GLP-1 and pure research peptides both fall under the same Google policy, but trip different restricted lines. Here's why the compliance playbook differs.
GLP-1 and GLP-1-adjacent products (semaglutide, tirzepatide, and related analogs) and pure research peptides like BPC-157 both fall under Google's Unapproved Substances policy, but in practice, Google's ad review systems don't treat them identically. Brands that run both categories in the same account, using the same compliance playbook for each, are often surprised when one gets flagged and the other doesn't — or vice versa. The difference comes down to how each category maps onto the policy's specific restricted lines.
The policy restricts "products that imply they are as effective as prescription drugs or controlled substances." GLP-1 analogs occupy an unusual position here: semaglutide and tirzepatide are themselves active ingredients in FDA-approved prescription medications (marketed under well-known brand names for diabetes and weight management). That means GLP-1-adjacent advertising is evaluated against an existing, specific, approved-drug comparison point — something pure research peptides like BPC-157 don't have.
Practically, this means GLP-1 advertising draws scrutiny for a different reason than BPC-157 does. BPC-157 gets flagged primarily for implied therapeutic claims about an unapproved compound. GLP-1 gets flagged primarily for implying equivalence to, or substitution for, an approved prescription medication — even when the ad never names the branded drug directly. Comparative or "alternative to" framing is the single highest-risk pattern specifically for this category, covered in more depth in our semaglutide and tirzepatide compliance guide.
Pure research compounds like BPC-157, TB-500, and Melanotan don't have an approved-drug equivalence risk in the same way — there's no branded prescription product they could be seen as substituting for. Their primary exposure is the "unapproved pharmaceuticals and supplements" line and the LegitScript-monitored list that feeds it, which is driven by whether the product is positioned for human consumption or therapeutic use rather than strictly laboratory research.
This is why the compliance playbook differs: GLP-1 campaigns need to avoid comparative and substitution language above almost everything else, while research peptide campaigns need to avoid therapeutic-outcome language and consumption-implying content (dosing instructions, "how to use" copy) above almost everything else. Both need research-use framing, but the specific phrases that trigger review are different.
Because the two categories trip different specific policy lines, running them in the same campaign or ad group structure makes diagnosis harder when something gets flagged — it's not always obvious which policy line caused the issue without separating the signal. We recommend, and build by default, fully separate campaign structures for GLP-1-adjacent products versus pure research peptide products, even within the same brand and account. This isn't purely a compliance safeguard — it also allows bidding strategy, audience targeting, and creative testing to be tuned to each category's very different search intent (GLP-1 search demand skews toward consumer weight-management intent; pure research peptide demand skews toward biohacking and research-context intent), a distinction covered further in our guide to structuring accounts across multiple compounds.
The same split applies to Shopping feeds. A GLP-1 product title or description that uses language like "compare to Ozempic" or "same active ingredient as" is one of the fastest routes to a Merchant Center suspension, since Shopping feed review tends to catch comparative and brand-adjacent language aggressively. A research peptide product feed, by contrast, is more commonly flagged for condition-specific titles ("BPC-157 for tendon repair") than for comparative language, since there's rarely an approved-drug equivalent to compare it to. Segmenting feeds by category, not just by product line, keeps a Merchant Center issue in one category from putting the other at risk — a pattern covered in more general terms in our Merchant Center suspension and reinstatement guide.
Multi-category brands — increasingly common as peptide brands expand into GLP-1-adjacent product lines — need two distinct compliance playbooks running in parallel, not one playbook applied twice. That means separate campaigns, separate landing page copy review criteria (comparison-language screening for GLP-1, consumption-language screening for research peptides), and ideally separate team ownership or review checklists for each, even if the same person or agency manages both.
Not currently — Google has not published a certification pathway specific to GLP-1-adjacent advertising the way it has for CBD. The compliance approach today relies on avoiding comparative and prescription-equivalence language rather than a certification process.
Both face scrutiny, but compounded, human-use-positioned products generally draw more direct attention given the active regulatory focus on compounding pharmacies in this category, while research-grade positioning (with appropriate research-use-only framing) sits closer to how other research peptides are evaluated.
We recommend against it. Even a shared site navigation or cross-sell module linking the two categories can create the kind of co-promotion signal that broadens scrutiny across both product lines during a review.
The underlying principle — separate playbooks for prescription-equivalence risk versus unapproved-supplement risk — transfers, though Meta's specific enforcement patterns differ; see our Meta Ads scaling guide for platform-specific detail.
See how a multi-category account was structured to scale both product lines compliantly.
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