The Power of Minerals for healthy sleep, stress, hormones & gut health

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Every system in your body relies on minerals to run properly, so replenishing your mineral stores has broad and major benefits. A good mineral supplement will help you with:

• Energy

• Sleep

• Stress

• Mental focus

• Muscle recovery

• Hormone balance

• And more

Here’s a quick look at some of the benefits of minerals—and why they deserve a place in your daily routine this year.

4 Benefits of a Good Mineral Supplement

Minerals have a lot of different research-backed benefits. These are a few of them.

1. Better Sleep

Every time you go to bed, several different minerals work together to regulate your sleep.

• Magnesium increases GABA, your brain’s main calming neurotransmitter, [ ] and a large body of research shows that increasing your magnesium stores improves sleep quality. [ ]
  

• Boron helps your cells retain and use magnesium to produce GABA, which makes boron an important cofactor for improving sleep. [ * ]
  

• Potassium improves sleep efficiency, meaning it increases the time you spend in deep sleep throughout the night. [ * ]
  

• Zinc regulates nighttime release of glutamate, an excitatory neurotransmitter that causes you to feel alert, and research suggests increasing zinc levels significantly improves sleep. [ * ] Zinc also acts alongside magnesium to balance levels of GABA and glutamate, so it’s important that you have enough of both.
  

• Selenium status correlates strongly with sleep duration, and a 2023 review concluded that it improves sleep by protecting sleep-regulating parts of the brain from oxidative stress throughout the night. [ * ]

You’ll notice that several of these minerals work in synchrony with one another. A single mineral deficit can throw your body’s sleep cues off—but when you have plenty of everything, the sum result is deep, restorative sleep.

2. Stress Relief

Stress is expensive for your body. It depletes a variety of minerals, most notably magnesium , selenium , and iron , and you become more affected by stress the more your minerals deplete. Researchers call this the “vicious circle of stress.” [ * ]

But if you break that circle by replenishing your minerals, you’ll actually become more capable of handling stress. Research shows that having an abundance of minerals increases your stress tolerance. [ * ] Taking a mineral supplement can help you build resilience so daily stressors don’t affect you as much.

3. Gut Health

Gut health is usually about probiotics—but minerals are the unsung heroes in keeping your gut bacteria healthy and happy.

A 2024 review noted that five essential minerals— calcium , copper , iron , magnesium , and zinc— all affect the balance of good and bad gut bacteria, and that deficiencies in any of those five minerals is a common underlying cause of dysbiosis and gastrointestinal problems. [ * ]

Minerals also keep your gut lining strong, which can help prevent leaky gut and ease discomfort and inflammation.

• Selenium improves gut integrity, decreases food sensitivity, and lowers gut inflammation. [ * ]
  

• Zinc makes intestinal barrier cells stronger, which can reverse and prevent leaky gut syndrome. [ * ]

• Boron encourages gut cells to grow more villi—little arms that grab nutrients from food as it passes through your digestive tract. A 2023 study found that a boron supplement can help increase the nutrition you get from food. [ * ]

Minerals support your gut in multiple ways. They don’t get as much attention as probiotics, but they’re just as essential for building a strong gut.

4. Hormone Support

Minerals are essential to hormone production for both men and women.

In men, minerals increase testosterone and help your body use existing testosterone more efficiently.

• Magnesium increases testosterone production and enhances the effectiveness of existing free testosterone. [ ] Recent research has found that low magnesium decreases testosterone levels. [ ] More than 60% of Americans are deficient in magnesium. [ * ]
  

• Boron increases the bioavailability of existing testosterone. [ ] A 2011 study found that healthy men who took a boron supplement for a week saw a nearly 40% increase in free testosterone levels. [ ]
  

• Zinc is an essential cofactor for testosterone production. Even slightly low zinc levels (toward the bottom of the “acceptable range” in standard zinc tests) cause a drop in testosterone in men, [ ] while a zinc supplement significantly increases both testosterone production and free testosterone levels. [ ][ * ]

In women, minerals help build both estrogen and progesterone. Minerals are also essential for thyroid hormones, which is especially important for women—thyroid issues are nearly 10 times more likely in women than in men. [ * ]

• Increasing iron and zinc levels encourages progesterone production at any age, and is especially useful during menopause for improving mood and cognition. [ * ]
  

• Boron increases estrogen levels—and again, it’s especially effective during and after menopause for stabilizing estrogen. [ ] Selenium, iron, iodine, and zinc all work together to regulate thyroid hormone production. [ ][ ][ ][ * ]
  

• Magnesium and calcium both restore balance between estrogen and progesterone, to the point that a mineral supplement can help stabilize your monthly cycle and reduce PMS symptoms. [ ][ ]

Virtually every system in your body relies on minerals to function properly—which is why it is important to know your levels.