Superhuman Protocol benefits: what the evidence says

By Dan Remon · Evidence checked October 2026

The pitch is simple: 3 machines in a fixed order, and more energy walking out than walking in.

The evidence is less tidy. Each part has its own research, and some of it holds up for specific uses. The package as a whole has no published trial behind it.

I’ve worked in health and performance since 1996, and at London 2012 I was a coach at the Olympic Village training facility. Below, each part is graded on the 4-grade scale I use for any health claim, then placed next to the inputs that move energy every day: sleep, training and food.

What is the Superhuman Protocol?

The Superhuman Protocol is a branded routine that runs 3 technologies in a fixed order: PEMF (pulsed electromagnetic field), then EWOT (exercise with oxygen therapy), then red and near-infrared light, also called photobiomodulation. Da Vinci Medical, which sells the equipment as packages, says each technology amplifies the next and that users often report feeling more energised and balanced.¹ Its page cites no studies, and I found no trial of the 3 together in PubMed. The parts have their own research. Red light has the most, mainly for knee arthritis pain at measured laser doses. Extra oxygen lifts exercise performance only while you breathe it. PEMF’s evidence is weak. On my 4-grade scale, none of it reaches Strong.

The protocol made sports news through UFC CEO Dana White. In March 2024, The SportsRush and Fitness Volt reported on a YouTube video in which White walked through the routine Gary Brecka had designed for him. White called Brecka a human biologist.^2,3 Both reports list 4 steps: a PEMF pad, a cold plunge, red light therapy and oxygen therapy. Fitness Volt reported White saying he felt 25 years old again.³ That’s one man’s account in sports news, so I treat it as background and leave it out of the grades. This post grades the 3 technologies both versions share.

How I grade the evidence

I use 4 grades for anything that makes a health claim, from supplements to devices.

• Strong: large human trials or meta-analyses with consistent results.
• Moderate: good human data with a real gap, such as one population or short follow-up.
• Weak: small, short or mixed studies, or tiny effects.
• Marketing: no meaningful human evidence for the claim.

Each grade applies to one specific claim. The same device can earn Moderate for one use and Marketing for another.

PEMF therapy benefits: what the trials show

PEMF devices pass a pulsing magnetic field through part of the body, usually from a mat you lie on or a coil placed over a joint. Most of the human research is in knee osteoarthritis.

A 2021 meta-analysis in Cartilage by Viganò and colleagues pooled 13 randomised trials with 914 patients. PEMF reduced knee pain in the short term, but it wasn’t better than other conservative treatments such as physiotherapy, and studies with longer follow-up showed smaller differences between treated and control patients.⁴ A 2026 meta-analysis in Medicina by Chang and colleagues looked at 9 newer trials, published from 2015 to 2025, with 457 patients. It found no significant improvement in pain or overall knee scores at 1 month, rated the overall risk of bias as high, and said the gains it did find may be too small to matter clinically.⁵

For energy, recovery or performance in healthy adults, I found only small single studies and no meta-analysis. The claims about charging your cells have no human outcome data behind them that I could find.

Grade: Weak for short-term knee arthritis pain. Marketing for energy, recovery and performance in healthy adults.

EWOT and oxygen therapy: what the trials show

The protocol’s oxygen step is EWOT: exercising while breathing oxygen-enriched air through a mask. A PubMed search for EWOT in October 2026 found no trials of it, so the closest evidence is lab research on breathing extra oxygen during exercise.

A 2018 meta-analysis in Sports Medicine by Mallette and colleagues reviewed 51 papers. Breathing oxygen-enriched air while exercising improved performance in the moment, with a large effect on time to exhaustion (g = 0.89) and a small-to-moderate effect on time trials (g = 0.56). Breathing air with 30% oxygen or more was enough for at least a small effect. Training and recovery with extra oxygen trended in a positive direction, but the studies were too few and too varied for a firm conclusion.⁶

That’s the catch. Extra oxygen helps while you’re breathing it. Whether a session on a bike with a mask leaves you with more energy the next day hasn’t been tested.

Hyperbaric oxygen is a different thing: breathing oxygen inside a pressurised chamber. A 2021 systematic review in Frontiers in Physiology by Huang and colleagues found 10 studies in healthy, physically active adults (166 people) and pooled 6 of them (69 people). Hyperbaric sessions before or after exercise had no significant effect on performance or recovery.⁷ If you have a heart or lung condition, speak to your doctor before any form of oxygen therapy.

Grade: Moderate for exercise performance while you’re breathing it. Weak for training gains and recovery. Marketing for EWOT as an energy or health routine.

Red light therapy benefits: what the trials show

Photobiomodulation uses red and near-infrared light from lasers, LED panels or full-body beds. Most of the research uses lasers or LEDs on one area. It has the most human research of the 3 parts, and the results depend on the dose and the target.

A 2019 meta-analysis in BMJ Open by Stausholm and colleagues pooled 22 placebo-controlled trials with 1,063 people with knee osteoarthritis. Low-level laser therapy reduced pain by 14.23 mm on a visual analogue pain scale at the end of treatment, and by 18.71 mm at the recommended doses. Those doses were specific: 4 to 8 joules per treatment spot at 785 to 860 nm, or 1 to 3 joules at 904 nm, applied to the knee. The authors also note that major knee osteoarthritis guidelines don’t recommend it.⁸

For muscle, a 2026 meta-analysis in the Journal of Integrative and Complementary Medicine by Zhai and colleagues pooled 23 placebo-controlled trials in healthy people. It found small effects on muscle endurance and strength, and said the evidence isn’t good enough yet to define a protocol.⁹

For skin, a 2014 randomised controlled trial in Photomedicine and Laser Surgery by Wunsch and Matuschka treated 113 volunteers twice a week for 30 sessions and compared them with 23 controls. The treated groups improved on skin roughness, collagen density measured by ultrasound and blinded ratings of photographs. It’s 1 trial, and both authors list company affiliations, one of them a medical light consultancy.¹⁰

A disclosure: Aspire, the coaching and physio business I run in Bangkok, offers red light sessions. I’ve graded red light on the trials, the same way as the other 2 parts.

Grade: Moderate for knee arthritis pain at the tested laser doses. Weak for muscle performance and skin. Marketing for general energy in healthy adults.

Does the sequence add anything?

The seller’s central claim is the order. PEMF goes first so cells are “energetically charged” before the oxygen step, and the light comes after EWOT.¹ I found no trial that tests the 3 in that order against any other order, or against each part on its own. Until someone runs that trial, the combination grades as Marketing, and so does any claim made for the package as a whole.

The evidence at a glance

None of the claims reaches Strong. The best-supported uses are clinical ones, mainly knee arthritis pain, which isn’t what the protocol is sold for.

The limits of this table: the knee trials were in people with arthritis, and most of the healthy-adult studies were lab exercise tests. I found none that tested a home mat or a full-body bed used for general energy, and the devices, doses and settings in the trials differ from what the protocol uses.

Where it fits next to sleep, training and food

Energy isn’t something you push through. It’s something you manage. If your calendar decides when you sleep, train and eat, the biggest return is in those 3, before any device.

The tool I use to rank them is the minimum effective dose: the smallest input that still moves the number you care about, done every week, including the bad ones. It’s the principle I build every client program on, and I’ve written it up in why you need a minimum effective dose. It does 2 jobs here. It stops you adding more than you need, and it makes you rank inputs by what they return before you spend time and money on them. My own strength dose is 3 sessions of 20 minutes a week.

Applied to energy and recovery, this is the order I work in:

1. Sleep. Regular hours and enough of them. I wouldn’t expect a light panel to make up for 5 hours a night.
2. Training. 2 strength sessions a week at minimum, and 3 works best for most people. Build it so it holds in the weeks you travel, as in the corporate athlete.
3. Food. Enough protein and an eating rhythm that fits your calendar. More in personalised nutrition.
4. Load and recovery. The gaps in your day and week when you’re fully off. See stress management for executives.
5. Then the extras. If those 4 are running and you have a specific goal, such as knee arthritis pain, there’s a case for trying a device with evidence for that use, with your doctor’s advice.

If you do try one, test it like any other change. One device at a time, for one 28-day cycle. Before you start, write down what would count as a result. Then log sleep and energy in the Stealth Tracker, a 60-second daily check-in. If nothing moves in 28 days, you have your answer.

How to start

Start with the basics, measured.

1. The 1% Scorecard. 8 questions, 2 minutes, free. You get your Compound Index, a score out of 100, the system that’s leaking most and the one thing to install first.
2. The Quest. The performance membership: a tested system and a room of founders who run on standards. 28-day cycles, one lever at a time, cancel anytime.

Get the basics running first. Then test the extras one at a time, with data.

FAQ

Sources

1. Da Vinci Medical. Superhuman Protocol. Company web page, accessed October 2026. davincimedicalusa.com/pages/superhuman-protocol
2. Iyer, R. Discovering the Superhuman Protocol: Biologist Gary Brecka’s Solution for UFC CEO Dana White’s Ailments. The SportsRush, 28 March 2024. News report, cited as history only. thesportsrush.com
3. Fitness Volt. UFC Boss Dana White Says He Feels 25 Again After Adopting the Superhuman Protocol. 27 March 2024. News report, cited as history only. fitnessvolt.com
4. Viganò, M., Perucca Orfei, C., Ragni, E., Colombini, A., and de Girolamo, L. (2021). Pain and Functional Scores in Patients Affected by Knee OA after Treatment with Pulsed Electromagnetic and Magnetic Fields: A Meta-Analysis. Cartilage, 13(1 suppl), 1749S-1760S. doi.org/10.1177/1947603520931168
5. Chang, Y. S., Lin, C. Y., and Huang, W. C. (2026). Pulsed Electromagnetic Field Therapy in People with Knee Osteoarthritis: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis. Medicina, 62(4), 677. doi.org/10.3390/medicina62040677
6. Mallette, M. M., Stewart, D. G., and Cheung, S. S. (2018). The Effects of Hyperoxia on Sea-Level Exercise Performance, Training, and Recovery: A Meta-Analysis. Sports Medicine, 48(1), 153-175. doi.org/10.1007/s40279-017-0791-2
7. Huang, X., Wang, R., Zhang, Z., Wang, G., and Gao, B. (2021). Effects of Pre-, Post- and Intra-Exercise Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy on Performance and Recovery: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis. Frontiers in Physiology, 12, 791872. doi.org/10.3389/fphys.2021.791872
8. Stausholm, M. B., Naterstad, I. F., Joensen, J., Lopes-Martins, R. Á. B., Sæbø, H., Lund, H., Fersum, K. V., and Bjordal, J. M. (2019). Efficacy of low-level laser therapy on pain and disability in knee osteoarthritis: systematic review and meta-analysis of randomised placebo-controlled trials. BMJ Open, 9(10), e031142. doi.org/10.1136/bmjopen-2019-031142
9. Zhai, H., Wang, T., Yan, H., Xu, N., Zhai, H., and Wei, H. (2026). Effects of Photobiomodulation Therapy on Muscle Strength and Muscle Endurance: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis. Journal of Integrative and Complementary Medicine, online ahead of print. doi.org/10.1177/27683605261488795
10. Wunsch, A., and Matuschka, K. (2014). A controlled trial to determine the efficacy of red and near-infrared light treatment in patient satisfaction, reduction of fine lines, wrinkles, skin roughness, and intradermal collagen density increase. Photomedicine and Laser Surgery, 32(2), 93-100. doi.org/10.1089/pho.2013.3616

This article is general information, not medical advice.