Cosmetic peptides — argireline, Matrixyl and company
Argireline, the most studied, has 50 articles and 6 studies — the ones that state the route in the title are for cream and serum. 6 of the 10 names have 4 articles or fewer on PubMed
Experimental material. Read before using anything from here.
Nothing on this page is a medical recommendation, prescription or treatment plan. It is an organized translation of protocols circulating in research communities and, where it exists, of what published trials tested. The two are marked differently — and they are not equivalent.
Most of the compounds here have no FDA approval for human use. Several are sold labeled "research use only", which means they have not gone through purity, sterility or dosage controls for human consumption. A community-reported dose is not a validated dose: it is what someone reported having done.
Talk to a licensed health professional before considering any of these compounds. If you already use one and feel anything unexpected, seek care — do not wait for the next routine test.
Summary
Ten cosmetic peptides that appear next to the injectables in store libraries: argireline, SNAP-8, Matrixyl, Matrixyl 3000 and its two components, Matrixyl synthe'6, Syn-Coll, Syn-Ake and acetyl tetrapeptide-5. The evidence is small, and what exists is for cream on the skin.
Cream ingredient sold in a vial
The peptides on this page are cosmetic ingredients, with a technical name in the International Nomenclature of Cosmetic Ingredients (INCI) and a trade name from the manufacturer: argireline (acetyl hexapeptide-3 or -8), SNAP-8 (acetyl octapeptide-3), Matrixyl (palmitoyl pentapeptide-4), Matrixyl 3000 (palmitoyl tripeptide-1 plus palmitoyl tetrapeptide-7), Matrixyl synthe'6 (palmitoyl tripeptide-38), Syn-Coll (palmitoyl tripeptide-5), Syn-Ake (dipeptide diaminobutyroyl benzylamide diacetate) and Eyeseryl (acetyl tetrapeptide-5). The match between trade name and INCI is the one the ingredient manufacturers declare — among them Lipotec (now part of Lubrizol), DSM-Firmenich and Sederma; I checked it against technical data sheets from ingredient distributors, which I don't link because this site does not link suppliers. All ten are in the same store library as the injectable peptides. GHK-Cu already has its own page.
Two method caveats. One: I searched by the INCI name and the trade name together, because the literature uses both. Two: cosmetics do not go through the Brazilian database of registered medicines, and that is why this page has no "In Brazil" section. I did not check the cosmetics database — it is declared as a gap, not as an absence.
No number on this page came from the site's secondary source.
How much evidence exists, compound by compound
The numbers below were gathered by me on October 5, 2026, on PubMed and ClinicalTrials.gov. Each row's query is written out in full, next to the number, so anyone can repeat it and contradict me — and so the script that rechecks this site's counts can run all of them.
The condition column is not a claim about mechanism: it is the Condition field copied from the largest phase 3 record that the search itself returned. When there is no phase 3 record, the cell says so.
| Compound | Condition in phase 3 registrations | Query | Articles in PubMed | Studies on ClinicalTrials.gov |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Argireline | Wrinkles | "acetyl hexapeptide-3" OR "acetyl hexapeptide-8" OR argireline | 50 | 6 |
| SNAP-8 | no phase 3 registration in this search | "acetyl octapeptide-3" OR "SNAP-8" | 2 | 0 |
| Matrixyl (palmitoyl pentapeptide-4) | no phase 3 registration in this search | "palmitoyl pentapeptide-4" OR "pal-KTTKS" OR "palmitoyl-KTTKS" OR Matrixyl | 33 | 0 |
| Palmitoyl tripeptide-1 | no phase 3 registration in this search | "palmitoyl tripeptide-1" OR "pal-GHK" | 7 | 0 |
| Palmitoyl tetrapeptide-7 | no phase 3 registration in this search | "palmitoyl tetrapeptide-7" OR "pal-GQPR" | 6 | 1 |
| Matrixyl 3000 | no phase 3 registration in this search | "Matrixyl 3000" | 1 | 0 |
| Matrixyl synthe'6 (palmitoyl tripeptide-38) | no phase 3 registration in this search | "palmitoyl tripeptide-38" OR "Matrixyl synthe" | 3 | 0 |
| Syn-Coll (palmitoyl tripeptide-5) | no phase 3 registration in this search | "palmitoyl tripeptide-5" OR "Syn-Coll" | 4 | 2 |
| Syn-Ake | no phase 3 registration in this search | "Syn-Ake" OR "dipeptide diaminobutyroyl benzylamide diacetate" | 2 | 0 |
| Acetyl tetrapeptide-5 | no phase 3 registration in this search | "acetyl tetrapeptide-5" OR Eyeseryl | 1 | 0 |
Where the numbers don't add up
- Argireline is the most studied, and even so it has 50 articles and 6 registered studies. 3 of the 6 records state in the title that the product is for skin — serum, cream, topical use. No title mentions injection.
- 8 of the 10 names have 7 articles or fewer on PubMed, and 6 have 4 or fewer: SNAP-8, Matrixyl 3000, Matrixyl synthe'6, Syn-Coll, Syn-Ake, Acetyl tetrapeptide-5. The evidence that exists on them is, in large part, the ingredient manufacturer's.
- A cream ingredient does not become an injectable. An ingredient designed to stay on the surface of the skin, at a cream concentration, has no data as an injection. The records that exist test products applied to the skin.