If you’ve never taken a hemp supplement before, you may have wondered how long it takes for CBD oil to work orally.
For most people, the answer is somewhere around 30-60 minutes. It can be faster or slower, depending on how much you have in your stomach already and how quickly your brain metabolizes CBD.
Everyone is different, of course. Every time you take a supplement, your brain comes up with ways to use it. In the case of CBD, the supplement works by holding the door open for your body to continue making endocannabinoids—something it produces on its own, with or without CBD.
THE ENDOCANNABINOID SYSTEM & CBD
Taking a supplement orally means sending it through the digestive system first before it hits the bloodstream. Once it does, the brain sends out a signal to activate your endocannabinoid system (ECS).
What is the ECS? Thanks to research only done within the last couple of decades, we know that this system is one of Mother Nature’s oldest evolutionary mechanisms. It is shared by all mammals, and it helps to regulate sleep, appetite, and mood.
There are ECS hubs all throughout the body, including the muscles, liver, heart, and brain. When you take a CBD supplement, your body triggers the release of hormones signaling for the creation of endocannabinoids to send wherever they need to go.
The CBD you take won’t actually be used by your ECS. Instead, it prevents enzymes from naturally stopping the production of endocannabinoids when they normally would. CBD makes for a great supplement because it’s nontoxic, and it naturally occurs in your body.
HOW CBD WORKS WHEN TAKEN ORALLY
When you swallow CBD, the first place it will go is into your stomach where it will be processed and digested. Because this can result in a loss of potency, we suggest that you leave the CBD product in your mouth for at least a minute. If it’s chewable, do as much chewing as you can.
This allows membranes in your mouth to leech out supplements before they head to the stomach. In the case of a CBD tincture oil, you can bypass the GI tract by putting drops directly under your tongue. The mucous glands underneath your tongue absorb nutrients faster, helping to speed up the reaction and get you feeling the effects sooner.
Once inside your stomach, the CBD oil is broken down further by digestive acids. Once this process is complete, the CBD is ready to go into your bloodstream and start to affect your ECS.
While oral ingestion of CBD isn’t the fastest way to experience the effects, many people prefer the slower, more drawn out to release that comes with it. If you aren’t a fan of the slightly bitter taste of CBD oil, there are far more delicious alternatives available.
After the CBD gets into your bloodstream, the effects usually last around 2-3 hours before your body’s enzymes slow the production of endocannabinoids.
OTHER ORAL AVENUES
Of course, eating CBD or using a dropper aren’t the only ways to get it into your system. Some who suffer from migraines keep a vape pen on them as a quick remedy.
Vape pens work faster than oral dosing. This is because the lungs have an incredibly intricate network of alveoli, bronchioles, and capillaries that distribute oxygen as quickly as possible. If the lungs didn’t work as quickly as they did, standing up would be too difficult a task for your muscles.
Using this effective network, vaping makes it easy for people to quickly feel the effects of their CBD products—usually within 15 minutes or less.
Unfortunately, the tradeoff is that the effects wear off quickly. While vaping CBD is convenient, effective, and discreet, its benefits are short-lived. Many people find that they have to vape hourly if they want to keep feeling the CBD, which can put them at risk of developing tolerance—a state where your body needs more of a drug to achieve the same effect.
If you only occasionally use CBD and you want it to work as fast as possible, vaping is probably the right choice. Otherwise, consider something that lasts longer.
MAKING CBD MORE BIOAVAILABLE
Not all CBD products are created equal. There are vendors that buy isolate CBD in a powder form, mix it with other chemicals, and sell it as CBD oil. While this isn’t exactly misleading, it’s not totally honest.
A quality CBD oil will contain as many plant extracts as possible so that users get the full effect of the supplement. Leaving them out not only keeps you from experiencing them—but it also changes the way the other products work.
As an antioxidant, CBD plays an important role in minimizing free radicals throughout your neural pathways. In poorly formulated supplements, this may not happen, making it harder to experience the same benefits.
If CBD can’t be absorbed and used by your body, it probably won’t do much good.
