You have probably seen the headlines about Ozempic and Wegovy for years. Many people have tried them, lost weight, and then wondered whether a stronger drug is on the way.
A new round of late-stage research now points to one.
Adults with type 2 diabetes who took the highest dose of Eli Lilly's investigational drug retatrutide lost about 50 pounds on average over 80 weeks. The results were published in The Lancet on September 29, 2026.
In the subgroup of participants who started with the highest body mass index (a BMI of 35 or more), the average weight loss on the top dose reached about 60 pounds. That is close to a quarter of starting body weight.
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That is a bigger average than earlier GLP-1 drugs have shown in a trial of similar length. Semaglutide, the active ingredient in Novo Nordisk's Ozempic and Wegovy, acts on one hormone pathway. Tirzepatide, used in Mounjaro and Zepbound (also from Eli Lilly), acts on two.
Retatrutide acts on three.
What a triple-hormone drug actually does
Retatrutide is a once-weekly injection that mimics three different hormones at the same time. It activates the receptors for GLP-1, which curbs appetite, GIP, which affects insulin and metabolism, and glucagon, which pushes the body to burn more energy.
The idea is that three signals are harder for the body to work around than one.
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How the trial played out
The trial, called TRIUMPH-2, enrolled 1,152 adults with type 2 diabetes and overweight or obesity. Participants received retatrutide at 4, 9 or 12 milligrams per week, or a placebo, for 80 weeks.
Average weight loss was 11.9% on the 4 milligram dose, 16.8% on 9 milligrams and 18.8% on the top 12 milligram dose. People on placebo lost about 5%.
Earlier phase 3 results from a sister trial in adults with obesity but without diabetes had already shown a new weight-loss drug could cut your body weight by a quarter. The new findings extend that pattern to a harder-to-treat group.
Blood sugar fell along with the weight
Blood sugar control improved as well. On all three doses, average HbA1c, a measure of long-term blood sugar, dropped by about 1.5 percentage points. The placebo group dropped around 0.2.
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Nearly 60% of participants on the top dose were no longer in the obese BMI range by the end of the study.
Dr. Susan Spratt, an endocrinologist at Duke Health, told NBC News the trial numbers stood out. "It rivals gastric bypass surgery without the surgery," she said.
Side effects were mostly in the gut
Side effects were mostly digestive. The most common was diarrhea, which hit about one in three people on retatrutide against roughly one in eight on placebo. Nausea and vomiting were also more frequent, and became more common as the dose went up.
Between 8 and 12% of people on the two higher doses stopped treatment because of side effects. On placebo, 5% stopped.
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The findings come from a phase 3 trial, the stage of research used to support regulatory approval, but retatrutide is not yet available outside clinical studies. Anyone with type 2 diabetes thinking about weight-loss treatment should talk with their own doctor.
What happens next for the drug
Retatrutide is not yet approved for sale anywhere in the world. Eli Lilly said it plans to file a Biologics License Application with the US Food and Drug Administration in the first quarter of 2027.
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This article is made and published by Aksel Kryhlmand, who may have used AI in the preparation.