Sage

Salvia officinalis

Sage and rosemary are the same genus. Botanists moved rosemary into Salvia in 2017, so the two jars in the rack are closer relatives than the labels suggest.

Benefits

Brings hot flushes down

Sage leaf tablets cut how often hot flushes come and how bad they get, and night sweats with them.

What It Is Known For

Sage tea for hot flushes

Nobody has tested the tea. A cup carries more leaf than a day of the tablets did, so it may well do the same thing — but may well is not a finding.

Sage for memory

That is a different question with a different literature, and it is not what this page is about.

Herbs being gentler than hormones

One of the two trials had no placebo group at all, so part of what it measured was people getting better while being watched.

Key Active Compounds

The leaf

The part used, and the part that was tested.

Thujone

The compound behind the limits on how much and how long.

Traditionally Used

As a tea

One to two grams of dried leaf in a cup of boiling water, left up to fifteen minutes, drunk three times a day. The reason it was drunk is sweating — night sweats, and flushes.

How to Take It / Use It

For hot flushes

Take sage leaf tablets daily and judge it after eight weeks. Tea has not been tested for this, which is not the same as it failing.

Cautions

Tablets are what was tested

The eight-week result belongs to leaf tablets, and to nothing else.

Thujone

Sage carries thujone, which is why it is taken in courses rather than indefinitely.

Pregnancy and breastfeeding

Medicinal amounts are not advised, though cooking with it is another matter.

Epilepsy

Anyone with seizures should avoid concentrated sage.

Where It Comes From

Salvia officinalis comes from the northern Mediterranean, where it grows on dry stony ground. Its name is the Latin for save or heal, and officinalis marked it as a plant kept in the pharmacy.

How We Choose It

We check every product so you don't have to. A sage only makes our list if:

Salvia officinalis on the label. Spanish sage and clary sage are different plants sold under the same word.
Leaf, and it says leaf. What was studied was a leaf preparation, not an isolated compound.
A stated amount per tablet. A tablet that does not say how much leaf is in it was never measured.
Not sage essential oil by mouth. The oil is where the thujone concentrates and it is not the leaf preparation that was studied.

If no product meets these standards, we don't list one. No exceptions for affiliates.

See our picks

Sage leaf tabletscoming soon

Dried sage leafcoming soon

Sources3

Bommer S, et al. First time proof of sage's tolerability and efficacy in menopausal women with hot flushes. Advances in Therapy, 2011. Open trial
The effect of Salvia officinalis tablet on hot flashes, night sweating and estradiol hormone in postmenopausal women. Randomized placebo-controlled trial
Sage monograph, Herbal Reality (The Earthsong Foundation). Herbal monograph