Eight of the sellers we track are listing orforglipron. Two of them are selling it in vials.
It is a tablet. The FDA approved it on 1 April 2026 as Foundayo, swallowed once a day, 77% absorbed by mouth, with no approved injectable form and no published injectable pharmacokinetics.12 There is no reason for a vial to exist, and two exist anyway.
A drug arrives that removes the problem everything else on this site works around, and within six months it is being sold in the format that problem created.
Foundayo in numbers:
- Approved 1 April 2026, for chronic weight management only
- A tablet, 0.8 to 17.2 mg, taken once daily with or without food2
- 12.4% weight loss at 72 weeks on the highest dose, among those who stayed on treatment3
- 8 listings across 8 of the 151 sellers we track: five capsules, two vials, one tablet4
- Prices from $129.00 to $289.00, against $149 a month self-pay from the manufacturer1
Is orforglipron a peptide?
No, and that is the whole point. Peptides are chains of amino acids, and digestion destroys them. That single fact is why almost everything else in this category comes in a vial with a syringe beside it.
Orforglipron is a small molecule, the same chemical category as an ordinary tablet. It survives the stomach. That is the entire reason it can be a pill.
What follows from that is larger than the convenience of not injecting.
No reconstitution. No bacteriostatic water, no mixing, no working out a concentration, no insulin syringe. Most of the practical guidance on this site exists because of steps this drug does not have.
Manufacturing at scale. Small molecules are made by chemical synthesis. Peptides are assembled sequentially, and that is part of why this category is expensive.
A different counterfeit problem. A research-labelled peptide is powder in a vial, and the question is what the powder is. A tablet is harder to pass off and easier to mass-produce badly, and the grey-market version of this will not look like the grey-market version of everything else.
What are peptide sellers listing as orforglipron?
Five capsules, two vials and one tablet, priced from $129.00 to $289.00.4
Several are labelled 6 mg, which is a trial capsule strength and not an approved tablet strength, so the number on the listing does not correspond to anything a pharmacy would hand you.
The manufacturer's self-pay price for the real thing starts at $149 a month, which puts the grey-market listings in the same range as the licensed product, from a prescriber, with a label.
For most of this market the usual question is whether a vial contains what the label says. Here there is a question before that one: whether the product category makes sense at all.
What does the coverage get wrong?
"Foundayo is the first GLP-1 pill for weight loss." Oral semaglutide was approved for weight management about three months earlier. Foundayo is the first non-peptide small-molecule one, and the first with no food or water restrictions.
"The dose is 36 mg." That is the trial capsule. The approved tablet maximum is 17.2 mg, and the label itself states the mapping.2
"It is an alternative to injections with similar results." It produces less weight loss than either injectable in their own trials. The convenience is real and the equivalence is not.
What is the dose of Foundayo?
It starts at 0.8 mg once daily and tops out at 17.2 mg, in six tablet strengths, with at least 30 days at each step.1
The trial doses of 6, 12 and 36 mg were an investigational capsule, and the label maps them to the 5.5, 9 and 17.2 mg tablets. So a page quoting 36 mg as a dose of Foundayo is quoting a formulation that was never marketed, which also explains the vials and capsules sold online labelled 6 mg.
Our dose page sets out both tables, the escalation schedule and the interaction that lowers the maximum.
How much weight do you lose on Foundayo?
About 12.4% at the highest dose over 72 weeks among those who stayed on treatment. ATTAIN-1 ran 72 weeks in adults with obesity or overweight with a weight-related condition.3
| At 72 weeks, highest dose | Orforglipron | Placebo |
|---|---|---|
| Weight loss, participants who stayed on treatment | 12.4% | 0.9% |
| Weight loss, everyone regardless of completion | 11.1% | 2.3% |
| Lost at least 10% of body weight | 54.6% | 12.9% |
| Lost at least 15% | 36.0% | 5.9% |
Weight loss rose with dose across the three arms, and the figure you will see quoted, 12.4%, comes from the top one. The other two arms did 7.8% and 9.3%, which matters if your prescriber starts you lower and keeps you there.
Foundayo vs Zepbound, Ozempic and Wegovy
Lower than all of them, and not by a little.
Semaglutide, the drug in Ozempic and Wegovy, produced about 14.9% at 2.4 mg in STEP 1, and tirzepatide, the drug in Mounjaro and Zepbound, about 20.9% at 15 mg in SURMOUNT-1, both in their own trials against their own placebo arms. Foundayo at its highest dose sits below both.
Cross-trial comparison is unreliable and the direction here is not subtle. The trade is explicit: a daily tablet with no food or water restrictions, against meaningfully less weight loss than a weekly injection. For plenty of people that is the right trade. It is still a trade, not an upgrade.
What are the side effects of Foundayo?
The GLP-1 class profile, arriving mainly during dose escalation: nausea, constipation, diarrhoea, vomiting and dyspepsia, mostly mild to moderate.3
The useful numbers are the discontinuations. Adverse events caused 5.3% to 10.3% of orforglipron participants to stop, against 2.7% on placebo, and stopping specifically because of gut effects ran 3.5% to 7.0% against 0.4%. Both rise with dose.
No hepatic safety signal was reported, which matters for an oral drug because the liver sees an oral dose differently from an injected one, and because an earlier oral candidate in this race was abandoned over liver findings.
There is also no injection site, which removes a whole category of problem that this site writes about regularly.
Is orforglipron approved for diabetes?
Not in the US. The approval covers weight management only.
Lilly has submitted orforglipron for weight management and for type 2 diabetes in more than forty countries, and diabetes trials exist.1 The US label does not carry a diabetes indication. Someone with type 2 diabetes asking a prescriber about this drug is asking about off-label use of a weight-management approval, which is a different conversation from asking for an approved diabetes medicine.
How much does Foundayo cost?
At approval Lilly stated $25 a month with commercial insurance through its savings card, $149 a month self-pay for the lowest dose, with higher doses priced higher, and $50 a month for eligible Medicare Part D beneficiaries from as soon as 1 July 2026.1
Those figures come from the approval announcement and prices move, so check the manufacturer's current page instead of this one.
The comparison to draw is with our own cost guide, which finds a market where the same compound runs from $40 to $1,200 a month depending on route. An approved drug with a label, a prescriber and pharmaceutical manufacturing, at a self-pay price in that range, is a different proposition from a grey-market vial at a similar number. That comparison did not exist eighteen months ago.
Is a daily pill better than a weekly injection?
It depends what you value, and the difference runs both ways.
A weekly injection is one decision a week, and forgetting it leaves a significant gap. A daily tablet is seven decisions, and missing one matters much less against a drug taken continuously.
So the daily form is more forgiving of a single miss and less forgiving of a disorganised week. Adherence to daily oral medication generally runs worse than to weekly injectables, which is the trade-off hiding inside the convenience.
Foundayo can be taken at any time of day, with or without food, which removes the timing problem that oral semaglutide has. It does not remove the frequency.
Common questions
Is orforglipron a peptide?
No. It is a small molecule GLP-1 receptor agonist, the same chemical category as an ordinary tablet, which is why it survives digestion. Peptide GLP-1 drugs are destroyed in the gut, which is why the rest of the class is injected.
What is the maximum dose of Foundayo?
17.2 mg once daily. The trials used an investigational capsule at 6, 12 and 36 mg, and the label maps those to the 5.5, 9 and 17.2 mg tablets. Anyone quoting 36 mg as a dose of the approved product is quoting a formulation that was never marketed.
How much weight do people lose on Foundayo?
In ATTAIN-1 at the highest dose, 12.4% among those who stayed on treatment and 11.1% counting everyone, at 72 weeks. More than half of that group lost at least 10% of their body weight.
Is it as good as Ozempic or Zepbound?
No. Both injectables produce more weight loss in their own trials. The trade is a daily pill with no food or water restrictions against roughly half to two thirds of the weight loss.
Is Foundayo available yet?
Yes. It has been available by prescription since April 2026, through LillyDirect from early April and then retail pharmacies and telehealth. It is prescription-only, and no legitimate route sells it without one.
Was Foundayo the first GLP-1 pill?
No. The Wegovy pill beat it to market by about three months. Foundayo is the first non-peptide small-molecule GLP-1, and the first that can be taken any time of day without food or water restrictions.
Is orforglipron approved for diabetes?
Not in the US. The approval covers chronic weight management only. Diabetes submissions exist in other countries and diabetes trials have reported, but the US label does not carry that indication.
Why are sellers offering orforglipron in vials?
No reason that makes sense. It is an oral drug with 77% bioavailability by mouth, with no approved injectable form and no published injectable pharmacokinetics. Two of the eight listings we track are vials, and the rest are capsules or tablets.
Does this change anything about research peptides?
Not the peptides themselves. It changes the alternative: an approved oral drug with a label and a prescriber now sits at a self-pay price in the same range as a grey-market vial.
Sources
- Eli Lilly and Company. FDA approves Lilly's Foundayo (orforglipron), the only GLP-1 pill for weight loss that can be taken any time of day without food or water restrictions, 1 April 2026. investor.lilly.com. Company announcement. Records the approval date, the indication, the ATTAIN-1 headline figures, availability through LillyDirect with shipping from 6 April, and the stated pricing of $25 monthly with commercial coverage, $149 self-pay for the lowest dose, and $50 for eligible Medicare Part D beneficiaries from as soon as 1 July 2026. Also records submissions for weight management or type 2 diabetes in more than forty countries.
- Foundayo (orforglipron) prescribing information, NDA 220934, sections 2.1, 3 and 14. accessdata.fda.gov. The approved label. Tablets of 0.8, 2.5, 5.5, 9, 14.5 and 17.2 mg; starting dosage 0.8 mg once daily with at least 30 days before each increase; maximum 17.2 mg; taken with or without food, swallowed whole, one tablet per day. Section 14 states that the trials used an investigational formulation and presents its efficacy as equivalent dosages of the marketed tablet, which is the mapping of the 6, 12 and 36 mg trial doses to 5.5, 9 and 17.2 mg. Absolute oral bioavailability 77% at 0.8 mg.
- Orforglipron, an Oral Small-Molecule GLP-1 Receptor Agonist for Obesity Treatment (ATTAIN-1). New England Journal of Medicine, 2025. doi:10.1056/NEJMoa2511774. Phase 3 trial, 72 weeks, read via the published abstract and clinical summaries of the results. Weight loss of 12.4% at the highest dose among those remaining on treatment and 11.1% counting all participants; at least 10% lost by 54.6% against 12.9% on placebo and at least 15% by 36.0% against 5.9%. Adverse events led to discontinuation in 5.3% to 10.3% against 2.7% on placebo, and gastrointestinal adverse events specifically in 3.5% to 7.0% against 0.4%. Gastrointestinal events were the most frequent, mostly mild to moderate, occurring mainly during dose escalation.
- Peptide Decoding vendor price capture, 29 September 2026. peptidedecoding.com/prices. Our own data, counting one priced product at one seller as a listing. Eight orforglipron listings across eight of 151 tracked sellers: five capsules, two vials and one tablet, priced from $129.00 to $289.00, with several labelled 6 mg. The 23 September capture had five vials and a low of $32.48, so the vial share and the cheap end both moved within a week.
Citing this page. Peptide Decoding. Foundayo (Orforglipron): The GLP-1 That Does Not Need a Syringe. Label figures from NDA 220934; listing data from the 29 September 2026 capture. https://peptidedecoding.com/guides/orforglipron-approved