Creatine, Lies, and Lean Mass: The Truth About Your Supplement Stack

Ah, creatine. The supplement aisle's poster child. The holy grail of lean gains. The glorified powdered saviour whispered into gym mirrors across the whole globe. If you’ve ever had the misfortune of scrolling through a fitness influencer’s stack breakdown video, you’ll have seen creatine being treated with the kind of reverence normally reserved for ancient relics or the rarest Pokémon card.

But does creatine really live up to the hype? Or are we just buying expensive milk powder and extra water weight in disguise?

I’ve been in this game long enough to remember when creatine was the forbidden fruit of supplement shelves—rumoured to transform teenagers into Schwarzenegger overnight or send your kidneys straight to rehab. Fast forward a few decades and creatine’s PR team has done wonders: now it’s "the most researched supplement in history." And sure, it might be. But as I learned back in the day defending my final project like it was the Magna Carta, research doesn’t always mean truth. Especially when your gains turn out to be glorified fluid retention.

So, what’s the deal?

A Study That Pulls the Curtain Back

A new 2025 study (Desai et al.) dared to ask the unthinkable: What if creatine doesn’t really make you more muscular, but just makes your body hold more water? Shocking, I know. Almost like saying the emperor’s new abs were carved out of bloat.

Here’s what they did: a group of healthy adults were either given creatine or nothing (no placebo, because who needs sugar pills when gym egos are placebo enough?). After just seven days of popping 5g/day—no training involved, mind you—the creatine group had gained half a kilo of lean mass.

"See? Gains!" cry the supplement bros.

Hold on, pal. That’s pre-training. No squats, no curls, not even a bicep rep for a selfie. Just creatine.

What this actually tells us is not that you grew a new set of quads overnight, but that creatine pulls water into your muscle cells like a thirsty cactus in the desert. DXA scans see more mass, but it’s not functional muscle—it’s fluid. As in, lean body mass inflation. Not quite fake news, but not quite muscle either.

When Training Entered the Chat

After that initial week of hydration hype, everyone started lifting weights like good old little guinea pigs. And guess what? Over the next 12 weeks, both the creatine crew and the no-supplement squad gained around 2kg of lean body mass.

Difference between the groups? Basically none. Nada. Zilch. So much for all the cash spilled on scoops of white powder, huh?

But wait, it gets better (or worse, depending on how many tubs of creatine are stacked in your kitchen). When they separated the data by sex, the creatine group only showed significant short-term gains in women—not in men. So much for the "universal" miracle supplement.

Let’s Talk Real Gains

Now, before the Creatine Cult crucifies me, let’s be clear: I’m not saying creatine is useless. It’s not. It can boost high-intensity performance, help some people squeeze out more reps, and in very specific contexts, it might even support muscle growth. Or so some studies say, with their very limited samples, let's be clear about that too.

But here’s the rub: most of the gains people attribute to creatine are either:

• Inflated by initial water retention.

• Overhyped by dodgy marketing and Instagram science.

• Or confounded by resistance training, proper sleep, adequate protein, and actual effort.

You can’t supplement your way out of crap programming and a tragic diet. Sorry.

TL;DR (Too Long, Didn’t Rep)

• Creatine increases lean body mass without training... but it’s likely water weight.

• With training, both creatine and non-creatine groups gained the same amount of muscle.

• Women might see a little more short-term water-related gain.

• Don’t expect miracles unless you’re training hard and eating right.

Final Set

Look, if you enjoy creatine and you’re not experiencing side effects, knock yourself out. Just don’t expect it to carry you to Hypertrophy Heaven without putting in the reps.

And next time someone tries to sell you the dream in a shiny tub, ask them: is it muscle, or just a swollen illusion?

Because as this study shows, sometimes the biggest pump is just well-hydrated hype.

Stay skeptical, stay sweaty.

For more information: Desai, I., Pandit, A., Smith-Ryan, A. E., Simar, D., Candow, D. G., Kaakoush, N. O., & Hagstrom, A. D. (2025). The effect of creatine supplementation on lean body mass with and without resistance training. Nutrients, 17(6), 1081.