Metformin, a widely prescribed, safe and inexpensive drug for type 2 diabetes, is a first-line treatment that lowers blood sugar and improves the body’s response to insulin. The drug appears to trick cells into sensing an energy shortage, similar to what happens during fasting or dieting. This activates a key cellular energy sensor called AMPK, which helps trigger cellular waste cleanup and supports cellular repair. Now, a recent review suggests metformin might also help counter some effects of aging.
The researchers compiled decades of global research, from cellular and molecular studies to animal and human studies, to provide a comprehensive, unified picture of how metformin might affect aging and longevity. The collective data indicated that metformin acts as a geroprotective agent that can target the biological root causes of aging and potentially improve health span.
Metformin’s antiaging effects are evident across species. Male monkeys treated for 40 months saw their tissues become biologically younger, with their brains alone reversing by nearly 6 years—a leap equivalent to 18 years in human terms. A similar pattern was seen in humans, where observational data indicate that people taking metformin had biological ages up to 3.43 years younger, with people with diabetes taking the drug living as much as 15% longer than their peers without diabetes.
These findings are published in Aging.
Targeting root causes of aging
The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that the number of people age 60 and older will double from 1 billion in 2020 to 2.1 billion by 2050. With an aging population comes a host of age-related diseases, including metabolic disorders, dementia, Alzheimer’s disease and osteoarthritis. These diseases not only diminish individuals’ quality of life but also place significant strain on a country’s health care system.
Over the past few years, a new field of science has been gaining momentum: geroscience. Instead of treating age-related diseases one by one, geroscience asks a bigger question: What if we could target the biological drivers of aging itself? Researchers are uncovering the common mechanisms that fuel aging and multiple chronic diseases, hoping to slow these processes and help people stay healthier for longer.
One drug to fight them all
A large body of evidence indicates that people prescribed metformin to manage blood sugar levels also had fewer cardiovascular events and showed lower rates of cognitive decline. Because developing new drugs takes years, researchers shifted their focus toward investigating whether metformin could be repurposed to slow the effects of aging.
Metformin has attracted considerable interest as a possible drug for slowing aging, but the evidence so far is far from consistent. Findings from cell, animal and human studies have been mixed, and a widely publicized study linking metformin to a survival advantage in humans has recently faced criticism after other researchers could not reproduce its results. Also, most human studies have involved people with diabetes, making it difficult to distinguish any potential effects on aging from the drug’s effects on the underlying disease.
To make sense of this fragmented evidence, the researchers brought findings from different species and biological systems together in a single framework.
Metformin’s track record
Instead of treating just one disease, metformin acts on multiple biological root causes of aging at the same time. It can trigger autophagy, the cell’s cleanup system, helping clear cellular waste while supporting DNA stability. As we age, the chemical tags on our DNA called methylation begin to shift, affecting how genes are regulated. Metformin slows abnormal changes in DNA by stabilizing an enzyme called TET2, helping preserve a more youthful genetic profile. Its effects also reach the gut and its microbiome, where it can boost beneficial, mucus-protecting bacteria and the production of short-chain fatty acids. This is promising news, as previous studies have found that a healthy gut microbiome can lower age-related inflammation throughout the body.
In microscopic worms called C. elegans, metformin extended lifespan by 36% to 40% by putting the animals into a state similar to calorie restriction. In mice, across different models, metformin increased average lifespan by 5.8% to 20.1% and delayed the onset of certain tumors.
Putting metformin to the test
The researchers noted that the biggest gap in longevity science today is the lack of large, rigorous studies testing metformin in healthy adults without diabetes. Most human evidence so far comes from observational studies, which, despite promising signals, cannot establish metformin as a proven longevity treatment.
They are hopeful that the Targeting Aging with Metformin (TAME) trial, which is designed to test whether metformin can delay the onset of multiple age-related chronic diseases in humans, will help confirm what we know while also uncovering what is hidden. https://medicalxpress.com/news/2026-09-diabetes-drug-metformin-repurposed-aging.html
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