Two very different promises
The word covers two things that should never be mixed. The first is to create desire — an appetite that was not there. The second is to make the mechanics work, erection or lubrication, when the appetite is present. Nothing reliably does the first, to this day. For the second there are medicines, and they are covered on the page Viagra and its equivalents.
Nearly every misunderstanding starts there: people buy a product for the first promise, judge its failure on the second, and try another.
Chocolate: what the study everyone cites actually says
Chocolate is the most cited aphrodisiac and the most badly cited. The study behind the reputation appeared in 2006 in The Journal of Sexual Medicine (J Sex Med, 2006): 163 women from northern Italy, mean age 35 (J Sex Med, 2006), asked about their chocolate intake and their sexual lives. Chocolate eaters scored higher. Then the authors adjusted the results for age — the chocolate eaters were younger — and the difference vanished (J Sex Med, 2006). The authors themselves conclude that nothing firm can be drawn from it.
That leaves the chemical argument: chocolate contains phenylethylamine, a molecule close to those the brain releases when we fall in love. That is correct, and beside the point: the quantities are tiny, and the molecule is almost entirely broken down in the gut and liver before it reaches the brain. Chocolate is a pleasure, which is reason enough to eat it. It does no more than that.
The same goes for oysters and their zinc, for ginger, cinnamon and truffle: the tradition is old, the data are nonexistent. The effect, when there is one, comes from the meal, the moment and the expectation — which is not nothing, but is not a molecule.
What has a real effect, and what it costs
One substance in the “natural” pharmacopoeia has beaten placebo in a meta-analysis of randomised trials: yohimbine, extracted from the bark of an African tree (NCCIH, 2025). The benefit is real and modest; the price is not. It raises blood pressure and speeds up the heart (NCCIH, 2025), it triggers anxiety, palpitations and insomnia, and it interacts with antidepressants (NCCIH, 2025) and with blood pressure treatments. In Europe the question is settled: yohimbe bark is banned in foods and food supplements since 2019 (Regulation (EU) 2019/650).
That is why the American Urological Association recommends against using it for erectile dysfunction, and why selling it freely as a treatment is unlawful in the United States without prior approval. Add that the actual content of yohimbe bark supplements varies wildly (NCCIH, 2025) — some contain almost none, others far too much.
What “booster” supplements really contain
Sexual enhancement products are the largest category of adulterated dietary supplements identified by the US Food and Drug Administration, with several hundred products (FDA, 2026). The most common adulterant is not a plant: it is undeclared sildenafil or one of its analogues. In other words, the “100% natural” capsule contains a prescription drug, at an unknown dose, taken with no examination and no knowledge of what must never be combined with it — nitrates (NHS), for instance, with which the drop in blood pressure can be fatal.
What sends people to the emergency department
“Spanish fly” is not a legend: it is cantharidin, a substance produced by a beetle, and it is a poison. Published cases describe vomiting blood, blood in the urine, acute kidney destruction (Am J Emerg Med, 1996) and prolonged, painful erections (Am J Emerg Med, 1996) — priapism, a surgical emergency that can leave permanent damage. Poisoning often happens without the victim's knowledge (Am J Emerg Med, 1996), because the substance was added to a drink. There is no safe use, at any dose.
The same category includes powders sold online under suggestive names and with no readable composition. One rule covers them all: a product that does not say what it contains is not to be taken.
The “erectile honeys”: what the checks in France show
The sticks of “aphrodisiac honey” sold online, on social media or in some late-night shops have become the textbook case of a “natural” product that is not. Customs recorded 18 cases in 2019, then 131 seizures in 2023 (French Senate, 2025). In November 2024, the port of Marseille intercepted a container from Malaysia: more than 13 tonnes, close to 860,000 sticks (French Customs, 2025). The figure is hard to remember because it is often distorted — the 131 seizures of 2023 and the 13 tonnes in Marseille are two separate data points, not “130 tonnes”.
What do these products contain? Of 50 honeys seized by French Customs and analysed by spectrometry, 43 (86%) were adulterated, almost always with tadalafil, sometimes with sildenafil (Danoun et al., Molecules, 2024). The doses are a problem in themselves: for one of these honeys, a tablespoon corresponded to about four tablets of tadalafil at the maximum dose, and poison control centres reported convulsions, cerebral oedema, kidney failure and, in one case, irreversible necrosis after priapism (ANSES, Vigil'Anses No. 16, 2022). ANSM, DGCCRF and Customs had already issued warnings in 2021 against specific brands, including Black Horse Vital Honey and Jaguar Power (ANSM, 2021).
Manufacturers adapt to the alerts. A team in Toulouse followed the same “100% natural” supplement for fifteen years: all ten versions analysed were adulterated, with eight different molecules over time, at doses from 15 to 145 mg per capsule (Balayssac et al., 2023). Switching to a different sildenafil analogue after each alert is a strategy, not an accident — and a product checked as “clean” one year is not necessarily clean the next.
The alerts continue. In France, the “Kama” honey was recalled on 9 October 2026 for “presence of unauthorised medicinal substances” (RappelConso, 2026). The RappelConso website lets you check a product before using it.
The plants with weak data
Maca and ginseng occupy an honest middle ground. Systematic reviews find a positive signal: a few randomised trials point the right way, on desire for maca, on erectile function for red ginseng (Cochrane, 2021). But the number of trials is small, the samples are small and the methodological quality is limited (Cochrane, 2021) — the reviewers themselves write that no conclusion can be drawn.
That is neither a condemnation nor a recommendation. It is the state of the evidence, and it supports a simple position: if you want to try, choose a product whose composition can be verified, tell your doctor if you are on any treatment, and do not expect anything spectacular.
Alcohol, the classic false friend
It lifts inhibition, which is easily mistaken for desire, and at the same time it degrades physical arousal, erection (NHS), lubrication and judgement about consent. The glass that relaxes is not the problem; what follows it is. It is the one “aphrodisiac” whose net effect turns negative above a very low dose, and it is also the most used. Thresholds, what stopping changes and where dependence begins are on the alcohol page.
What actually moves desire
The paradox of this subject is that the effective levers are known, free and dull. They are nonetheless the only ones that have been measured.
- Sleep. Sleep deprivation lowers desire in both sexes, and testosterone in men (JAMA, 2011). It is the best-documented effect on this whole page.
- The medicines you already take. Serotonergic antidepressants, beta-blockers, some hormone treatments: reduced desire is a common side effect, and often reversible by changing drug (NHS, 2026). Discuss it with the prescriber, never by stopping on your own (NHS).
- Stress and the mental load. See everyday life as a couple: desire has no room in a day that leaves room for nothing.
- The state of the relationship. In settled couples it is the dominant factor (BMJ Open, 2017), by a long way ahead of everything else.
- A medical cause. Thyroid, anaemia, depression, pain during sex (NHS, 2026): a settled loss of desire deserves an examination before it deserves a capsule.
Erection medicines: what works, and what must never be combined with them
Sildenafil, tadalafil, vardenafil and avanafil are not aphrodisiacs: they work only in the presence of sexual stimulation and do not create desire. They are available on prescription because their main danger is known: combining them with nitrates (nitroglycerin, some angina treatments) makes blood pressure drop, sometimes fatally (NHS). The Princeton IV consensus recommendations set the minimum interval before any nitrate at 24 hours after sildenafil, vardenafil or avanafil, and 48 hours after tadalafil (Princeton IV, Mayo Clin Proc, 2024). Emergency doctors (the 15 in France) only know if they are told: in case of chest pain after taking an erection medicine — or a “honey” that may contain one — tell the emergency services straight away.
Poppers (alkyl nitrites) follow the same logic, because they also release nitric oxide. Combining them with an erection medicine is one of the best-documented risks of “chemsex”: in a British series of deaths linked to these practices, sildenafil or tadalafil was found in the blood of 9 of the 21 victims examined (Tyler et al., 2025), often alongside other inhaled or ingested substances (Schifano et al., 2025). Other combinations need the advice of a doctor or pharmacist — some alpha-blockers, antivirals or antifungals (French public medicines database). An erection that lasts more than 4 hours is an emergency (NHS).
Getting treated legally, including remotely
Seeing a doctor in person is not the only route. A doctor can prescribe this type of treatment after a video consultation, which allows blood pressure and current treatments to be checked; the prescription is then presented at a pharmacy. However, no legal French website sells these medicines: only medicines that do not require a prescription may be sold online (Public Health Code, art. L. 5125-34). A site that offers sildenafil “without a prescription” is therefore, by definition, outside the law, and its tablets are risky. Erectile dysfunction can also signal a cardiovascular problem: one more reason to go through a doctor (Princeton IV, Mayo Clin Proc, 2024).
Selling or importing: what the law says
A product that contains sildenafil is a medicine, whatever the label says. Selling, offering for sale or importing a falsified medicine is punishable by 5 years in prison and a €375,000 fine; these penalties rise to 7 years and €750,000 when the product is dangerous, sold over a telecommunications network or by an organised gang (Public Health Code, art. L. 5421-13). On 13 March 2024, the Court of Cassation dismissed the appeal of an importer of sildenafil tablets from India and upheld the customs fines; it did, however, quash the conviction of a postal worker for possession of a poisonous substance, because it had not been established that he knew what the parcels contained (Court of Cassation, 2024). For the buyer, the usual risk is simpler: the parcel is seized.
After a suspect product: what to do, where to report
- Chest pain, feeling faint, palpitations, an erection lasting more than 4 hours: call 15 or 112, and say which product was taken, and at what time.
- Symptoms without distress: a poison control centre answers day and night.
- Keep the packaging, the stick or the remaining tablets, the batch number and a screenshot of the shop: they allow analysis and withdrawal of the batch.
- Report: a side effect on the health event reporting portal; a business on SignalConso; a website or social media account selling these products on Pharos.
A recent alert, in Spain: on 27 October 2026, the medicines agency ordered the withdrawal of “Enerup Premium”, sold as a natural supplement, after undeclared sildenafil was detected (AEMPS, 2026). It illustrates the starting point of this page: on this market, the label is not a guarantee.
And for what concerns function rather than appetite, two pages on the site go further: erectile dysfunction and desire and the female orgasm.
