Cardarine vs SLU-PP-332
Two 'exercise in a pill' compounds discontinued or unapproved for very different reasons — one a real PPARδ agonist GSK abandoned over cancer findings, the other a brand-new synthetic never tested in a person.
Cardarine
GW-501516, endurobol
Not a SARM but a PPARδ agonist — a real mechanism and a real 12-week human lipid signal, ended by two-year rodent carcinogenicity findings, with no human endurance trial ever run to weigh against it.
Full Cardarine evidence reviewSLU-PP-332
A synthetic ERR agonist that reproduces exercise-like gene-expression changes in mice — a genuinely novel mechanism with zero human data of any kind; everything sold under this name is unregulated research material.
Full SLU-PP-332 evidence reviewSide by side
| Cardarine | SLU-PP-332 | |
|---|---|---|
| Marketed for | Endurance and 'exercise in a pill', fat loss, HDL/triglycerides | 'Exercise mimetic', metabolic health |
| Evidence grade | Preclinical / minimal | Preclinical / minimal |
| Family | Metabolic / AMPK | Metabolic / AMPK |
| Key human source | Olson 2012 phase 2, Arterioscler Thromb Vasc Biol | ERR agonist mouse exercise mimicry, Nat Commun 2023 |
marks a row where the two differ. Evidence grades come from our evidence matrix, which grades each molecule on the human data for the use it is marketed for.
Our verdict
Cardarine (GW-501516) isn't a SARM — it's a PPARδ agonist GlaxoSmithKline discontinued after two-year rodent studies found tumors across multiple organs, and it's prohibited in sport at all times. SLU-PP-332 is a different, newer mechanism (an ERR agonist), with genuine mouse exercise-mimicry data and, critically, no long-term safety signal yet — mostly because it hasn't existed long enough to generate one. 'No cancer signal yet' isn't the same as 'safe.'
Cardarine fits if
You're reading about the history of a discontinued drug — the cancer-risk finding is why it was abandoned, not a reason to seek it out.
SLU-PP-332 fits if
The newer mechanism is the draw — know that the absence of a safety signal reflects how new the compound is, not a clean bill of health.