If you take kratom for some time, you may develop kratom tolerance. It’s one of the most common reasons for kratom not working.
When it happens, your body becomes less sensitive to the plant. And the dose that you normally take does not deliver the same results.
Thus, to get the same effects as before, you need to take a larger dose. While it may seem like a good solution, it is not optimal in the long haul.
A larger dose means that you’ll go through your kratom reserves a lot faster. And will need to order it more frequently. That will require you to spend more and more money over time.
The good news is that kratom tolerance is preventable and also reversible. So, even if you have already developed it, you can easily get over it.
But, before we get into how to do it, let’s first look at why that happens.
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Alkaloids Cause Kratom Tolerance
Kratom has a number of different alkaloids that contribute to its medicinal properties. Two of the main ones are mitragynine and 7-hydroxymitragynine.
Mitragynine is primarily responsible for kratom’s pain-killing and stimulating properties. Meanwhile, 7-hydroxymitragynine causes pain-killing, relaxing, and stimulating effects.
The two alkaloids are also the main ones causing kratom tolerance to develop.
When you take kratom, its alkaloids interact with the brain receptors. That usually happens within 10-30 minutes after you take your dose, but this time may vary with some strains.
That is when you’ll feel kratom kick in.
When alkaloid concentration reaches a certain amount, your brain begins to down-regulate these receptors. It does so to regain balance.
Kratom alkaloids don’t leave the body the moment you stop feeling the effects. Instead, they remain in your system for approximately 24 hours.
So, if you take kratom regularly, you don’t let alkaloids leave your body completely. Because of that, there is always some amount of them in your system.
Your brain knows that, and it keeps regulating the receptors to continuously find balance. Over time that develops into kratom tolerance.
How Can You Prevent Kratom Tolerance
1. Take the Right Dose
To make sure that you’re not taking more than you need, ingest the right dose that your body requires.
You can do so by first determining what your perfect dose is. Always start with the lowest amount. It’ll usually be 2-3 grams for most strains or even less if a specific vendor’s kratom is very strong.
You may experience kratom effects or not feel anything at all. If the latter happens, gradually up your dose until you feel the desired results.
When you know what the right dose for you is, carefully measure the amount of kratom that you intake each time. We recommend using a sensitive digital scale instead of eyeing your dose with a spoon.
Depending on what size the spoon is and how much you load onto it, the amount of kratom in it can drastically vary. So, you may be taking a lot more than you actually need.
2. Keep Track of Your Kratom Intake
The surest way to developing kratom tolerance is taking it whenever you feel like doing it. The problem with such an approach is that you’ll be ingesting kratom irregularly and even multiple times a day.
Some users end up taking as much as 30-50 grams of kratom powder a day. If that’s where you’re at, you definitely suffer from kratom tolerance.
This way you’ll be constantly adding a new kratom dose without letting the existing alkaloids leave your system. Alkaloid levels in brain receptors are never the same. They will fluctuate depending on how long ago you took your dose.
Along with alkaloid concentration, the intensity at which your brain will try to self-regulate will also vary.
It’s best to take a new dose when both of these are low. This way you’ll be allowing enough time for your body to reset.
To ensure that you avoid sporadic kratom intake times, keep track of the doses that you ingest.
You can do it via a journal, a mobile app, or any other means that works for you. Select the best time depending on your needs and the strain that you’re taking and stay consistent.
3. Take Magnesium Supplements
You may already be familiar with kratom potentiatiors. But, there’s one that we’d like to point out.
Magnesium is effective for both – increasing the potency of kratom as well as lowering kratom tolerance.
Remember the receptors that were responsible for developing kratom tolerance? Magnesium is saturated in antagonists for these receptors and can help to keep them balanced.
4. Do Not Take or Limit Your Intake of Kratom Extracts
According to multiple users, kratom extracts can quickly develop tolerance. Or, they can make users immune to kratom powder, especially if taken for a long time.
Another problem with extracts is that you will need to calculate each dose. Kratom doses are normally measured in grams of kratom powder. That means that you’ll need to know how much kratom powder you would need in grams. Then, you’ll need to calculate that taking into consideration the strength of the extract.
This makes doses of kratom extracts hard to measure. And you can easily take a much larger dose than your body actually requires.
5. Rotate Kratom Veins and Strains
Kratom tolerance is most likely to develop if you’re continuously taking the same strain. To avoid that, many users suggest rotating vein colors and strains.
Since each of them will have a different concentration and potency of alkaloids, your body will have a harder time getting used to any one of them. Users also report feeling more sensitive to each of the strains if they rotate them.
If you’d like to do this, select a few strains with similar effects that would deliver the results that you need. Then, create a schedule of what days you’ll be taking each of them on.
Keep in mind that different strains will have different potency and alkaloid concentration. Therefore, you will likely need to take a slightly different dose for each strain.
6. Take Days Off
Kratom tolerance develops if you allow for kratom buildup to occur. This can happen if you aren’t allowing enough time between your doses for alkaloids to leave your system.
An easy way of preventing tolerance from happening and is not taking kratom every day.
Allow one or two days between each kratom dose. That will let your body expel the alkaloids that it has accumulated. It will also help you keep your kratom sensitivity low.
What If You Already Have Developed Kratom Tolerance?
The best and the fastest way of lowering kratom tolerance is taking a break. How long of a break you’ll need, will depend on your individual body and how strong your tolerance is.
Time off will give your body time to remove the alkaloids that it has accumulated and reset. As a result, your tolerance levels will go down.
Observe how your body is feeling. When you feel recovered and any side effects are gone, try taking your initial dose of kratom again.
And most importantly, assess why tolerance developed in the first place and what you can do to prevent that from happening again in the future.
Have you ever experienced kratom tolerance? Why did that happen? What did you do to overcome it? Perhaps you’ve discovered your own tricks for preventing and lowering kratom tolerance?
I’ve been taking Kratom daily for about 8 or 9 months now. I intially started using Kratom to stop taking Suboxone after close to 3 years. I don’t believe I would have been able to without it. So I started with 5g’s 3x a day being mostly greens. Then I went to a 3/2 green/white dose. After a few months I’d gotten close to 30g’s a day. But knowing that was not only unnecessary but probably due to my addictive more is better character trait, I’ve spent the last 2 weeks dropping my dosage relatively quickly I think, by a gram a dose for a week. I’m now back down to 15g’s a day but in a 3g’s 5x a day and always with 3-4 hours in between. Being my reasons for taking Kratom being mainly as an alternative to opioids and anxiety I don’t know if I will get any lower than that but I feel like 15g’s a day is realistic and more beneficial. I order a different strain every month but always in the same green, white and red as well as a yellow or gold and I rotate them throughout the day. Sometimes using a straight strain or mixing strains each dose. It’s what works best for me. At 42 years old I don’t think it’s a stretch to say Kratom saved my life. Thank you.
Hello Joe,
Thank you very much for sharing your experience with kratom.
Different variables play into how kratom interacts with individual bodies. These can be age, gender, body composition, and similar. Some people will require more, some less.
15g is a bit higher than the recommended dosage, but do keep in mind that these doses usually are references for a single intake.
I started taking kratom 18 months ago. I was an alcoholic who nursed a hangover every day and generally felt wretched all the time. A coworker suggested I try kratom saying it would make me feel better and give me energy. It did just that. I quickly realized that alcohol conflicted with the kratom, as if they cancelled each other out, so after drinking nearly every day for 3 decades, I quit alcohol in less than 3 weeks. I know 100% that this was only possible because of kratom. I cannot even stand the idea of an alcohol buzz anymore as the feeling holds no pleasure at all to me now.
That’s the good part.
The bad part is the I’m an addict. It is how i approach things. After 18 months of kratom every day i am doing 8g 4 to 6 times a day. When i dont, it feels like opioid withdrawal, mostly when I wake up in the morning as that is usually 9 to 12 hours since my last dose. I remember in the beginning I could feel nauseous if I took too much. I feel nothing like that now. I’m confident my body could process any quantity at this point without batting an eye.
I have to get control over this. Kratom has literally saved my life, not just from alcohol but from the many other dangerous and illegal alternatives an addict like me turns to. I’m taking the rest of my stash as I type this (8g in a glass of OJ, which is a tasty way to do it. The flavors compliment each other nicely).
Tomorrow is Sunday and I will abstain. I will feel like my brain is wrapped in sandpaper and I won’t be able to even sleep it off because I’ll be too uncomfortable to sleep. I want to make until next Friday at least with nothing. I want to keep taking kratom but I have to get it back to 4g 3 times a day like when I started. Wish me luck.
Hello Andy,
Thank you for sharing your experience. We were glad that you were able to quit alcohol. Alkohol and kratom are indeed not a good combination.
What you described is not uncommon with people who are taking kratom to beat an addiction. Frequently, they don’t allow their bodies to detox from opioids or other substances and they also do not learn to manage their behavior and deal with unhealthy habits, which then leads to the same habits transferring to how they take kratom. This is what many anti-kratom advocates also use as an argument against kratom, when, in actuality, that’s not kratom causing it.
Medical studies show that kratom in its pure form has the abuse potential equivalent to that of coffee and similar withdrawal effects. If you take a few cups of coffee daily and them abruptly stop, you will feel sick, fatigued and have a terrible headache. It’s not life-threatening, but unpleasant to experience. Kratom can have similar effects if not taken properly.
Are you taking the same strain or different ones? Have you increased your dose? From what you described, it sounds like you indeed may have kratom tolerance. We would advise taking at least a few days off. When you resume taking kratom, aim for rotating strains and not taking the same more than once in a day or a few. Depending on which strain(s) you are taking, their half-life is approximately 3-6 hours. After that, the effects will diminish, but the alkaloids will still be in your system, though much weaker. It will take your body approximately 24 hours to eliminate most alkaloids. Traces will remain for up to a week.
So, if you take another dose of the same strain of kratom within 24 hours, you’re not letting your body excrete alkaloids already ingested. Thus, you create a buildup of them and your body gets accustomed to them.
Hopefully, this helps and you feel better soon.
I would like to agree with your reply, that’s a pretty perfect comparison. I finally decided to take a break from 2 years of *continuous* use; literally, NO breaks at all. I was taking anywhere from 12 to 25 grams per day, depending on my individual level of pain, in 6 gram increments (2 measured teaspoons).
Having withdrawn from Klonopin in the past, which was HORRIBLE and literally took months to fully recover from – I’d been putting off taking a break because of fear of withdrawal. Well…my fears were very much blown out of proportion. Yes, there’s been a psychological “Man, I really want to take Kratom” eating at my mind at times (primarily when I’m in pain), and I had a lot of trouble sleeping the first night after I’d gone 24 hours. Other than that, however, it’s mostly been agitation, restlessness, etc. I’m now at about 98 hours since my last dosage, and today I’ve felt almost completely normal.
So…if anyone out there is putting off taking a break for fear of withdrawal symptoms, just go ahead and do it. In the world of physical withdrawals, this is a 2 on a scale of 1-10. And that’s after 700+ days of not missing ANY dosages.
Thank you for sharing your experience.
Hello I’ve been taking kratom for since November of 2019 I take it daily mostly Bali sometimes I switch it up to red vain bali, Thai, red vain Thai and meangda the problem I’m having is for about a lil over a month I stopped feeling it almost completely I take around 6-8 pills every 5-6 hrs a day 3 times a day any recommendations to reverse the tolerance build up ? I read some where I should stop taking it for at least two days …I to am a addict and kratom has stopped me from taking opiates and drinking alcohol as well as piping ectasy and molly…any recommendations?
Hello Eric, we’re sorry to hear that kratom is no longer working for you.
Considering that dose that you’re taking, wed recommend a break for at least a week or longer so to let your body can expel all of the alkaloids that have accumulated in your system.
Have you always been taking kratom capsules? Many users complain that capsules, due to the time it takes to break down the shell in your stomach, have weaker effects than pure kratom powder. It may be a good idea to try pure kratom powder, perhaps from a different vendor to see if you experience the same results.
Moreover, we strongly recommend that you rotate your strains regularly. Instead of taking Bali kratom 3 times a day, try different strains each time you take kratom. This could expose you to slightly different alkaloid profiles, making tolerance less likely or slower to develop. It is also beneficial not to take kratom every single day, but take a few days off every week. You can look into kratom alternatives such as akuamma seeds for the days you do not take kratom.
If you would like to learn more, please check out the posts on our blog: “why kratom is not working” and “kratom alternatives.” Copy-paste the keywords in the search bar at the top of our site to find the posts.
We hope that these suggestions work for you and you are able to experience the beneficial effects of kratom once more.