Apigenin: Sleep Benefits, Food Sources, Dosage & Side Effects

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Steep a spoonful of dried chamomile flowers in hot water for a few minutes, and you've made one of the richest everyday sources of apigenin. When researchers measured 10 herbal teas brewed the usual way, chamomile carried about three times as much apigenin as the next tea, sage.8 Apigenin is a flavone, one branch of the flavonoid family of plant compounds, and parsley and celery seed are among its richest foods.2

Researchers have traced part of chamomile's long reputation as a calming bedtime tea to apigenin, and they now study it for sleep, calm, inflammation and the way cells age.910 Your body takes it up best from the tea and the foods it comes in, so start there before you reach for a capsule.6

Chamomile, a gentle, calming herb long used for sleep, is one of the top eight sleep nutrients in my Deep Sleep Protocol, listed with its apigenin.3 In Heal Your Cells, Dr. Will Cole and I list apigenin among five standout compounds for aging cells, taken through foods like parsley and chamomile tea or as a supplement of 50 to 100 mg a day.11

Did you know?

• In a review of flavone sources, chamomile and parsley had the highest flavone concentrations of the teas and dried herbs listed, led by apigenin in its sugar-bound forms.1

• Celery seed carries about 28 times the apigenin of the celery stalk, gram for gram, by USDA's measures.2

• Parsley's apigenin holds up in the kitchen: its sugar-bound forms stay intact through chopping, juicing and heating.1

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What is apigenin?

Flavonoids are a large family of compounds that plants make, and apigenin sits in the flavone branch with its close cousin luteolin. In the same herbal tea analysis, peppermint and sage teas were richer in luteolin, and chamomile in apigenin.8 Apigenin is one of the many polyphenols and phytonutrients in plant foods, and a 2024 review described it as a natural molecule at the intersection of sleep and aging.10

You'll find apigenin in three forms:

A short history of apigenin

The dried flower heads of German chamomile have long been used in traditional medicine to make a soothing, sedative tea.9 In 1995, researchers separated a chamomile tea extract into fractions to find what was acting on the brain's calming receptors, and one fraction yielded apigenin.9 In 2013, a team studying NAD+, a molecule your cells need to make energy, found that apigenin blocks CD38, the main enzyme that uses it up, and research has since turned to its effects on aging cells.1415

Which foods have apigenin?

Apigenin values from the USDA Database for the Flavonoid Content of Selected Foods, Release 3.3, in milligrams per 100 grams of the edible portion (the mean of the samples analyzed). Per-serving amounts are our arithmetic at USDA FoodData Central serving weights.27161718

Parsley is the standout, and the way to get its apigenin is to use it by the handful. A cup chopped into a salad, a chimichurri or a quinoa tabouli brings about 129 mg. Values swing widely from sample to sample, though: USDA's fresh parsley samples ranged from 0.00 to 630.00 mg per 100 g, and its dried parsley samples from 1,774.60 to 13,506.22 mg, so treat any single number as a typical amount.2

Celery stalks carry far less, about 1.1 mg in a medium stalk, while celery seed and Chinese celery are much richer by weight.217 Celery was in the green drink my mom made every morning, along with spinach, cucumber, cilantro, lime and a green apple.19 Kumquats, artichokes and fresh peppermint add smaller amounts.2

How much apigenin is in chamomile tea?

A cup of chamomile tea carries about 16.5 mg of apigenin, based on one lab analysis. Researchers brewed 10 herbal teas the usual way, 1.5 g of dried herb steeped for 3 minutes in 150 mL of boiling water, then freed the apigenin from its sugars and measured each tea 3 times. German chamomile tea had 110.0 µg of apigenin per mL, which works out to about 16.5 mg in that 150 mL cup. Sage came second at 37.0 µg per mL, peppermint third at 30.4, and the other seven teas carried 1.4 or less.8

How much lands in your own cup depends on the flowers. In a study of 22 store-bought chamomile teas, loose whole flower heads had a more consistent makeup and higher overall quality than tea bags, whose apigenin-7-glucoside often fell short of pharmacopoeia standards.20 German chamomile (Matricaria), the species in the extract trials, also carried about twice the sugar-bound apigenin of Roman chamomile (Chamaemelum nobile) in a review of measured flowers, 5,010 to 5,320 mg against 2,531 mg per 100 g dried.1 So reach for loose, whole German chamomile flowers when you can.

If you deal with acid reflux, chamomile is the evening tea in my Acid Reflux & GERD Protocol, a calming swap for peppermint tea, which can relax the valve at the top of your stomach.21

What is apigenin good for?

How apigenin works in your body

Apigenin's path runs from your cup to your cells. The first three steps below come from studies in people; the last two come from lab and animal studies:

Tea and food come first, and capsules still have a place. A 2021 modeling review estimated that food alone can't reach the blood levels that showed effects in lab studies, while capsules of semi-purified apigenin could.27

Apigenin benefits, ranked by evidence

Ranked by the human research behind each one, apigenin's benefits start with better sleep quality and calmer anxiety, both from chamomile, then antioxidant enzymes from parsley and longer life in older women who used chamomile, followed by lab and animal research on aging cells and cancer.

Does apigenin help you sleep?

Sleep is medicine, and apigenin works best on top of a steady daily rhythm. As my Deep Sleep Protocol puts it, "Add a sleep supplement to a day with no morning light, coffee at 4pm and a phone in bed and you’re pushing against your own clock. Set the clock. Build the runway."3 Its top eight sleep nutrients start with magnesium in phase 1 and add the rest, chamomile included, in phases 2 and 3, and every one works better with a fixed wake time, morning light and a cool, dark room.3 For the foundation, see sleep hygiene and natural sleep aids.

What the sleep studies show

A 2024 review pooled five chamomile trials in older adults, women past menopause and adults with insomnia, and found sleep-quality scores improved by 1.88 points on the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index, a 0-to-21 questionnaire where lower is better.533 In the trials that measured them, getting to sleep improved in three of four and staying asleep in two of three, while sleep length and daytime functioning didn't change.5 Two trials show who it helped:

• Older adults: In a randomized trial of 60 people aged 60 and older at a day-care nursing home in Iran, 200 mg of chamomile extract twice a day for 28 days left sleep quality significantly better than in a group given flour capsules.34
• New mothers: In a randomized trial of 80 women in Taiwan with poor sleep after giving birth, drinking chamomile tea for 2 weeks lowered sleep problems tied to physical symptoms, along with symptoms of depression, compared with usual care; 2 weeks after they stopped, the groups were alike again.35

In long-standing insomnia, a 28-day placebo-controlled pilot trial of 34 adults gave 540 mg of chamomile extract a day. People on chamomile fell asleep a bit more than 15 minutes faster and woke about a third less often, though their sleep diaries didn't differ significantly from placebo, and total sleep time favored placebo.33

The one randomized trial we found with a 50 mg dose of apigenin gave it in an evening blend, with 200 mg of L-theanine and 2 g of magnesium L-threonate, for 2 weeks; 50 of its 103 healthy, physically active adults took that blend, and neither the people nor the researchers knew who got what. The gains in stress and sleep came from the trial's morning blend of ashwagandha and rhodiola. The evening blend didn't improve stress or sleep scores over placebo in these adults, none of whom had a diagnosed sleep or stress disorder, so the chamomile trials above remain the main human evidence for sleep.36

Apigenin in everyday food points the way the chamomile trials do. In a study of 1,936 adults in southern Italy, those whose diets carried the most apigenin had 37% lower odds of poor sleep quality than those with the least (odds ratio 0.63), an association drawn from food questionnaires.32

How I use apigenin for sleep

As I've said on my show, apigenin, the compound in chamomile tea, can support sleep over the long term.37 I like chamomile for sleep, along with lemon balm and magnolia.37 In my Deep Sleep Protocol, chamomile, lemon balm or passionflower tea is the evening drink, and the wind-down is a 20-minute routine of a warm shower, stretching, reading on paper and prayer, in the same order every night.3 A cup of chamomile tea fits naturally at the start of that routine.

Does apigenin help with anxiety?

In Ancient Remedies, I wrote that chamomile tea before bed can calm you down and set the stage for sleep, partly because it reduces anxiety.38 Trials of chamomile extract in generalized anxiety, a condition of persistent, hard-to-control worry, back that up.

The first was a trial at the University of Pennsylvania in 57 adults with mild to moderate generalized anxiety. They took 220 mg capsules of German chamomile extract standardized to 1.2% apigenin, one a day in week 1 and two in week 2, rising to as many as five a day (1,100 mg) for those who hadn't improved, or identical placebo capsules, for 8 weeks; neither the people nor the researchers knew who got what. Anxiety scores on the Hamilton scale fell 3.17 points more on chamomile than on placebo, a difference too large to put down to chance. More people responded on chamomile, 57.13% against 37.93%, a gap too small to rule out chance in a trial this size, and side effects were no more common than on placebo.12 Follow-up analyses found depression scores eased too.3940

A larger study gave 179 adults with moderate to severe generalized anxiety 1,500 mg of chamomile extract a day, three 500 mg capsules, for 8 weeks; people knew which treatment they got. By week 8, 58.1% met the trial's standard for response: anxiety scores cut at least in half, with the researchers rating their symptoms mild or better. Anxiety scores on the Hamilton scale fell 9.0 points, and about a quarter of the group responded within the first 2 weeks. The researchers judged that response rate comparable to those seen in trials of conventional anxiety drugs, though no trial has yet compared the two directly. Side effects showed up in 11.7%, all mild or moderate, most often drowsiness (7.2%).4 This is the trial I point to on chamomile and anxiety.38

After 12 weeks on chamomile, the same team took 93 of the people who had responded and assigned them at random to keep taking chamomile or switch to placebo for 26 weeks, without anyone knowing who got which. Each 500 mg capsule carried 6 mg of apigenin glycosides, apigenin in its sugar-bound forms. Fewer people relapsed on chamomile, 15.2% against 25.5%, a difference too small to rule out chance, and their relapses came later, at 11.4 weeks on average against 6.3. Anxiety symptoms stayed significantly lower on chamomile, and body weight and blood pressure came down more, with side effects about the same in both groups.13

If anxiety is part of what keeps you up, a cup of chamomile tea in the evening is a gentle place to start, and these natural remedies for anxiety round out the plan.

How much apigenin should you take?

Apigenin is a plant compound, not an essential nutrient, so there's no official daily requirement. Here's how my books and protocols put it to work:

• For sleep: one to two cups of chamomile tea, or 50 mg of apigenin, from my Deep Sleep Protocol.3
• For more from chamomile: a cup or two of chamomile tea before bed or, for greater benefit, 220 to 1,600 mg of a chamomile supplement instead.38
• For aging cells: foods like parsley and chamomile tea first, or a supplement of 50 to 100 mg a day.11
• During cancer care: apigenin 50 mg at bedtime for deep sleep, added only as your oncology team approves.19

The trials used these amounts, each with its own product:

For sleep, drink chamomile tea in the evening so the cup becomes part of your wind-down; if you take apigenin instead, take it at bedtime.319 Magnesium may pair well with it: in mice, apigenin plus magnesium lengthened sleep by 44%, more than either did alone.42

How to choose an apigenin supplement

Look for these on the label:

• Apigenin listed in milligrams per capsule, so you can match the 50 mg in my protocols319

• Chamomile extract with its apigenin percentage stated, like the 1.2% extracts used in the anxiety trials12

• German chamomile (Matricaria) for teas and extracts, the species in the trials, and loose whole flowers for tea120

• Third-party testing for identity and purity

• Bovine or fish gelatin, or a plant-based capsule shell

Apigenin side effects and who should be careful

The safety record comes mostly from chamomile. A 2025 review of 72 chamomile trials and 11 published case reports found that side effects in the trials were uncommon and mild, most often stomach upset and drowsiness, which passed on their own, though many trials didn't report side effects at all. No allergic reactions turned up in the trials, while several case reports described allergic reactions, some of them anaphylaxis, a severe whole-body reaction.47 In the colon cancer study, 3 of 27 people taking the apigenin-and-EGCG tablets stopped within 3 months for slight discomfort.31

Bleeding risk comes up because of one case: a 70-year-old woman taking warfarin was hospitalized with internal bleeding after using chamomile tea and lotion.43 A review of warfarin interactions lists chamomile tea among the foods and herbs tied to a higher bleeding risk.44 In people not taking warfarin, the tests haven't moved. In 12 healthy volunteers who each tried a week of chamomile tea (nine tea bags a day), a week of chamomile extract capsules (three 500 mg capsules a day) and a week of placebo, prothrombin time, a standard clotting test, dropped 0.2 seconds with the tea and with the capsules and rose 0.1 seconds with placebo, differences too small to be meaningful.48 In 18 healthy volunteers who each tried parsley, onions and a placebo, 5 g of dried parsley a day for a week, about 84 mg of apigenin, didn't change platelet clumping or other clotting measures either.41 Apigenin did block clumping in test tubes, but only at concentrations far above what food delivers.41

The bottom line

Apigenin: frequently asked questions

References

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Dr. Josh Axe, DC, DNM, CNS

Doctor of Natural Medicine · Founder, DrAxe.com

Dr. Axe is a certified doctor of natural medicine, clinical nutritionist, and multiple New York Times bestselling author. He has spent 20+ years in clinical practice helping people heal at the root cause and founded one of the most-visited natural-health platforms in the world.

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