7 min read
Sam North
Cannabis is not proven to cause weight loss, with THC more commonly increasing appetite rather than being a suppressant. That said, THCV, the cannabinoid increasingly being referred to as “skinny weed”, behaves differently to THC. THCV (tetrahydrocannabivarin) is a non-intoxicating cannabis compound that is showing promise as an appetite suppressant by blocking the CB1 receptor. Unlike THC, which triggers the munchies, THCV may do the opposite.
Early research is showing that THCV may influence blood sugar control and other aspects of metabolism, though the human evidence is still in the preliminary stage. THCV is not currently approved as a weight-loss treatment in the UK.
Welcome back to Decoding Cannabis, our ongoing blog series where we take a recent piece of medical cannabis research and make it a little more easily digestible, so you can skip the heavy science chatter and get straight to what the research actually shows.
This week, we are actually looking at two adjacent papers from 2025 that focus on THCV and the growing interest in the relationship between cannabis, appetite, and weight loss. THCV has picked up the nickname “skinny weed” because, unlike THC (which is famous for triggering the munchies), THCV appears to interact with the body differently.
The first piece of research is a small (but still very useful) human trial testing THCV/CBD strips for weight loss over 90 days. The second reviews what the existing evidence tells us about THCV’s effects on appetite, metabolism, and blood sugar control. Read together, they present an intriguing early picture, though one with a few caveats worth explaining.
Key takeaways
Contents
THCV, short for tetrahydrocannabivarin, is a naturally occurring cannabinoid found in some (but not all) cannabis strains, though usually only in trace amounts. It is closely related to THC but behaves very differently in the body, and at the doses you will find in most cultivars, it does not get you ‘high’.
The key difference comes down to how it interacts with one of the two endocannabinoid receptors.
While THC switches on the CB1 receptor, which results in increased feelings of hunger, THCV seems to do the exact opposite - at least at low doses (more on this a bit further down).
Rather than activating CB1, it blocks it, which is why researchers have repeatedly linked THCV to reduced appetite. It also partially activates the second receptor, CB2, which helps regulate inflammation and blood sugar.
If you want a refresher on how these two receptors actually work, our guide to the endocannabinoid system breaks it all down.
That combo, dialling CB1 down while nudging up CB2, is what makes THCV’s metabolic profile so interesting, and why it keeps turning up in obesity and diabetes research.
But what does the evidence actually say?
The first piece of research we are going to unpack today is a review published in AIMS Neuroscience, which gathers up the preclinical and early human research on how THCV affects appetite, weight, and blood sugar control in conditions like obesity and type 2 diabetes. The second is a placebo-controlled trial in the journal Cannabis, which tested THCV and CBD oral strips for weight loss in 44 adults over 90 days.
All bases covered, preclinical and human trials.
While there were only 44 participants and the trial ran for only three months, the data gathered, and the outcomes are really quite encouraging.
Researchers gave the participants one of three options each day for the duration of the trial:
A lower-dose strip: 8mg of THCV combined with 10mg of CBD
A higher-dose strip: 16mg of THCV combined with 20mg of CBD
A placebo strip: no active cannabinoids
These are the type of strips that dissolve away on the tongue almost as soon as they touch it, releasing the cannabinoids straight into the mouth’s lining rather than sending them through the gut. Participants took theirs once a day on an empty stomach, with no other changes to their diet or exercise routines.
As we said, the results were really promising, and lined up neatly with what the mechanism behind THCV predicts:
The higher-dose group (16mg THCV / 20mg CBD) lost an average of 4.1 kg
The lower-dose group (8mg THCV / 10mg CBD) lost an average of 2.6 kg
The placebo group stayed at almost the exact same weight, losing just 0.1 kg
Weight was not the only thing that moved.
Compared with placebo, the people using the strips also recorded significant reductions in waist size, blood pressure and both total and LDL cholesterol, the “bad” cholesterol linked to heart disease.
That said, not every difference was statistically significant when the individual treatment groups were compared directly with the placebo. Combined with the small sample size, this means the findings should be treated as an encouraging early signal, not definitive evidence.
The strip trial produced some encouraging results, but it is the review findings where the data broadens out from weight loss into metabolism more generally.
By blocking that CB1 receptor rather than switching it on, THCV appears to turn down the hunger signal that THC can send into overdrive.
In animal studies pulled together by the review, this translated into real effects: rodents given THCV ate less, and some showed a marked jump in energy expenditure, meaning they burned more of what they took in. THCV also reduced fat building up in the liver, a problem closely tied to obesity and metabolic disease.
It’s not just animals that the review looked at, though. In a human brain-imaging study, a single dose of THCV changed how volunteers’ brains responded to images of food, dialling up the response to unappetising food and shifting activity in the brain’s reward circuitry. In other words, THCV may not just reduce your appetite, it may also alter how rewarding food feels in the first place.
This is where THCV’s metabolic case gets stronger, because the best human evidence so far is not about weight at all, but also how it affects blood sugar levels.
In a 2016 randomised controlled trial of THCV in people with type 2 diabetes included in the review, 62 patients took either THCV, a comparison treatment, or placebo over 13 weeks. The THCV group showed significantly lower fasting blood glucose levels and improved pancreatic cell functioning (the cells that produce insulin), and the treatment was generally well tolerated.
One caveat to point out: the diabetes trial found no meaningful weight loss, even though it improved blood sugar. The strips trial found clear weight loss from the combination of THCV and CBD. Rather than cancelling out, the two point to something useful: THCV seems to act across several metabolic levers at once, and which effects show up most strongly may depend on the dose, the formulation, and who is taking it.
Early indications show that THCV may have a direct influence on appetite, blood sugar control, and energy metabolism. Most available evidence is preclinical or comes from small human trials, so we cannot say with full certainty what the potential benefits are.
No, THCV is generally considered to be non-intoxicating at low doses, but those effects may change at higher doses. More randomised controlled trials are needed before we can say with total certainty that THCV is completely non-intoxicating.
No, at this point, there is no evidence to prove that cannabis can or will make you lose weight. THC commonly increases appetite in most people, and while the early evidence suggests that THCV may behave differently (even reduce appetite), more human research is needed before any firm conclusions can be made.
Yes, THCV-rich medical cannabis flower will soon be available to eligible Releaf patients.
The brand-new medical cannabis strain has been developed through our ongoing partnership with Glass Pharms, the first company licensed to grow commercial medical cannabis in the UK. This means that Releaf patients will be among the first in the country to have access to a prescribable option that offers meaningful levels of THCV.
It is important to make clear that THCV is not currently an approved weight-loss treatment, and access to the new cultivar is not automatic, even for existing patients. To learn more, check out medical cannabis for weight management.
Or simply head to our fast (and totally cost-free) medical cannabis eligibility checker. It takes all of 30 seconds to complete and could be your first step towards being prescribed medical cannabis with THCV, THC, and CBD.
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