Tirzepatide and semaglutide brand names: licensed, compounded and research-labelled

Semaglutide and tirzepatide are the active ingredients. Ozempic, Wegovy and Rybelsus are brand names for semaglutide, made by Novo Nordisk. Mounjaro and Zepbound are brand names for tirzepatide, made by Eli Lilly. So Zepbound is tirzepatide, Ozempic is semaglutide, and Mounjaro is not semaglutide: it is tirzepatide.

Those licensed brands are only part of what people search for. Many other names belong to telehealth services, which arrange prescriptions and often supply compounded versions made by a pharmacy rather than the licensed product. Still other names belong to products labelled “for research use only”, including pens said to contain retatrutide, a drug that is not approved anywhere. This guide explains each group using regulators’ and manufacturers’ own pages. It describes; it does not recommend. All of these are prescription-only medicines or unlicensed products, and any decision about treatment belongs with a prescriber or pharmacist.

Semaglutide is a GLP-1 receptor agonist first approved in the US in 2017. The same molecule is sold under different brand names because each brand is licensed for different uses, in different forms and doses. That is the main reason people ask whether Ozempic and Wegovy are the same thing: they share an ingredient but are separate products with separate labels.

• Ozempic (injection). The current US label on DailyMed lists three uses, all in adults with type 2 diabetes: blood sugar control alongside diet and exercise, lowering the risk of major cardiovascular events in people with established heart disease, and lowering the risk of kidney decline and cardiovascular death in people with chronic kidney disease. It is a once-weekly injection in a multi-dose pen, and the label also lists single-dose prefilled syringes. It is not licensed for weight management.
• Wegovy (injection and tablets). The US Wegovy label covers both an injection and a tablet. The injection is licensed, with a reduced-calorie diet and more physical activity, for long-term weight management in adults and children aged 12 and over, for lowering cardiovascular risk in adults with established heart disease and obesity or overweight, and for a form of fatty liver disease (MASH) with moderate to advanced fibrosis under accelerated approval. The tablets are licensed for weight management and cardiovascular risk reduction in adults. The FDA approved a higher 7.2 mg dose of the injection, called Wegovy HD, on 19 March 2026.
• Rybelsus, and Ozempic tablets. Rybelsus is semaglutide taken by mouth once a day. The US label updated in August 2026 now covers both “Rybelsus and Ozempic tablets” for blood sugar control in adults with type 2 diabetes and for lowering cardiovascular risk in those at high risk. The label states the two tablets “are not substitutable on a mg-to-mg basis”, so a tablet dose cannot be swapped for another product’s dose by number alone.

The “Wegovy pill” people search for is the oral form of Wegovy. It is a different product from Rybelsus even though both are semaglutide tablets, because it has its own doses, its own licence and its own label.

Tirzepatide acts on two receptors, GIP and GLP-1, and was first approved in the US in 2022. Eli Lilly sells it under two brand names in the US.

• Mounjaro. The US Mounjaro label covers blood sugar control in adults and children aged 10 and over with type 2 diabetes, and, since an August 2026 update, lowering the risk of major cardiovascular events in adults with type 2 diabetes at high risk of them.
• Zepbound. The US Zepbound label covers long-term weight management in adults with obesity, or with overweight and at least one weight-related condition, and moderate to severe obstructive sleep apnoea in adults with obesity, in each case alongside diet and physical activity.

Both labels list the same presentations: single-dose pens, single-dose vials, multi-dose vials and a four-dose KwikPen. That is why searches such as “Zepbound tirzepatide injection prefilled syringes” or “tirzepatide KwikPen” can refer to any of several licensed forms. The practical differences between tirzepatide and semaglutide, including trial results, are covered in tirzepatide vs semaglutide.

Brand names do not line up across countries. In the UK there is no Zepbound. The MHRA’s public guidance, GLP-1 medicines for weight loss and diabetes (updated 5 February 2026), lists Mounjaro as licensed for both diabetes and weight management, Wegovy for weight management and cardiovascular risk reduction, and Ozempic and Rybelsus for diabetes only. The electronic medicines compendium lists tirzepatide only as Mounjaro KwikPen, in six strengths, from Eli Lilly. A search there for semaglutide lists Ozempic pens, Rybelsus tablets, and Wegovy as both FlexTouch pens and tablets, all from Novo Nordisk.

The MHRA approved the Wegovy tablet on 11 June 2026 as the UK’s first GLP-1 tablet for weight management. At that date it was not available on the NHS, pending the usual evaluation by NICE. The same MHRA guidance says all GLP-1 medicines are prescription-only, and the UK legal status page sets out how that works.

In Australia, the TGA’s register (the ARTG) lists Mounjaro KwikPen, sponsored by Eli Lilly Australia, which is why Australian searches use the word KwikPen. A register search for semaglutide returns Ozempic and Wegovy, and also two further Novo Nordisk brand names added in April 2026, Poviztra and Plosbrio. Semaglutide and tirzepatide are Schedule 4 (prescription only) in Australia; see peptide rules in Australia. Australian searches that pair these drugs with a pharmacy chain’s name are asking where a prescription can be dispensed. We could not load that chain’s website to check what it says, so we do not describe it.

These are the questions people search most. The answers, taken from the labels above:

• Is Zepbound tirzepatide? Yes. Zepbound is Eli Lilly’s brand of tirzepatide licensed for weight management and sleep apnoea.
• Is Zepbound a semaglutide? No. It contains tirzepatide, a different molecule that acts on the GIP receptor as well as the GLP-1 receptor.
• Is Mounjaro tirzepatide? Yes. Mounjaro and Zepbound contain the same active ingredient but carry different licences.
• Is Mounjaro semaglutide? No. Mounjaro is tirzepatide. Semaglutide is sold as Ozempic, Wegovy and Rybelsus.
• Is Ozempic semaglutide? Yes. Ozempic is Novo Nordisk’s semaglutide licensed for type 2 diabetes.
• Is Wegovy semaglutide? Yes. Wegovy is semaglutide licensed for weight management, among other uses.

“Same ingredient” does not mean “interchangeable”. The Wegovy label advises against using it with other semaglutide-containing products or any other GLP-1 receptor agonist, and doses differ between brands. Switching between brands is a prescriber’s decision.

In the US, a compounded drug is one a pharmacy or outsourcing facility prepares itself, instead of dispensing a manufacturer’s licensed product. Compounded semaglutide and tirzepatide became widespread while the branded drugs were in shortage, because US law lets compounders make copies of a drug that is on FDA’s shortage list.

Those shortages are over. According to the FDA’s statement on compounders, the tirzepatide shortage was resolved on 19 December 2024 and the semaglutide shortage on 21 February 2025. The grace periods for state-licensed (503A) pharmacies ended on 18 February 2025 for tirzepatide and 22 April 2025 for semaglutide. For outsourcing facilities (503B) they ended on 19 March 2025 and 22 May 2025. Compounders may not regularly make drugs that are “essentially copies” of a commercially available drug. A compounded version can still be prescribed where the prescriber documents a significant difference for the individual patient. The FDA states plainly: “Compounded drugs are not approved by FDA.”

On 30 April 2026 the FDA also proposed excluding semaglutide, tirzepatide and liraglutide from the list of bulk substances outsourcing facilities may compound from. As of our check, no final decision had been found.

The FDA’s page on concerns with unapproved GLP-1 drugs (current as of 1 September 2026) says the agency does not review compounded drugs for safety, effectiveness or quality before they are marketed. It describes reports of dosing errors, some requiring hospitalisation, and doses outside the approved labels. It warns that salt forms such as semaglutide sodium and semaglutide acetate “are different active ingredients” from the semaglutide in licensed products. It also says multi-dose vials must be discarded within 28 days of first use.

The FDA has also told telehealth companies which claims it considers false or misleading. They include describing a compounded drug as a generic version of an approved drug or “the same as” one, implying the telehealth company is the compounder, and implying FDA approval. On 3 March 2026 it announced warning letters to 30 telehealth companies over such claims. That release does not name the companies, and nothing in this guide suggests any company named below received one.

Compounding in this sense is a US arrangement. In the UK, the MHRA’s guidance says GLP-1 “products supplied as a powder in vials which must be mixed with a liquid prior to injection are not authorised”.

Many high-volume searches pair “semaglutide” or “tirzepatide” with the name of a company. Most are US telehealth services: websites that connect a patient with a clinician who decides whether to prescribe, and then arrange supply from a pharmacy. The name in the search is the service’s brand, not the brand of the drug. The drug is either a licensed product such as Wegovy or Zepbound, or a compounded version.

We describe a company below only where we could read its own public website, or an official source, on 24 September 2026. We report only what the company says about itself. We make no judgement of any company and express no view on its standing.

• MEDVi. Its website describes an online GLP-1 weight-management service. It says prescriptions are issued only after an online consultation with an independent licensed provider, that clinicians from a third-party network decide whether to prescribe compounded GLP-1s, and that compound medications are dispensed by state-licensed pharmacies “but are not FDA approved”. It also says MEDVi does not produce compounded medications.
• ElixaMD. Its website carries near-identical wording: an online GLP-1 service, prescriptions only after an online consultation with an independent licensed provider, and compounded medications dispensed by state-licensed pharmacies that are not FDA-approved.
• Mochi Health. Its website describes a telehealth service. It says Mochi Health Corp. provides administrative and technology services to affiliated medical practices. It lists compounded semaglutide and compounded tirzepatide, and also the branded products Wegovy (injection and pill), Ozempic, Zepbound and Mounjaro. It states that prescription medications require a written prescription from a licensed provider, and that compounded medications are not approved or evaluated by the FDA.
• TrumpRx. TrumpRx.gov is a US government website, not a telehealth service or a compounder. On the date checked it listed brand-name products only, among them Wegovy (pen and pill), Ozempic and Zepbound. Its Wegovy and Ozempic pages say the offer requires a valid prescription for the brand, and its Zepbound page says orders are managed by Eli Lilly through LillyDirect.
• Costco. Costco runs pharmacies in the US. In a 5 January 2026 release, Novo Nordisk named Costco among the US pharmacies where the Wegovy pill, a prescription medicine, had become available. Costco’s own pharmacy pages did not load in a readable form for us. We found no official source on Costco and tirzepatide, so we say nothing further.

Several other company names that appear in these searches are not described here. Some sites blocked automated reading behind a bot check. For others we could not confirm which website was the company’s official one, because search results were dominated by paid “review” pages. Leaving a name out is not a comment on that company.

Whatever the service, the questions to put to a prescriber or pharmacist are the same. Is this the licensed product or a compounded one? If compounded, what exactly is the active ingredient and its salt form? Which pharmacy prepared it? How should it be stored and dosed? For the US rules in more detail, see US legal status.

A third group of names belongs to products sold as “research peptides”: vials or ready-made pens labelled “for research use only” or “not for human consumption”. In UK searches, several brand names attached to retatrutide and tirzepatide pens are common. We could not verify any of them from an official company website, so we do not name them or describe their products. What can be said is what regulators say about the category. The general background is in what are research peptides.

Retatrutide is not approved anywhere. The FDA says retatrutide and cagrilintide are not components of any FDA-approved drug and “cannot be used in compounding under federal law”. The MHRA has described retatrutide as a medicine “in clinical development, which has not been approved for UK use”, and said in October 2025 that retatrutide products sold outside clinical trials are “likely to be illegal”. New Zealand’s Medsafe says it “has not been approved for use by any trusted medicines regulator”. So any pen or vial sold as retatrutide is, by definition, not a licensed medicine.

A research label does not make a product a medicine, or lawful. The FDA’s unapproved GLP-1 page warns about companies selling semaglutide, tirzepatide and retatrutide falsely labelled “for research purposes”. In a March 2026 warning letter about retatrutide and tirzepatide, it found that the seller’s website established the products were intended as drugs despite the disclaimers. Health Canada says research-use labelling “does not make these products legal or exempt from regulatory requirements”. Australia’s TGA says such disclaimers do not make supply lawful. Medsafe says the wording “has no legal effect”. The country pages for Canada and New Zealand give the detail.

The UK has seen repeated enforcement. On 25 February 2026 the MHRA disrupted a facility it suspected of making retatrutide and tirzepatide. On 28 May 2026 it made its largest ever seizure of unlicensed weight-loss medicines, with two arrests. Lilly itself says products claiming to be retatrutide that are offered to consumers may contain the wrong ingredient, or too much or too little of the right one. Our guide on spotting unreliable suppliers covers the warning signs, and the country-by-country rules are on are peptides legal?

Retatrutide is Eli Lilly’s investigational “triple agonist”, a single molecule that acts on the GIP, GLP-1 and glucagon receptors. It is taken as a once-weekly injection in trials. Lilly’s retatrutide FAQ (last updated July 2026) says it “is not yet available for public use” and is available only to participants in Lilly’s clinical trials. Lilly lists Phase 3 trials in obesity, type 2 diabetes, knee osteoarthritis pain, obstructive sleep apnoea, chronic low back pain, cardiovascular and kidney outcomes, and fatty liver disease. Lilly’s medical information page says it has not been approved by the FDA or any other regulator, and that retatrutide products offered for sale to consumers are unlawful.

On weight loss, Lilly reported topline results from its TRIUMPH programme during 2025 and 2026. In TRIUMPH-4, in adults with obesity or overweight and knee osteoarthritis, Lilly’s preliminary results give an average weight reduction of up to 28.7% at 68 weeks on the 12 mg dose (efficacy estimand). These are company-reported figures from trials still being published. How they compare with tirzepatide is covered in retatrutide vs tirzepatide.

Early access. Lilly has registered a programme on ClinicalTrials.gov, Pre-approval Expanded Access of Retatrutide (NCT07629401), first posted on 5 June 2026 and listed as “Available”. It is single-patient expanded access, not an open early-access scheme. The listed criteria are all of the following:

• age 18 or over;
• obesity with a BMI of 35 or more despite the highest available dose of an existing weight-management treatment;
• two or more serious or life-threatening obesity-related complications;
• being unable to join a retatrutide trial or a similar trial;
• all standard options, including bariatric surgery, having been discussed.

The record says requests are made by the treating physician, that patients should go to their physician rather than contact Lilly, and that availability depends on geography, supply and individual assessment. We found no other public early-access route. Lilly’s own consumer FAQ does not describe one.

On timing, we do not report filing or approval dates, because we could not confirm them from a regulator. Any news of a licence will come from the FDA, the MHRA or another regulator, and PepFinder tracks developments in peptide news.

A few facts separate the three groups. A licensed product carries the manufacturer’s brand, such as Wegovy or Mounjaro, and comes with a patient leaflet; in the US it has a DailyMed label and in the UK an EMC entry. A compounded US product is labelled by the pharmacy that made it, not by Novo Nordisk or Lilly. A research-labelled product carries a “not for human consumption” disclaimer and is not a licensed medicine in any of the countries PepFinder covers.

In the UK, the MHRA’s guidance says GLP-1 medicines should not be obtained from unregulated sellers such as beauty salons or social media, that a pharmacy can be checked on the General Pharmaceutical Council register, and that side effects or suspected fakes can be reported through the Yellow Card scheme. Lilly publishes its own guide to identifying genuine Lilly medicines.

Before starting, stopping or switching any of these medicines, speak to a prescriber or pharmacist. They can say which brand, if any, suits a particular person, and can check a product that seems doubtful. The molecule pages for semaglutide and tirzepatide summarise the published research.