Is shilajit bad for your liver? What the studies show

“Is shilajit bad for your liver?” comes up often, partly because herbal supplements are a known cause of liver injury. For healthy people, the trials so far are reassuring: every human study that measured liver function found it unchanged, at least over a few months.

There are two caveats. The trials were small, short and left out people with liver problems. And the clearest danger to the liver isn’t shilajit itself but the toxic metals that poorly made Ayurvedic products can contain.

What do human trials show about the liver?

No harm, in the studies that checked. Doctors judge liver health mainly from blood tests for liver enzymes, such as ALT (also called SGPT), AST (SGOT) and alkaline phosphatase, which rise when liver cells are damaged.

That is fewer than 100 people taking shilajit, for no longer than three months. None of the trials included people with liver disease, heavy drinkers or people taking medicines that strain the liver, and none followed anyone for years. Rare side effects need far larger studies to show up, so trials this size could miss them. Our side effects page covers what else the trials reported.

Why are heavy metals the bigger liver risk?

Because contaminated Ayurvedic products have caused severe liver injury, and shilajit is sold through the same channels. At one hospital in southern India, doctors found 94 people with severe liver injury who had taken Ayurvedic or herbal medicines, and judged 33 of them to have liver injury caused by those medicines. Five of the 27 patients with a liver biopsy died, and products containing arsenic and mercury were linked to death (Philips et al., 2018).

Lead can harm the liver too. In an Indian hospital series of 73 people poisoned by lead in Ayurvedic medicines, all had abnormal liver tests (Mehta et al., 2017). In Australia, a man who had taken two Indian herbal tonics developed mild hepatitis and anaemia, and the tablets turned out to contain very high levels of lead (Dunbabin et al., 1992).

These reports did not involve shilajit specifically, and we found no published case of liver injury blamed on shilajit itself. But raw shilajit can contain lead and arsenic, which is why a batch-specific lab report from an independent lab matters more than any claim on the label. In our audit of 20 UK sellers, 11 published no lab report at all. See heavy metals in shilajit for the GB limits, and use our lab report checker to compare a seller’s results with them.

Is shilajit safe with liver disease?

It has never been studied, so the safe answer is to ask your liver team first. There are three reasons for caution.

• Contamination hits a damaged liver harder. At a hospital in Kerala, doctors linked serious illness (jaundice, fluid in the abdomen or confusion) in 19 people with cirrhosis to Ayurvedic and homeopathic “immunity boosters” taken during the COVID-19 pandemic, and 8 died within six months. Most of the products tested contained lead or mercury, and 40% contained arsenic (Philips et al., 2023).
• Iron. Shilajit contains iron, and rats given very high doses for 91 days had a change in liver iron levels (Velmurugan et al., 2012). In haemochromatosis, an inherited condition where iron builds up, the extra iron can scar the liver, and the NHS advises people with it to avoid iron supplements.
• No safety data. None of the trials included anyone with hepatitis, cirrhosis, fatty liver disease or a liver transplant.

If you have liver disease, don’t start shilajit without your liver team’s advice. The NHS notes that most liver disease causes no symptoms early on, so a normal feeling isn’t proof your liver is healthy.

Can shilajit help fatty liver disease?

Not on current evidence. Non-alcoholic fatty liver disease, now also called MASLD, is very common and linked to being overweight, type 2 diabetes and high cholesterol. The only studies of shilajit for it are in rats. In rats fed a high-fat diet for 12 weeks, 150 or 250 mg per kilo of shilajit for 2 weeks lowered liver enzymes, liver weight and liver fat compared with untreated rats (Ghezelbash et al., 2020).

For scale, 150 mg per kilo would be more than 10 g a day for a 70 kg adult, far above the 250 to 500 mg used in most human trials. No human trial has tested shilajit for fatty liver. The NHS advice is to lose weight if you are overweight, eat a healthy, balanced diet, exercise regularly and keep alcohol within limits.

What do other animal studies show?

Mostly protection, with one warning sign. In mice, a shilajit extract given before an overdose of paracetamol (called acetaminophen in the US) lowered the rise in liver enzymes ALT and AST by about 75% and 70% (He et al., 2026). In rats with bone cancer, shilajit given with chemotherapy reduced liver and kidney damage (Jambi and Abdulaziz Alshubaily, 2022).

On the other side, rats given 5,000 mg per kilo a day for 91 days had “negligible” changes in the liver only at that highest dose (Velmurugan et al., 2012). A 2026 study of a single 2,000 mg per kilo dose found mild to moderate damage in liver cells under the microscope across all ten shilajit samples tested, with no scarring, even though the rats showed no signs of illness (Rizun et al., 2026). The first author of that study founded a company that sells shilajit.

These doses are far above what people take, and rat results often don’t carry over. They don’t show that shilajit protects the human liver, and none of them is a reason to take it alongside paracetamol or chemotherapy.

Does shilajit detox the liver?

No study shows that it does. Your liver and kidneys clear waste without help, and “liver detox” is not an authorised health claim for any food supplement in the UK. A seller who says shilajit cleanses or detoxes the liver is breaking the rules (see is shilajit legal in the UK?).

How can you protect your liver if you take shilajit?

• Choose a purified product with a recent, batch-specific lab report showing lead, arsenic and mercury within GB limits.
• Stay within the doses used in trials, usually 250 to 500 mg a day (see the dosage guide).
• Don’t take it if you have liver disease or a liver transplant, unless your liver team agrees.
• Tell your GP you take it if you have liver blood tests, so any change can be interpreted correctly.
• Stop and see your GP if you notice yellow skin or eyes, itchy skin, unusual tiredness or pain under your right ribs.
• Check with a pharmacist if you take regular medicines (see drug interactions).

For the other organ most often asked about, see shilajit and your kidneys. For other risks, see the safety overview.