Guide
A certificate of analysis is only as trustworthy as your ability to check it. Here's how we evaluate every report, and how you can do the same in under two minutes.
01
A COA is usually a PDF or a screenshot. Anyone with a free PDF editor can change a vendor name, a date, a purity figure or a batch number in minutes — and the result looks identical to the real thing. A genuine report from one vendor can be relabeled for another, and a two-year-old report can be "re-dated" for this month's batch.
Looking at a PDF can tell you a report is suspicious. It can never tell you a report is genuine.
02
Some labs keep every report on their own servers and let anyone look it up with the report's task ID or QR code. When you pull the report straight from the lab, you see what the lab actually issued — any edit to the PDF shows up as a mismatch. That direct lookup is the only foolproof check against a forged report.
Lab credibility is worth 25 of 100 points.
03
HPLC purity is the headline number, but it's one test. A complete picture needs to know how much is in the vial, whether it's contaminated, and whether the report even describes the batch you're holding.
Purity says what share of the powder is the peptide. Quantity says how much powder is there. A 10mg vial measuring 7.8mg can be 99.5% pure and still 22% underdosed — which also makes its real price per mg 28% higher.
Pass · Within ±5% of the label
Bacterial endotoxins survive filtration and aren't visible on an HPLC trace. Only a dedicated LAL test shows them.
Pass · Under 1 EU/mg
Lead, arsenic, cadmium and mercury can come from reagents and equipment. A purity test doesn't measure them.
Pass · Pb < 0.5 · As < 1.5 · Cd < 0.5 · Hg < 1.5 µg/g
Checks for live microbial contamination. Rarely published by RUO vendors — when it is, it's a strong signal.
Pass · No growth
A certificate only describes the batch that was tested. Some vendors reuse one good report for years across many production runs. If the batch number on your vial doesn't match a recent report, the COA tells you nothing about it.
Pass · Current batch, tested < 60–90 days
04
None of these prove a forgery on their own. Two or more on one report is a reason to stop and verify.
For research use only. This guide explains how laboratory reports are evaluated; it isn't medical advice.
PeptideAudits · Protocols App
Log every vial, batch number and reconstitution in one place — with half-life curves and the same math as the calculator above, saved per protocol.
Open the Protocols App