The ‘Oatzempic Challenge’ On TikTok: Here’s What You Need To Know

Talk about sowing some wild oats. TikTokers have been adding the word “oat” to Ozempic to name a liquid concoction of oats, water and lime juice. They’ve been calling this drink “Oatzempic,” even though there’s no Ozempic medication in it. And “oat” my goodness, TikTokers have been claiming that consuming “Oatzempic” can lead to some Ozempic-esque weight loss—like up to 40 pounds in the course of two months. This has included urging people to take the “Oatzempic challenge” and try to lose such amounts of body weight simply by drinking the oat mixture. So, have these TikTokers been sowing some reasonable claims about oats or have they been wildly off the mark?

These days it seems like people on social media have been dropping the word Ozempic as loosely as people in the corporate world have used the phrase, “Let's circle back.” If you haven’t heard, Ozempic is a medication that Novo Nordisk has marketed for the treatment of as a diabetes. What’s made it quite popular has been the observation of what Ozempic’s principal component, semaglutide, can do.

When injected once a week, this medication can significantly reduce your appetite, which in turn can help you fairly rapidly drop pounds or kilograms. As a result, various celebrities and social media influencers have been touting the use of Ozempic and other glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) agonists for weight loss. And surprise, surprise, their claims about Ozempic haven’t always been accurate.

They’ve also been inaccurately using the word “Ozempic” as a buzz word for anything that supposedly can help you lose weight. For example, folks have been rather lax about dubbing laxatives as “budget Ozempic,” even though the comparison between the two is basically full of you-know-what. As I explained for Forbes back in September 2023, while laxatives can get things moving through your rear, in the end, laxatives are not a good solution for weight loss.

So, how about these “Oatzempic” recipes that are now being pushed on TikTok—such as the one that consists of a half-cup of oats, mixed in a cup of water and juice from half a lime? The word “Oatzempic” may sound rather trendy and sexy. But there’s long been another seemingly less catchy word for such an oat concoction—oatmeal. Yes, oatmeal. Referring to oatmeal as “Oatzempic” is sort of like calling Aubrey Drake Graham by his more popular name Drake. It may sound newer and sexier, but it is essentially the same thing.

The potential health benefits of oats and oatmeal are not new either. For example, an American Heart Association website states that “Extensive studies have associated oats and oatmeal with plenty of heart-healthy benefits, such as lowering cholesterol (both total and "bad" LDL cholesterol) and helping with weight control.” Oatmeal is chock-full of vitamins and minerals, such as vitamin B1, manganese and avenanthramides. Manganese can help boost your immune system, improve blood clotting and facilitate your metabolism of cholesterol and sugar in your blood. Oats also are surrounded by a seed-like groat—that’s groat and not Groot—that’s encased in bran, making oats a whole grain food.

Oats are about 11% fiber with one cup of raw oats typically having around eight grams of fiber along with about 0.8 grams of sugar and 5.3 grams of fat, amounting to a little over 300 calories. This includes beta glucan, a type of fiber that can dissolves in hot water to become a slimy goo. Such fiber can make you feel fuller when you consume it, which in turn can reduce the number of calories that you end up eating. So, if you do consume some oatmeal, maybe you don’t end up eating that extra hot dog or two or three or four. That in theory could help you lose weight.

But can drinking oats actually lead to the 10% to 20% weight loss that has been reported for GLP-1 agonists in clinical trials such as the one described in the New England Journal of Medicine? In other words, do such oat mixtures really deserve the “Oatzempic” moniker? Has anyone verified and validated with scientific evidence the claim that an oat drink can lead to 40 pounds of weight loss over just two months? How about no?

Whenever you hear any type of weight loss claim on social media, check to see whether it’s backed by real peer-reviewed scientific studies versus some dude or dudette simply telling you a story. When someone asserts that he or she has lost such-and-such number of pounds, you have no idea what else that person has been doing. For example, a celebrity may also be paying some high-priced chefs and trainers to help them maintain diet and exercise regimens that mere mortals do not have the time and means to maintain.

Heck, often you can’t even tell whether that person really lost the amount of weight that he or she has claimed to have lost. Believing what is being said on social media can be like believing everything that people say on dating app profiles. Sure that person may claim that he or she doesn’t like drama, but here’s a dramatic revelation—people can lie on dating sites, social media and any other type of advertising.

So, the bottom line is that drinking or eating an oatmeal-esque concoction can indeed help improve your health and potentially help you lose some weight. Just don’t expect it to be a miracle weight loss measure. There’s really no such thing as a miracle weight loss measure. Even Ozmepic and other GLP-1 agonists have a number of limitations. For example, you have to keep taking such medications—which can cost you up to $1,000 each injection—indefinitely. Otherwise the lost body weight may return. Plus, these medications are not without their potential side effects, and it’s not yet clear what their longer-term effects may be. Nothing can provide a short cut over maintaining a healthful diet and physical activity, not even steel-cut oats.