The #1 Mineral for Sleep That 48% of People Lack

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1:49In this episode, you'll learn the 10 warning signs of magnesium deficiency,

1:54Dr. Josh Axe:how to test for it, which form of magnesium is right for you because so many people have questions about, do I take magnesium glycinate, magnesium thrillate, magnesium cellate? I'll answer those questions and I'll get into three magnesium rich meals you can start eating this week. Welcome to the Dr. Josh Axe Show.

2:26So listen, we're living in a time in history where we have calorie excess and mineral scarcity.

2:33Dr. Josh Axe:You know, our food environment is mineral poor and ultra processed, and that shows up as symptoms in many, many people. You know, under the Maha movement, this is finally being said out loud At a Maha Commission statement in September 2025, they framed nutrient deficiency as a downstream effect of the food environment, which has become an ultra-processed displacement of nutrient-dense foods. And new federal nutrition messaging, this came out last month in January, is explicitly pushing real food, less sugar, less processed foods, which naturally raises micronutrient density. You can see in the eat real food pyramid, this food pyramid has a big focus on just eating real food.

3:21It's lower in grains. That's at the bottom now.

3:23Dr. Josh Axe:You see a high amount of organic high protein meat, lots of vegetables. We see berries. We see lots of healthy fats. And that's predominantly what we're seeing here on the new food pyramid, again, with an emphasis on eat real food, which I love. In fact, some of you know this, not all of you. if you've been following me for a long time, my first book that came out, and this was back in like 2008 or nine, was called The Real Food Diet Cookbook. And so my big message to all of my patients and to all of my radio show listeners and podcast listeners was, listen, there's one thing across the board everybody needs to do more of, and it's eat real food.

4:04And so I love that messaging. And part of what happens when you're eating more real food is you're getting more vitamins and you're getting more minerals, you're getting more nutrients in your diet, and that should be a focus that everyone has. Listen, we're already at a disadvantage today because of modern farming practices. Even if you're getting whole real foods today, oftentimes you're getting less minerals like iron and magnesium and zinc because of modern farming practices where we till the soil, we don't replace the nutrients, we only put three nutrients back in the soil where there's probably 80 plus that should be put back there.

4:39And magnesium is one of those minerals that now we're getting less of. So when you eat broccoli today, there might be 50 % less magnesium or at least 10 % less

4:48Dr. Josh Axe:than there was 100 years ago, at least according to a few studies. So overall, our foods are less nutrient dense than they were 100 years ago. And this is why it's important to eat whole foods, eat organic foods, and even shop at your local farmer's market whenever possible. But today I want to put the focus on magnesium. Magnesium is probably up there in the top three minerals up there with iron that we are the most efficient in today. And when I look at study after study, our magnesium intake is lower than it should be. Magnesium is literally the lifeblood of plants. Now, where humans have iron at the center of our blood, magnesium is at the center of the blood, not truly blood, but chlorophyll, but it's at the center of the so-called blood of plants.

5:40And our blood has a superstar protein called hemoglobin. And the job of hemoglobin in humans is to pick up oxygen in the lungs and deliver it to every cell in your body. And right at the center of hemoglobin is the mineral iron. And so iron is incredibly important for humans. In fact, if you look at third world countries, I believe it's iron and maybe vitamin A are the most,

6:11Dr. Josh Axe:that's where people are the most nutrient deficient across the globe. Now, generally in the United States, iron is up there, but magnesium tends to be higher. But overall, again, iron is at the lifeblood of humans. Well, magnesium is the lifeblood of plants. And so the way that hemoglobin or iron works in humans is it's at the core that makes oxygen transport possible. So no iron at the center, that means no oxygen delivery. That means no energy, no life. And here's where things get interesting. Again, plants have their own version of a life-defining molecule called chlorophyll. If you remember the old movie, The Waterboy with Adam Sandler, you know, there's this, There's this scene where he's in science class and he says, chlorophyll more like borophyll.

6:58Well, chlorophyll really isn't that boring. It's actually pretty interesting from the standpoint of it is the blood of the plants. And here's what it does. It's pretty interesting. Chlorophyll, this is the green pigment that allows plants to capture light and turn it into energy through something called photosynthesis. and at the very center of chlorophyll is magnesium. So think about this. Every plant, every green plant actually has chlorophyll in it and it takes the sun, that energy from the sun and that chlorophyll absorbs it and turns it into energy for the plant, okay? And magnesium is at the center of that process of creating energy in plants.

7:41So if iron sits at the center of our oxygen-carrying system, Magnesium sits at the center of the plant's energy capturing system. And here's kind of the poetic part. Iron is the center of animal blood. Magnesium is at the center of plant blood or chlorophyll. Now, again, it's not literally blood, but this molecule that gives plants their life force, their ability to harness sunlight and build sugars and proteins and leaves and create fruit and oxygen, that whole ecosystem is built upon magnesium. Something to note here, the structures of hemoglobin and chlorophyll are surprisingly similar, almost like nature reused a blueprint, but swapped the metal in the center, the mineral in the center.

8:28Hemoglobin, again, iron is in the middle, carries oxygen. Chlorophyll, magnesium is in the middle and carries sunlight energy. And so the way this works in plants is plants breathe in light and give off oxygen. We breathe in oxygen and give off carbon dioxide. And maybe that's why so many people feel better when they spend more time outside breathing in fresh air, getting sunlight and eating mineral-rich greens, is we are getting more oxygen and more nutrients. Now, here is why magnesium is so incredibly important in the human body.

9:01Dr. Josh Axe:Magnesium is involved in over 300 enzymatic reactions in the body. It calms nerve signaling. It allows muscles to relax after contraction. It stabilizes our heart rhythm. It helps convert food into usable energy, and it signals the brain that it's safe to rest. Less than 1 % of your body's magnesium is in the blood, though. So symptoms can show up long before your lab show you're deficient. Now, first off, most doctors don't run magnesium tests at all. Even if you do get a magnesium test, oftentimes they're not fully accurate because they're not looking at the amount of magnesium that's actually in your cells.

9:43Now, here are the 10 most common ways that magnesium deficiency shows up in your body. If you've got two or more of these, make sure to stay with me because I'm going to go through the foods, the right supplements to correct all of these. One of the first ones is muscle tightness, cramps, and spasms.

10:00Dr. Josh Axe:If you're dealing with any sort of, especially in the trap muscles, sometimes even lingering headaches, these are warning signs that you have a magnesium deficiency. Fatigue and weakness. Magnesium is involved in energy production. Without it, you can feel tired, weak, or sluggish for no clear reason. Now, a huge amount of what we call ATP energy, remember I've talked a lot on the show about mitochondria. These are the batteries of your body that produce energy for your thyroid to function and your hormones to be proper levels and just for you to have energy. But this ATP energy in the body, the way your body typically uses it, is actually MG.

10:40Dr. Josh Axe:That's magnesium-ATP. And so it's ATP that's actually bound to and connected to magnesium because magnesium stabilizes ATP. So now your enzymes in body can use it. So your body doesn't actually run on ATP very much. It runs on magnesium-activated ATP. So it is incredibly important. Early signs of magnesium deficiency include digestive issues like nausea or even vomiting. This is why it's connected to morning sickness, a magnesium deficiency. And I'll get into that more in depth in a little bit. Number four, loss of appetite. If you're just not hungry. Number five, tingling and numbness, especially in your hands and feet.

11:20Dr. Josh Axe:That's a warning sign you have magnesium deficiency. irregular heartbeats. Magnesium helps regulate your heart's rhythms. Mood changes or anxiety. There's growing evidence that low magnesium is linked to mood disorders such as anxiety and depression. I can tell you, especially with anxiety, that supplementing with a magnesium glycinate or magnesium threonate has tremendous benefits at improving anxiety. Number eight, blood pressure. Magnesium helps relax blood vessels. Without enough magnesium, your blood pressure will rise. It's put strain on your entire cardiovascular system. So very important there.

11:58Dr. Josh Axe:Weak bones. Magnesium works closely with calcium and boron and phosphorus and other minerals to keep your bones strong. Long-term magnesium deficiency can contribute to the development of osteoporosis. And number 10, trouble sleeping. Magnesium has a calming effect on the nervous system and low levels can interfere with your ability to fall asleep or stay asleep. So, and now I want to talk about how to test for magnesium deficiency, the right type of blood work. Magnesium is one of the most important minerals for cellular health because it acts like a master key that It turns on energy inside your cells.

12:37Dr. Josh Axe:But your body's main energy molecule is ATP. But here's the twist. Again, ATP is only biologically active when it's bound to magnesium, meaning a huge amount of what we call ATP is really magnesium ATP, which is the usable form. And that's why magnesium affects almost everything from your energy levels to your stress response, to muscle relaxation, to nerve signaling, even DNA and RNA stability. so the health of your nucleus and epigenetics, because magnesium is required in hundreds of reactions in your body. Now, here's the problem. Most people think a normal magnesium blood test means they're fine.

13:16Dr. Josh Axe:But serum, which means in your blood, but serum magnesium is a weak way to measure true magnesium status because only about 1 % of the body's magnesium is found outside of the cell in what we call your extracellular fluid. outside of the cell in your blood, meaning the bloodstream is not where most magnesium lives. So your body can keep serum magnesium looking normal while silently pulling magnesium out of your tissues like your bones. That's why the best type of blood test for magnesium is known as an RBC, that stands for Red Blood Cell Magnesium Test. It measures magnesium inside your red blood cells, which gives you a closer reflection of the amount of magnesium inside your cell, not what's just floating in your blood at the moment.

14:07And it's important because magnesium is a cellular mineral. Its real job happens inside the cell where it fuels energy production, supports nervous system stability, and even powers conversions happening like glutathione and other things happening later on in the body. So if you wanna know whether magnesium is truly reaching your tissues, not just passing through your bloodstream, the RBC magnesium test can give deeper insight, much deeper and better insight than a serum alone can, especially in someone with fatigue issues or stress overload or muscle tightness or poor sleep

14:43Dr. Josh Axe:or other types of metabolic issues like diabetes. Serum magnesium can look normal while your cells are running low, but red blood cell magnesium helps show what's happening where the magnesium actually matters, which is inside yourself. Are you interested in functional nutrition tips to burn fat, reduce inflammation, improve your brain and energy levels, and heal naturally? Then I want to encourage you to listen to my friend, Dr. Dave Jocker's podcast, The Functional Nutrition Podcast. This podcast is designed to help you with easy actual steps to improve your nutrition and lifestyle, understand your lab work, and address the root cause factors that may be driving up inflammation in your body.

15:25Now, I've been friends with Dr. David Jockers for 20 years, and he's truly a world expert in functional nutrition, cellular healing, and so much more. If you want to learn the best nutrition and natural healing tips, tune in to the Dr. Jockers Functional Nutrition Podcast on Apple iTunes, Spotify, YouTube, and wherever you can listen to podcasts worldwide. Which type of magnesium should you be taking? Well, the first magnesium I want to touch on here, and I'm going to walk you through the

15:53Dr. Josh Axe:seven types of magnesium you should consider. But the first one here is magnesium glycinate. Now, I want to say this. When we look at magnesium, almost every time you buy a magnesium supplement, it's going to be magnesium glycinate, magnesium threonate, magnesium malate. You have magnesium attached to something. The reason for that is whatever you attach to the magnesium is going to help determine, it's like a vehicle. Magnesium is the passenger and the amino acid, like glycine, is the vehicle magnesium gets into, and then it's delivered more to one area of the body than another. Now, most of these forms of magnesium have a holistic benefit on the body, but most of them generally affect one area of the body more than another because that's determined by the amino acid that magnesium is attached to.

16:43Dr. Josh Axe:So for instance, if your main goal is getting better quality sleep at night and to reduce anxiety, magnesium glycinate is your best option. So it's important to know when we talk about magnesium glycinate, well, what is magnesium attached to there? It's glycine, okay? Now the mineral glycine is known for helping the body sleep. It's actually primarily found in bone broth. So if you know where it's found in nature, glycine is found in bone broth and the skin of animals. And so if you remember this, in collagen, collagen is primarily made up of proline, hydroxyproline, and glycine. Okay, so glycine is a mineral found in our bones and bone broth and our connective tissue that is really good for calming the nervous system and for supporting sleep and relaxation and calming anxiety.

17:33Dr. Josh Axe:So that's why magnesium glycinate, that type of magnesium is going to have the biggest impact on sleep and anxiety is because it's bound to glycine. And this form is in particular, as we talked about, it's great for relaxation. It's great for reducing anxiety. It's great for sleep. It's great for supporting muscle recovery. It is one of the least likely also to cause digestive upset compared to other forms. Because think about this, glycine is found in bone broth. That tends to be healing for the gut microbiome. So again, if you need help with sleep and anxiety, magnesium glycinate is probably your best bet in terms of a magnesium supplement.

18:11Dr. Josh Axe:Now, let's say your goal here is to relieve constipation or muscle cramps. Now, magnesium glycinate is still pretty good for that, but magnesium citrate tends to be the best for short-term constipation. I don't think it's the best for long-term, but it tends to be the best for short-term and it's highly absorbable and often used as a natural laxative. And magnesium citrate is effective for treating constipation and relaxing your body's muscles. So again, it's really good for that. Now, again, if you have really chronic long-term constipation, I think there are some others that could be just as good or better.

18:46Dr. Josh Axe:But for short-term, you're dealing with constipation, magnesium citrate. Now, if your goal is brain health, memory, fighting or preventing Alzheimer's, those sort of issues, magnesium threonate is probably your best option. It's unique in its ability to cross the blood-brain barrier. So threonate, as an amino acid, takes magnesium in this vehicle and helps it cross the blood-brain barrier. And so this is going to help have a bigger impact on nerve tissue and brain. So this is why it's good for memory, for cognitive function, for brain health. It can be good for sleep for some people. I tend to have people try it out to see if magnesium glycinate or magnesium threonate is more effective at them sleeping, but it is the ideal for mental clarity, for learning, for neuroprotection, for brain fog.

19:35Dr. Josh Axe:Magnesium threonate is the best for that. If your goal is cellular function, okay, and less muscle soreness and improving low energy, magnesium malate is probably your best option. Magnesium malate is bound to malic acid, which plays a role in energy production and reducing muscle pain, making it especially beneficial for anybody who has chronic fatigue or fibromyalgia. It's the best option there. It's excellent, as I mentioned, for boosting energy. If you're an athlete and you've got muscle soreness and want to improve recovery, take magnesium malate. It's a really good option there. Now, number five is if you've got indigestion or acid reflux, magnesium carbonate is well known for its anti-acid properties, helping with indigestion, acid reflux, and also has a mild laxative effect.

20:27Dr. Josh Axe:Now here's number six, Epsom salts. Okay, so this is a magnesium salt. This is best for topical absorption and topical recovery for muscle relaxation. So this is also good if you're an athlete or you've got sore muscles, doing a tub soak in Epsom salts or a foot bath soak is great because it will enter your body. Now there's also these mineral sprays similar like a magnesium oil you can rub in. But whether it's an Epsom salt or oil, these are magnesium salts, and these are good overall for tends to be relaxation of the muscles. And then number seven, now I wanna say number seven is a magnesium probably not a lot of people are familiar with, but it might be the best overall form of magnesium because it's the most food-based.

21:12Dr. Josh Axe:And it's the best what I would call for longevity. and it's called a multi-amino magnesium complex. Okay, so here's what it is. Multi-amino, that means there's multiple aminos attached, not just one, not just glycine or threonate or malate. All of them or many of them are attached to magnesium. There's one magnesium, like for instance, if we take a magnesium superfood like spirulina, okay? Okay, spirulina has 18 different amino acids all attached to the one magnesium, okay? And that's how you're going to find it in food. So the absorption is going to be very high. It's not going to have as big of an isolated impact on one thing.

21:56Dr. Josh Axe:Let's say, for instance, you want to get good sleep. Glycinate is going to beat out a magnesium, a multi-amino magnesium in just sleep alone. But the magnesium, the multi-amino magnesium is going to be good for everything in the body, not just one thing. It's not gonna be as powerful as the one thing, but it's gonna be good, generally good at everything. It's never the best, but it's good at everything, okay? So the multi-amino acid magnesium complex is a type of magnesium that tends to be derived from a mineral-rich source like spirulina. And so your body will recognize it and absorb it like it's real food.

22:37Dr. Josh Axe:So it's not synthetic at all. It's literally taken from real food. And so as a true food-based magnesium, it's going to have very high absorption. It's going to be very gentle on the digestive track. It's going to be good for everyday cellular energy, for muscle relaxation, for calming the body. It's going to be the best overall to take a multi-amino magnesium chill-like. Now I know that's a lot of words there, but that's because there's a lot of things attached to it, but it's really a food-based magnesium. And that's the one. I personally take two forms of magnesium the most, but I have four or five different forms in my home.

23:11Dr. Josh Axe:I take the food-based the most personally. I recommend it the most to patients. I do also recommend, though, magnesium glycinate a lot, especially those who are having trouble sleeping and those who are dealing with anxiety. So that's the other one I recommend the most. So those are two I personally take most often. Now, we're going on a snow ski trip here to Park City in the near future, and my legs are going to get really fatigued. And so I might bring magnesium Epsom salts with me and soak at night, or I might do magnesium melate for cellular energy for recovery. So I might do that then. If I really want to study and focus in on something, I might take a magnesium threonate.

23:48Dr. Josh Axe:But if you're wanting to know, hey, what's the best one to get? It's or probably magnesium glycinate for most people in terms of what you should be looking at. Have you ever felt like you're doing everything right? Eating clean, working out, taking all the right supplements, but your body just won't cooperate. Maybe you're tired, you're foggy, you're gaining weight, you can't sleep, and your doctor says your labs are normal. Here's the truth. Normal blood work does not mean your body is operating normally. It just means the levels in your blood work look okay. Not that your cells are actually using them the way they should.