Most Kratom Reviews Are Advertising. Including Ours.
Kemal WhyteListen to this column
Read by an AI voice. The words are mine, the voice is not. Both boxes below are read aloud, including the numbers and the disclosure.
The numbers first. If someone is difficult to wake, is not breathing normally, or is unresponsive, call 911. Poison Control is 1-800-222-1222, about a product in your hand. Call or text 988 anywhere in the United States. The federal treatment locator is findtreatment.gov.
Stated once. Kratom is not a treatment for opioid use disorder, and it is not a treatment for opioid or kratom withdrawal. The medicines with an evidence base are buprenorphine, methadone and naltrexone, and they come from a clinician. Clinical questions belong with a clinician, not with a seller.
Checked 1 October 2026. Every page below was read on that date, and pages change. The ranked lists and the unlabeled promotional pieces are described, not linked.
Disclosure. I hold commercial interests in kratom brands. Read me as an interested party from here to the end. This site sells nothing.
Search a kratom brand's name with "review" after it and you will meet pages like these. A press release on a finance portal, labeled as paid, whose deck describes an independent review. Ranked "best kratom" lists on medical reference sites, with tracked links and no line saying who is paid when you click. An editorial on a wildlife photography site. A brand profile in a beer magazine's kratom blog.
My view is that most of what this category calls a review is advertising. That is an opinion. The eight pages below, read on 1 October 2026, are examples I chose, not a measurement, and I have no source that measures how common this is.
The headline also says "including ours", and that is the half to hold me to. My group's retail store offers affiliates a commission on first orders. Three vendor reviews on our retail store did not say up front that a competitor wrote them, and two of them carry my name. One of our brands compares itself with a rival on its own site, and our retail store sells some of the brands other people's "reviews" are about. All of it is below.
The paid release that calls itself a review
Start with the labeled ones. On Yahoo Finance, a release headlined "Kats Botanicals Under Review", dated 19 April 2025, carries this line: "This is a paid press release. Contact the press release distributor directly with any inquiries." The distributor is GlobeNewswire. The author line is "Kats Botanicals". Its deck describes an "Independent Review", and at the end an affiliate disclosure says the article may contain affiliate links on which the publisher may earn a commission. A second release, dated 6 May 2025, has the author line "MIT45" and the same label.
These two are, oddly, the most honest pages in the set, because they say what they are. My problem is how they travel: in search results they carry a finance site's name and a headline that reads like a review. Yahoo Finance reviewed nobody. It carried a company's release, labeled as such, and the review language is the company's own.
Since I have named them: no store in my group sells Kats Botanicals, and GRH Kratom competes with it directly. GRH does retail three MIT 45 products, and King K's liquid extracts compete with MIT45's.
Ranked lists on a radiology site
Now the unlabeled ones. Radiology Key, tagline "Fastest Radiology Insight Engine", posted "Best Kratom Extracts of 2026: Top Brands for Potency & Purity" on 5 June 2026. Five extract brands, ranked, with pros, cons and dosing. The footer reads "Posted by admin in CARDIOVASCULAR IMAGING". I found no affiliate or sponsorship statement in its text. The links for the brand ranked first carry "utm_medium=affiliate" and an affiliate ID.
Two sister sites run the same format. Plastic Surgery Key's list introduces "these five winners" and then tables six; it says "We sampled 200+ products" and, further down, "We reviewed 30+ kratom extract products". Musculoskeletal Key's list, dated 8 July 2026, names a wellness writer and a fact-checker at the top and says "Posted by admin" at the bottom, and a related-posts link on the live page is titled "{{ keyword }}", a template placeholder nobody filled in. On both, one brand's links run through a separate tracking domain tagged "utm_source=everflow". Neither carries an affiliate or sponsorship disclosure that I could find.
Be precise about what that shows: ranked lists with affiliate-tracked links and no disclosure on the page. It does not show who wrote them, or whether anyone paid to be placed or ranked. I will not pretend it does.
One claim on the radiology list can be tested. Of the American Kratom Association's GMP program, it says "Every brand on this list meets this standard." When AKA's public list was read on 1 October 2026, two of the five, including the one ranked first, were not found on it. Lists lag, and absence on one day does not prove a vendor was never qualified, but on that date the list did not bear the sentence out. The lists also disagree about state law: one counts Rhode Island as a ban state, another says Rhode Island reversed its ban in April 2026. None of them is a legal source. For that, go to the state, or to the state by state picture on my intel page.
A wildlife site, a beer magazine, and one page of consumer reviews
On 23 July 2025 Focusing on Wildlife, a wildlife photography and conservation site, ran "Kats Botanicals Stands Out As The Best Kratom Brand: Here's Why" in its "Editorials" category, by "Supertrooper", "Founder and Executive Editor". I found no disclosure line. The first "Kats Botanicals" link goes not to Kats but to a vendor profile on the site of The Golden Monk, a kratom seller whose AKA listing says it publishes "kratom strain reviews, vendor profiles, and kratom buying guides"; the header image comes from the same domain. The page does not say who commissioned it, so I state no relationship. GRH Kratom has its own review of The Golden Monk, under my byline.
The Beer Connoisseur, a beer magazine, lists a Kratom Blog among its blog categories, alongside casinos and gambling, dating, sports betting and mushrooms. On 29 July 2025 it published "Real Botanicals: Setting The Gold Standard For Kratom And Kava", bylined "Story by: Kratom Blog". I found no disclosure on the article; the site footer links "Advertising", "Write For Us" and "Affiliate Program". My side of it: GRH Kratom lists a Real Botanicals product.
For contrast, Drugs.com has a kratom user reviews page: 47 reviews, reviewers shown by a truncated name or "Anonymous", and a note that "Reviews appearing to come from parties with a vested interest are not published." The reviews are self-reported, not stated to be verified, and no evidence that kratom is safe or does anything. But of the eight pages, it is the only one that plainly fits the FTC rule's definition of a consumer review.
What the FTC rule covers, and what it does not
The Federal Trade Commission announced its consumer review rule on 14 August 2024, after a 5-0 vote. It was published in the Federal Register on 22 August 2024, at 89 FR 68034, and took effect on 21 October 2024. Only the last date binds anyone.
Much turns on one definition. Under 16 CFR Part 465, section 465.1(d), a consumer review is an evaluation "submitted by the consumer or purported consumer and that is published to a website or platform dedicated in whole or in part to receiving and displaying such evaluations." The drugs.com page is that. A ranked list on a radiology site is not, and nor is a press release. The rule reaches fake reviews, reviews bought for a particular sentiment, undisclosed insider reviews, review suppression, and a business passing off a site it controls as an independent reviewer. Most of the pages above fall, if anywhere, under section 5 of the FTC Act and the Endorsement Guides.
Its disclosure duties are narrower still. FTC staff, in their questions and answers on the rule, say it in one line: "The rule's only disclosure requirements relate to certain situations involving company insiders." Affiliate disclosure comes from somewhere else.
What the rule added was penalties. The same staff page says it "authorizes courts to impose civil penalties for knowing violations". The Federal Register in 2024 put the maximum at $51,744 per violation, adding that courts "may impose much lower per-violation penalties"; the FTC's warning letters of December 2025 cited up to $53,088. There is no private right of action. A shopper or a rival cannot sue anyone under it.
The enforcement I found: warning letters to 10 unnamed companies on 22 December 2025, which the FTC says "are not formal determinations" of a violation; an administrative complaint on 13 April 2026 alleging that the website of TruHeight, a supplement company, carried several thousand five-star reviews written by employees, with a proposed order carrying a $4 million judgment, partially suspended, and $750,000 to pay; and a federal suit, announced on 11 May 2026, alleging that Premium Home Service created thousands of fake business listings for home repair companies, and fake reviews. Allegations, not findings. Supplements and home repair. I could find no action under the rule that involves kratom.
The Endorsement Guides, which are not a rule
The Endorsement Guides, 16 CFR Part 255, revised in 2023, call themselves "administrative interpretations" of the laws the FTC enforces. Guidance, then. Practices inconsistent with them "may result in corrective action by the Commission under section 5 if, after investigation, the Commission has reason to believe that the practices fall within the scope of conduct declared unlawful by the statute."
A connection between endorser and seller that "might materially affect the weight or credibility of the endorsement", and that the audience would not reasonably expect, "must be disclosed clearly and conspicuously". And there is an example about a headphone review site that could have been written about a "best kratom extracts" page. If a site takes money for higher rankings, "such paid-for rankings are deceptive", and a disclosure does not cure it. If it earns from affiliate links instead, "it should clearly and conspicuously disclose that it receives such payments." FTC staff add, elsewhere: "The closer the disclosure is to your recommendation, the better."
Hold the radiology list up against that. If its affiliate-tagged links pay whoever runs it, the Guides say what the page should tell you. Whether anyone has done something the FTC would act on is the FTC's question, not mine.
What Google says, and what it has not said
Google's spam policies have a section now headed "Site reputation policy"; the older name was site reputation abuse, and the page was last updated on 28 August 2026. It covers third-party content "published on a host site mainly because of that host's already-established ranking signals". One of Google's own examples is "A medical site hosting a low-quality, third-party advertising page about 'best casinos' that isn't integrated with the site, and that's being placed on the site to rank better due to the established site's ranking signals".
I call the medical reference lists parasite SEO. That is my label, not Google's, and their resemblance to the casino example is my observation, not a Google finding. Google decides after "human review", and nothing public tells me it has looked at any of these pages. The same policy lists "Wire service or press release service sites", "work of an editorial nature" and affiliate links "with links treated appropriately" among things it does not treat as inconsistent.
What an AKA listing means, and a list we are not on
Two of the ranked lists invoke the American Kratom Association, so here is what its GMP program is, in AKA's own description: "facility and process certification versus product certification", and "The AKA does not endorse the quality of the product". Its program document adds that it "does not certify the safety of any kratom product". A vendor pays an annual registration fee and passes an audit by an AKA-approved third-party auditor within 90 days of registering, then every year. AKA's term for the result is "GMP Qualified".
So, on AKA's own terms, there is no AKA-certified product. A list that says every brand on it meets the AKA standard is telling you about factories and paperwork. Not about the bottle.
Now the part that costs me something. On AKA's list as read on 1 October 2026, Kats Botanicals, MIT 45 and O.P.M.S. Kratom appear. GRH Kratom, King K and GUD Tonics do not. A vendor called King Kratom does; that is a different name, and nothing on the page connects it to King K. If you are weighing our brands against those three, that is a line in their favor, and you should hear it from me first.
Now ours
The affiliate program. GRH Kratom's affiliate page offers "Up to 25% Commission on first orders". The Growth tier, for quarterly sales up to $2,000, pays 20% on a first order and 5% recurring, with a 45 day cookie. Partner, from $2,000 to $10,000, pays 25% and 10%, with 60 days. Ambassador, at $10,000 and above, pays 25% with custom recurring terms and a cookie listed as "90 days / Lifetime". The payout minimum is $50. So a "best kratom" page that ranks GRH can carry a link that pays its writer when you buy, and under the Endorsement Guides and FTC staff guidance that should be disclosed, near the link, in plain words. Our page says partners get "platform-safe language, assets, and FTC templates". A template is not a disclosure, and nothing in this column checks what partners actually publish.
The vendor reviews. Three of GRH's were read on 1 October 2026: The Golden Monk, dated 31 May 2026, and Kona, both under my byline, and Payless, under the byline GRH Kratom. Each opens with a Quick Verdict box, and the Payless one, to its credit, declines to repeat an unsourced "3.5 out of 5" score it found on other blogs. None of the three opens by saying it was written by a competing seller. That is the omission I spent half this column describing, and on two of those pages the person not saying so was me. By its own listing, The Golden Monk sells kratom and publishes reviews and vendor profiles. So does GRH.
The comparison. King K's store runs a post comparing MIT45's extract shots with its own. It sits under King K's name, which is a disclosure it cannot avoid, and it is still a seller comparing itself with a rival.
The shelf. We also sell some of the brands people review. As listed on grhkratom.com on 1 October 2026, GRH sells MIT 45 Gold liquid extract (15ml) at $14.99, MIT 45 Super K Extra Strong (30ml) at $22.99, an MIT 45 Black honey pouch at $12.99, and Kanva Botanicals Focus + Flow at $10.99 a bottle or $115.00 for 12, plus Real Botanicals, feel free and Superfeels products. GUD Tonics' drinks compete with Kanva Focus + Flow. A page praising MIT45 can send GRH a sale; a page arguing against it can send King K one. Rebel X, our wholesale business, distributes King K, GUD Tonics and GRH products, and none of MIT45, Kanva, Kats or O.P.M.S.
The rule reads differently once you own stores. Section 465.6 bars a business from materially misrepresenting "that a website, organization, or entity that it controls, owns, or operates provides independent reviews or opinions". Asked whether a seller that reviews its own and rivals' products complies if it discloses that it owns the site, FTC staff answer "It depends", on "the net impression of the website". I read that as: a disclosure box is necessary, and not sufficient. Section 465.5(a) is aimed at people like me, an officer or manager who reviews his own business's products without "a clear and conspicuous disclosure" of the relationship. If I left five stars on one of ours without saying who I am, that is my section.
Four reviews dated 1 October 2026, with the interest on top
Four of our stores have each written a review of a competitor, dated 1 October 2026 like this column: Kats Botanicals on GRH Kratom, O.P.M.S. on King K, Kanva Focus + Flow on GUD Tonics, and MIT45 on Rebel X, that last one for shops deciding what to stock. Each carries, near the top, a box titled "Who wrote this, and what we sell". It says which of our stores, if any, sells the brand, and that the page has no affiliate links.
A second box, "How we reviewed it", says documents only. We did not buy, taste or test the products. No stars, no scores, no rating markup in the page code. The verdict is in words.
Google's guidance on writing reviews asks for evidence "of your own experience with what you are reviewing", and for anything called the best, "first-hand supporting evidence". Ours have none, and I would rather they did not pretend to. A seller describing how a rival's product felt is the least checkable sentence a review can contain. A certificate, a label and a price are things you can open yourself.
Are the four independent? No. Each was written by a competitor of the brand it reviews, and our retail store sells two of the four brands. The box does not make a seller's review neutral. It makes the interest visible, which is the most a seller's review can honestly do, and more than five of the eight pages above managed.
What you can check on any review, ours included
- Who is talking? Find the author line and the business behind it. If the author is the brand, it is the brand's page, whatever the headline says. A named writer at the top and "admin" in the footer: ask who actually wrote it. If the business sells the same thing, or sells against it, the page should say so.
- Is it labeled? Look for "paid press release", a wire service's name, "sponsored", at the top and at the bottom. A disclosure in the last paragraph of a long page is still a disclosure. FTC staff advise putting it close to the recommendation.
- Where do the links go? Hover first. "utm_medium=affiliate", an affiliate ID, an "everflow" tag or a hop through somebody else's domain means the link is tracked. Then look for a nearby sentence saying the writer is paid. Our four reviews have no affiliate links.
- What is the host site for? Radiology, plastic surgery, wildlife photography, beer. If a site has no reason to know about kratom, ask why it is ranking it.
- Check one claim against its source. An AKA claim: open AKA's list. A state law claim: go to the state. A lab claim: ask for the certificate, tied to a lot, from a named laboratory, and read the certificate rather than the summary. My column on the quiet lie in half the labels is about how a true statement can still mislead.
- Where did the score come from? Stars, a number out of five or a "#1" need a method you can see. Our four carry none.
Run all six on our four reviews, then on the three older GRH reviews named above, none of which says up front that a competitor wrote it. I intend to put the same line on GRH's older vendor reviews, starting with the ones that carry my name. Then run them on whatever ranks above us.
If a page of ours fails, or a document contradicts a date or quote above, send it and I will correct the piece at the top, with the date. A review by someone who sells the product, or sells against it, is not worthless. It is advertising, and it should say so in its first lines. Three of ours did not. The four dated 1 October 2026 do.
Disclaimer: This article describes public pages as they read on 1 October 2026 and links primary sources so you can check them. Pages, listings and penalty figures change. It is general commentary, not legal or medical advice. Opinions are the author's own; the author holds commercial interests in botanical brands, including the stores named above. Naming a brand implies no affiliation with it or endorsement by it. Nothing here is a health claim, and statements about botanical products have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration.