“Vitamin D3?”Here!
Appears in 2 scanned products.
As a supplement
Talk to your doctor or pharmacist.
Roll Call does not check drug interactions or assess personal safety.
Vitamin D3 (cholecalciferol) is the form of vitamin D the skin makes from sunlight and the form most common in supplements.
Why it’s used
Taken to raise or maintain blood vitamin D, especially where sun exposure or dietary intake is low.
What the evidence is for
raising serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D and correcting deficiency.
What the evidence says
Vitamin D3 reliably raises serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D, and in people who are deficient it prevents rickets and osteomalacia. In adults who are not deficient, clinical trials have not shown that supplementation reliably reduces fractures.
Dose studied
15–100 mcg — adult RDA (15–20 mcg/day) up to the tolerable upper intake level (100 mcg/day), per NIH ODS.
Context
Deficiency is the setting where benefit is clearest. The adult RDA is 15 mcg (600 IU) for ages 19–70 and 20 mcg (800 IU) over 70; the tolerable upper intake level is 100 mcg (4,000 IU) per day.
Rumors
Correcting vitamin D deficiency, which causes rickets — soft bones and skeletal deformity — in children, and osteomalacia, weak and painful bones, in adults.
Supports — establishedhealth and safety evidence
Measured as a biomarker.
- Office of Dietary Supplements - Vitamin D (Regulatory) · Funding not checked
How much is a reference amount
- 15 mcg a dayfor adults 19–50 · Recommended Dietary Allowance
Upper limit 100 mcg a day, from food and supplements together.
- 15 mcg a dayfor adults 51–70 · Recommended Dietary Allowance
Upper limit 100 mcg a day, from food and supplements together.
- 20 mcg a dayfor adults 71 and over · Recommended Dietary Allowance
Upper limit 100 mcg a day, from food and supplements together.
15 mcg is 600 IU and 20 mcg is 800 IU; the UL of 100 mcg is 4,000 IU. Stored in mcg. A label in IU cannot be compared without conversion, and 028's standing rule is that the card blocks the comparison rather than converting silently.
Every applicable line is shown because we don’t know which one is yours, and a reference intake is a target for a population, not a threshold for harm.