't even get me started on supplements, which are often either contaminated or misrepresent what's on the label.

So what does work? A recent narrative review looked into the research to answer exactly that. Here's what they found:

How to reclaim your alpha and become a high-T sigma overnight How to increase testosterone naturally

• Energy balance: Prolonged periods of being in an energy deficit mess with the signalling between your brain and your testes — specifically, this screws up the pulsatile release of the hormone that tells your body to make testosterone.
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  • There's an important caveat here. It's not as simple as "deficit = bad; maintenance = good." Body fat matters. Overweight men losing fat usually see an increase in testosterone since body fat contains an enzyme called aromatase that converts testosterone into estrogen. But an already lean guy trying to get leaner will eventually see a drop in testosterone because the body doesn't know he's trying to get a six pack for summer. It just sees body fat levels are getting too low, the dude must be going through some type of starvation, so shut down any processes that aren't essential to his survival.
• Eat enough fat and carbs. Very low intakes of either fat or carbs can negatively affect testosterone. Relatedly, soy-based and plant-based diets don't seem to affect testosterone.
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• Zinc Intake. Zinc plays several roles in supporting healthy testosterone production. Foods like red meat, eggs, pumpkin seeds, and legumes are good sources.
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• Sleep. A surprising amount of your daily testosterone is secreted during sleep, particularly REM. This is the part where I tell you to make sure that you're sleeping enough. But you probably don't want sleep advice from the guy who only gets 4-5 hours of sleep per night. So do with this what you will.
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• Exercise. Lift weights, do cardio, go outside and touch grass.
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• Have sex. Do I...do I really need to fucking explain this?

The "probably doesn't work" pile

• Supplements (tongkat ali, ashwagandha, fenugreek, HMB, betaine, etc.): I'm going to be honest, the researchers lost me on this one. They list these as "demonstrating potential" and then cite a single trial on tongkat ali and a narrative review from 1994. They also go on to cite a meta-analysis on tongkat ali that found increased testosterone with supplementation but looking through the paper, there are implausibly large effect sizes that suggest errors in data extraction. Additionally, there's a statistical error in the meta-analysis known as double counting, which inflates the effect size. TL;DR: I don't recommend any of these supplements for increasing testosterone, based on the current evidence.
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• Alcohol, cannabis, and nicotine. The current paper noted the evidence was limited. However, we don't have to rely only on this review to get a sense of how alcohol, cannabis, and nicotine can impact testosterone.
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  • Alcohol:
    • ​A 2024 meta-analysis found that chronic alcohol intake was associated with lower total testosterone, lower calculated free testosterone, lower SHBG, and higher estradiol. However, this only seemed to be an issue in men who were drinking a lot, and regularly.
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    • In a separate 2024 meta-analysis by Moosazadeh and colleagues, male sex hormones were not significantly different between drinkers and non-drinkers.
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    • The main point shouldn't be surprising: A little bit of alcohol a few times per week is probably ok, while heavy drinking isn't doing your testosterone levels any favours.
• Cannabis:
  • The idea that cannabis “tanks testosterone” mostly comes from an old 1974 study by Kolodny et al., which reported lower testosterone in heavy chronic marijuana users. But the study's findings haven't held up in newer studies.
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  • A 2021 meta-analysis by Belladelli et al. found no meaningful link between cannabis use and testosterone.
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• Nicotine (smoking)
  • This is a weird one because smoking doesn't seem to lower testosterone. Zhao and colleagues conducted a meta-analysis and found male smokers actually had slightly higher testosterone levels than non-smokers. But the big caveat here is the studies were observational–ethics committees generally frown upon "please inhale cancer sticks for science." So this isn't 'proof' that smoking will boost your testosterone, and there could be dozens of other factors at play. Also, it's smoking–I don't think someone is picking up a smoking habit to try and increase their testosterone. I hope.

There were other strategies the researchers looked at like melatonin supplementation, sauna, cold-water immersion, and ejaculation but these all had mixed results, with limited evidence.

All in all, the things that can actually help 'boost'–or at least maintain–healthy testosterone levels are the boring things, like maintaining a healthy body fat percentage (not too fat, not too lean), eating a balanced diet with enough carbs and fats, consistently engaging in moderate-to-high intensity exercise, getting enough sleep, and a healthy sex life. Everything else, like supplements marketed as test boosters, aren't doing anything, and that's if they even contain the ingredients advertised.

–Aa

P.S. How did you find this week's instalment of the Vitamin?

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