SmartyPants Vitamins Review

Welcome to our SmartyPants review!

For more than a decade, SmartyPants Vitamins has provided premium, comprehensive, and delicious gummy multivitamins to support the health and well-being of kids. 

But with their expansion to include supplements for all ages and life stages, SmartyPants is now a leader in the clean gummy vitamin space. 

Not only do they provide clean multivitamins, but they’re also highly transparent and are constantly innovating with new products and lines, including sugar-free gummies, liquids, and options for ages ranging from 6 months to 60+. 

For these reasons, which we’ll get into in great depth, we awarded SmartyPants with an overall A grade—let’s dive into the details. 

Pros and Cons of SmartyPants Vitamins

The SmartyPants Story: Boosting Nutrition, One Clean Gummy at a Time

Back in the day, the only available multivitamins for kids were those brightly colored, artificial-ingredient-filled, yabba-dabba-doo chalk-like ones (you know the ones we’re talking about).

So in 2011, a group of concerned parents and health and wellness leaders—including Courtney Nichols Gould, Gordon Gould, Breck Costin, and Drew Francis—joined forces to create a gummy vitamin for kids that was loaded with nutrients but not full of junk.

Filled with bioavailable vitamins, minerals, and essential fats—but without synthetic colors or artificial sweeteners—the first affordable and clean gummy vitamins for children were born. 

The original SmartyPants kids’ gummy vitamins were such a hit that they expanded the catalog to include clean supplements for every age and life stage, including babies, toddlers, kids, teens, adults, pregnancy, and 50-plus adults. 

It’s important to know that at SmartyPants we live and breathe by our values–smart, simple and true.

Jeff Wong, VP of Marketing at SmartyPants Vitamins

And they aren’t your typical run-of-the-mill supplements with just a handful of vitamins and minerals—SmartyPants are carefully crafted, containing nutrients in highly bioavailable forms and additional compounds like omega-3 fatty acids to support brain health. 

Now, SmartyPants is under the Unilever umbrella and is still innovating new products, including their most recent addition—Sugar-Free Multi & Omegas gummy multivitamins that are formulated without sugar alcohols.

And not only does SmartyPants care about what they put into their vitamins, but they also support people who don’t have access to them, providing life-changing nutrient donations for women and children in the U.S. and globally via their partnership with Vitamin Angels.

We learned more about the brand and what they stand behind from Jeff Wong, VP of Marketing at SmartyPants Vitamins. 

One gem he shared with us about the company is that “It’s important to know that at SmartyPants we live and breathe by our values–smart, simple and true. ‘Smart’ in that the brand formulates its products based on the latest scientific evidence, ‘Simple’ in that SmartyPants offers comprehensive, delicious multivitamin formulas to streamline the whole family’s vitamin routine, and ‘True’ in that we’re committed to doing right by humans and the planet, with multiple quality credentials and certifications, responsible ingredient sourcing, and our partnership with Vitamin Angels.”

Our SmartyPants Review

Every brand we review is assessed according to this set of universal factors—here’s how SmartyPants scored to earn them an overall A grade: 

• Quality (A)
• Transparency (A+)
• Website Experience (A-)
• Customer Service (A-)
• Value (B+)
• Brand Value (A)

Now, let’s take a closer look at these six categories, starting with the crucial component of quality.

Quality

In this section, we take into account several quality-related factors, including:

• Packaging and labeling
• Quality of ingredients
• Sourcing, manufacturing, and formulation
• Product or facility certifications

Starting with the first point, we had no issues with the SmartyPants packaging or labeling, which were tightly sealed and the labels prominently showed the supplement facts, “Superstar Ingredients,” and a few points about their benefits.   

The sourcing, formulation, and quality of ingredients were also top-tier. 

SmartyPants never uses synthetic colors, artificial flavors, artificial sweeteners, or preservatives, instead opting for organic cane sugar and organic tapioca syrup or organic monk fruit in their sugar-free options. 

The only thing keeping us from awarding an A+ grade here was the amount of sugar in some of the supplements—for example, the Women’s Formula contains 6g of sugar (organic cane sugar and organic tapioca syrup) per six-gummy serving. 

Other products, like the Kids Formula, contain 4g of sugar per four-gummy serving. 

However, we recognize that the larger serving size (and 1g of sugar per gummy) are necessary to pack in the abundance of vitamins, minerals, and omega-3 fats without negatively affecting the taste.

Plus, we appreciate that each age and life stage has sugar-free, monk fruit-sweetened options. 

SmartyPants has plenty of certifications to back up their products, including USDA Organic, non-GMO, cGMP, and Certified Vegetarian for some.

Each product is also certified clean by Clean Label Project®, a third-party verification given to products that exceed the strictest standards of purity and have tested free of contaminants and chemicals of concern. 

All SmartyPants supplements are free of the top eight most common allergens—and they test at all stages, from raw materials to finished product, to ensure that all labels are accurate and true.

Lastly, the formulations of all SmartyPants products are carefully chosen, providing science-backed amounts of each nutrient in the most bioavailable forms. 

Now, let’s take a look at some of the top products that SmartyPants has to offer.

SmartyPants Product Catalog

Toddlers and Babies

Uniquely, SmartyPants offers supplements that can start as early as six months of age.

While babies don’t really need complete multivitamins, they can benefit from some nutrients and healthy fats to help bridge the nutritional gap when they transition from breastfeeding or formula to eating solid foods.

Notably, the Baby Multi and DHA liquid contains 13 premium nutrients, including plant-based omega-3 DHA from algal oil for brain health, vitamin D3 for bone health, vitamin C for immunity, lutein for eye health, and iodine for cognitive development.

They also carry Baby Probiotics and supplements for toddlers aged two and three. 

Kids and Teens

For children aged four and up, SmartyPants offers several versions of their kids’ supplements, including the original Kids Formula, the Sugar-Free Kids Multi & Omegas, the Organic Kids Formula, and the Kids Formula with Fiber.

Once the kiddos reach their teen years, you’ll find multivitamin and mineral supplements formulated for both teen boys and girls. 

Adults

In this category, SmartyPants provides supplements (both gummies and capsules) for Women, Men, Prenatal, and 50+ Adults.

Transparency

One of the main factors we look for in this section is how transparent a brand is with where their ingredients are sourced from and how their product is made.

And wouldn’t you know it, SmartyPants has an entire “Ingredient Transparency” page dedicated to this topic—they’re definitely off to a good start here. 

On this page, you can find detailed information about each ingredient in each supplement, including a map showing the ingredients’ countries of origin. 

For example, here are the nutrients that are sourced from Italy: 

SmartyPants is also transparent about their manufacturing process, with more information on the page “Making SmartyPants.” 

They share that each batch of vitamins and minerals is tested for identity, strength, purity, and composition, and the fish oil undergoes molecular distillation to remove impurities and is checked for safety and purity.

But it’s not just a one-time test—all supplements are tested at six stages: 1) pre-blend, 2) mid-process, 3) pre-bottling, 4) additional testing for microbiological contamination, residual solvents, pesticides, heavy metals, 5) during bottling and labeling, and 6) stability testing. 

And if you want to check it for yourself, feel free—you can see testing results on their Certificates of Compliance.

The SmartyPants product pages are informative and include the prominent benefits of each nutrient, and the shipping and return policies can be found in the FAQs

Website Experience

The SmartyPants website is well-designed, visually appealing, and full of information—but you can’t buy directly from the site. 

Rather, clicking on a “Buy Now” button will take you straight to Amazon. 

While this isn’t necessarily a huge issue, some people may prefer to shop directly through the brand. 

A few things that SmartyPants does right in this category are the abundance of educational materials, including a helpful nutrient guide and a quiz to find the right supplement for you. 

It’s also easy to navigate, with dropdown tabs separating the supplements into Kids and Adults with subcategories from there. 

Another (very) minor drawback was that you can’t zoom in (whether by hovering over the image or by clicking on a “+” button) on the hard-to-read supplement facts on each product page—however, they do have a clickable “Supplement Facts” link on the product page to help alleviate this issue.

Customer Service

SmartyPants provides three lines of communication—text, email, and phone—with all three responding in a relatively timely manner. 

We got replies to our text in 1.5 hours, an email response in less than 2 hours, and our phone call was returned in about 3 hours. 

While these are certainly respectable response times, it can be helpful to have an immediate option, like a live chat. 
However, SmartyPants got high points here for their generous money-back satisfaction guarantee on all products—although it won’t include a refund for the shipping cost, which has a standard rate of $5.

Value

With over 40 products to choose from, it can be challenging to assess prices compared to competitors for every offering in the catalog. 

Although SmartyPants has several different supplement formulations, we focused on the kids’ gummies for our price comparison. 

As you can see, SmartyPants is not the most expensive on the list, but not the most affordable either. 

Kids Gummy Vitamin	Price
SmartyPants Organic Kids Gummies	$20.99 for 30 servings: $0.70/serving
Nordic Naturals Kids Zero-Sugar Multi Gummies	$29.71 for 30 servings: $0.99/serving
New Chapter Kids Gummies	$19.97 for 30 servings: $0.66/serving
MaryRuth Organics Kids Gummies	$24.99 for 60 servings: $0.42/serving

But, we award higher points for quality—and the fact that SmartyPants’ supplements also include additional nutrients or compounds, like fish oil or omega-3s and coenzyme Q10 in the adult formulas.

Combining their high-quality ingredients and the value of providing clean gummy supplements for all ages with the comparison to other brands, we awarded SmartyPants with a B+ an A- here.

Brand Value

Last but not least, this category takes a deep dive into how much impact the brand has in the world—from philanthropic efforts and innovation to scientific research and sustainability. 

Starting with innovation, SmartyPants is not lacking in new ideas—they could’ve just stuck to kids’ gummies, but they’ve branched out into several other categories. 

In addition to innovating supplements for different life stages, they are continually coming out with new variations, like sugar-free gummies or combinations with omega-3s, probiotics, or fiber. 

On the philanthropy front, SmartyPants donates to just one organization—but they are all in with it. 

Since their founding, SmartyPants has partnered with Vitamin Angels, where they’ve provided life-changing vitamins to more than 27 million mothers and children at risk of malnutrition in 65 countries worldwide, as well as all 50 U.S. states. 

Next on our list is sustainability efforts, which SmartyPants has a fair amount of, including getting their omega-3s from sustainably sourced fish and using recycled PET plastic in their supplement bottles and caps. 

As far as scientific research and institutional knowledge, SmartyPants is backed by a Scientific Advisory Board that includes a team of well-known experts in the fields of antioxidant research and fitness, nutrition science and policy, psychiatry, and psychology.

Overall, the combination of doctor-backed products, benefit to public health, and innovative product lines led to an A here.

Our Experience

Our team got the chance to sample a couple of SmartyPants’ products, including the Women’s Formula and the Sugar-Free Women’s Multi & Omegas. 

While both gummies were tasty, the classic Women’s Formula won out in terms of flavor—probably due to the addition of sugar. 

And although the omega-3s in this formula come from fish oil, there is no fishy taste to be found.

The Sugar-Free Women’s Multi tasted fine, albeit a little “vitamin-y”—however, having a sugar-free option is much appreciated. 

The serving size for the original formula seems a bit excessive, at six gummies per serving—but when they taste like candy, it’s hard to complain. 

Overall, we had a good experience with the SmartyPants gummies and would recommend them. 

FAQs About SmartyPants Vitamins

Final Thoughts

Overall, SmartyPants receives a solid A rating from our team, with high points awarded for impressive quality, transparent sourcing and manufacturing processes, good customer service, and innovative products. 

The only minor dings to their near-perfect score were the sugar content in the regular gummies and their slightly higher price point—which is still great considering the quality of ingredients going into them.