Six Star Whey Protein Review (It Wasn’t The Best, Here’s Why)

Six Star has four different kinds of whey protein, and while I’ll discuss each of these products in further detail below depending on which one you’re interested in purchasing, the specific protein I bought and tested for this review was the “For Her” version.  

I will be honest right up front here – I struggled with this product as soon as it landed in my hands because it is a food supplement that is marketed to women.

In my ten years as a supplement store manager, I used to see brands who would offer protein supplements “for women,” which were identical in formula to the ones sold “for men”, but came with pink writing and cost a few extra dollars. 

When it comes to food supplements, like protein powders, having a product marketed for women is the same in my mind as going to a grocery store and buying chicken breasts that are “for women”. In that context, it sounds absurd, and it should be for a protein powder supplement as well. 

(This is different for other types of supplements like multivitamins or products that affect hormone levels. There is a time and place for sexual differentiation in the supplement industry, but food products aren’t it). 

Ultimately, I don’t think Six Star Whey Protein (For Her) is worth it. It has a low protein percentage per scoop (58%), low total protein (16g per scoop), added maltodextrin (a processed carbohydrate), and multiple artificial flavors. The fruit & veggie blend and added probiotics are a nice touch, but not enough to redeem the product. 

Honest Review Guarantee from FeastGood: Our testing team purchases each product 100% independently and uses the product for several weeks up to several months before writing a review. Learn more about our review process here.

We Recommend These Whey Proteins Instead

If you like the value of Six Star (because it’s considered a budget protein), I recommend getting their 100% Whey Protein Plus (click for best price), which offers nearly twice as much protein per scoop (30g) and comes in at 66% protein versus 58% in the “whey protein for her” version while staying at $1.00 per serving.  Price-conscious customers in my shop seem to really like this protein and are repeat buyers of this product.

However, if price isn’t an issue for you, I would recommend another brand entirely, which is Transparent Labs Grass-Fed Whey Protein (click for best price).  It has a higher protein content than all the Six Start products (74%) with zero artificial flavors, colors, or sweeteners and no added fillers.  Simply put, it’s the best protein powder on the market right now (Want to learn more? Read our Transparent Labs Whey Protein Review).

About Six Star Pro Nutrition 

Six Star is manufactured by MuscleTech under the research and innovation brand, Iovate Health Sciences. 

Six Star was launched by Iovate in 2005, but unfortunately the Six Star Nutrition website doesn’t offer a lot of insight into the company’s history. 

They market themselves as a “premium-quality line of supplements built for all levels of athletes to deliver powerful results at an incredible value.”

From the website, we can see that their brand is very much athlete-centered, with a lot of their marketing and the product tubs themselves featuring their athlete brand ambassadors like TJ Watt and Tobin Heath. 

From my experience in the industry, we’ve generally seen their sister company, MuscleTech, promoted as the higher quality option sold in specialty retail stores like GNC, with Six Star Nutrition being the more economical brand sold at wholesale stores like Walmart. 

(I also reviewed MuscleTech protein – click to read what I thought)

Overview of Six Star Whey Protein 

Six Star Nutrition manufactures four different types of protein 

• 100% Whey Protein Plus: This powder is a blend of fast and medium-release proteins making it suitable for post-workout recovery, but also great any time of day. It has 30g of protein per scoop with 67% of the calories coming from protein. It also has added vitamin C and Zinc (100% of your recommended daily value) for immune support.  If you’re looking to buy a Six Star Whey Protein, this is the version I’d get.

• Casein Protein: At 130 calories with 24g of protein, this product offers 74% protein per scoop. At less than $1.00 per serving, this is an incredible value. Casein protein is very slow digesting (upwards of 5 hours) and mixes up quite thick. It’s best taken before bed or during extended periods of time when food might be unavailable. 

• Whey Isolate +: This is the fastest digesting protein option, excellent for post-workout recovery. It is low-calorie (120) and has a very respectable 87% protein per scoop. However, this product is currently out of stock on Amazon and is no longer listed on the Six Star Pro Nutrition website. This leads me to question if it’s going to be available going forward. 

• 100% Whey Protein For Her: The For Her formula is low calorie (110 calories), but also low protein at 16g (58% of the calories come from protein). It has added maltodextrin and despite having flaxseed in the ingredients, has no notable fiber content. There is a fruit & veggie blend for added nutrients and probiotics for improved digestibility. 

As I said, if you are looking to purchase a whey protein from Six Star Nutrition, I recommend the 100% Whey Protein Plus. This product is a good blend of quality and quantity. 

The rest of this review is going to be centered specifically around the “Whey Protein For Her” because it’s the one that I bought and tried. Even though this product is labeled and marketed as being specifically for women, the information in this article will be helpful whether you are a man or woman and interested in Six Star products. 

Macronutrient Breakdown

The macronutrient breakdown of Six Star Whey Protein (For Her) is: 

• Protein: 16g  
• Carbohydrates:  7g
• Fat:  1.5g
• Sugar: 2g

Offering 110 calories per serving, but only 16 grams of protein means that 58% of the calories in this product come from protein.

This is in line with other proteins that we have found under the MuscleTech brand (Like MuscleTech 100% Grass-Fed Whey Protein) but it falls below our criteria of what is considered a “good quality” protein source.

Per our experience and criteria: 

• 65-75% protein per scoop = reasonable
• 75-85% protein per scoop = good
• More than 85% protein per scoop = excellent

This product falls below our criteria for a reasonable amount of protein per scoop, for a product that is marketed as a protein powder. 

If they were to call themselves a meal supplement or meal replacement, then these criteria would be different but the fact that they market themselves as a protein powder while only offering 58% protein per scoop means they fall short. 

Takeaway: Six Star Whey Protein (For Her) falls below our criteria for acceptable protein percentage per scoop. 

Highlights: What I Liked About Six Star Whey Protein

Inexpensive

Six Star Whey Protein is less than a dollar per serving (around 88 cents) making it one of the most cost-effective protein supplements on the market. 

While it only offers 16g of protein per serving (most other products offer between 20 and 30g per serving), it does contain the same amount of protein as 2.5 eggs. 

For reference, at the time this article is being written, large eggs cost around 30 cents each. Two and a half eggs would cost you about 75 cents. 

Getting a product with the same amount of protein with some added fruit and vegetable nutrients and a probiotic for 88 cents makes it a good value for a convenient, on-the-go option. 

Fruit and Veggie Blend

Six Star Whey Protein has an added fruit and veggie blend consisting of spinach powder, broccoli powder, and blueberry powder. 

While I am considering this a highlight, I might be reaching for redeeming qualities in this product. 

Spinach is a food that naturally contains both Vitamin A and Vitamin C, yet this product says it contains 0% of your daily value of both. What that tells me is that the amount of veggie and fruit blend in here is so minimal, that it’s not actually contributing to your daily vitamin intake. 

Probiotics

The addition of GanedenBC30, a probiotic that supports immune health and the digestive system, means that this product should be easily digested with minimal side effects. 

Like the fruit and veggie blend, I am marking this one as a highlight because I think it IS a great addition to the product, but I am adding one caveat. 

The probiotics are the very last ingredient in the product, and it’s not clear how many probiotics you get per serving. Because of this ambiguity, it’s impossible to know if the number of probiotics added is enough to actually be beneficial or not. 

In contrast, a Canadian company, Pure Vita Labs Isogold, also has probiotics in their formula listed as the last ingredient, but they specify that you get 1 Billion units per scoop. 

The PVL label which clearly states how many units per serving. The Six Star Pro Nutrition label which doesn’t show units per serving.

Drawbacks: What I Didn’t Like About Six Star Whey Protein

Low Protein

Six Star Whey Protein (For Her) offers 16g of protein per scoop and only 58% of the calories come from protein. 

The formula is low calorie and low fat, but for a product that is marketed as a protein supplement, it falls way short on protein content. 

Even a similar product from the same brand (100% Whey Protein Plus) offers twice as much protein per scoop with 66% of the calories coming from protein.

Outdated Marketing

A description from the Six Star Pro Nutrition Blog makes claims about how women don’t share men’s goals of putting on a significant amount of muscle, and that women don’t need creatine because it’s only great for men who are looking to increase size. 

This article was only found on the Canadian site and does have a lot of broken code so hopefully, the company Six Star Pro Nutrition agrees that this is an outdated view, and having this article still on their website is an oversight. 

This kind of marketing can be extremely harmful to women and the industry, by invalidating the women who DO want to put on a significant amount of muscle and misinforming consumers by making women feel like if they accidentally take in too much protein, they will magically become big and bulky. 

The reality is, that kind of muscle gain takes a lot of dedication and concentrated work, and won’t happen by just taking in extra protein. 

They also state creatine “is great for most men who are looking to increase size, but this is not always the look women are going for.”

This is an extremely outdated view about creatine, first of all. You can read more about that here. 

It is also very misleading to imply that the majority of protein powders will have creatine in them because that’s simply not the case. 

Availability

This product is no longer listed on the Six Star Pro Nutrition website, and could only be found on Amazon.ca, not Amazon.com

Honestly, I hope this is an indication that the product itself is on its way out. 

Every source I could find showed that I could buy the Six Star Pro Nutrition Whey Protein, Whey Protein Isolate, and casein protein, but didn’t list the Whey Protein For Her. 

Six Star Whey Protein: My Experience

While I don’t agree with the formula or the marketing and message behind the product, I didn’t hate the experience of consuming the product itself. 

I tried the French Vanilla flavor (which was the only one in stock, chocolate was unavailable) and it did have a nice flavor when mixed with water. 

I tried it mixed with milk, water, and oatmeal and it tasted good across the board. 

As someone who is currently tracking macros, I found this product a bit difficult to fit into my day. 

For both protein content and satiety, I wanted to take two scoops of the product. I found that by taking just one scoop, I was hungry pretty quickly and I wanted more than 20g of protein in my meal/snack.

The two scoops gave me 32g of protein and did help with satiety and fullness, but that also added 14g of carbohydrates which had to be factored into my day, causing me to shift around other foods and portion sizes. 

At a two-scoop serving, the product only has about 9 servings per container, which eliminates the budget-friendly aspect that I promoted as a highlight. 

I do think that there is a lot that Six Star does well, and their updated website and design show that they are going in the right direction. 

Takeaway: If you want to support Six Star Pro Nutrition, and you are looking for a protein powder supplement at a budget-friendly price, go for the Six Star Nutrition Whey Protein which has almost twice as much protein per scoop (30g) with added nutrients (vitamin C and zinc) for immune support and recovery.  

How Does Six Star Whey Protein Stack Up Against Our Criteria For Protein Powders

At FeastGood, we have 8 different criteria for ranking whey protein powders.  Here’s how Six Star stacked up:

Nutrition Label Transparency 

Our rating: 3/5

I give them a three out of five because they do clearly label everything that is added to their formula including probiotics, the fruit and veggie blend, and the two artificial sweeteners. 

They lose points for marketing themselves as a whey protein supplement but only offering 58% protein per scoop.

Fat Content Transparency 

Our rating: 5/5

The fat content is clearly labeled on the front (1.5g) and broken down on the nutrition facts panel as 1.5g of fat with 0.5g of saturated fat. 

Effective Ingredients 

Our rating: 2/5

The blend of whey concentrate and isolate is a good quality whey protein blend. However, the nutrients from the added fruit and veggie blend are so minimal they don’t even count towards your % Daily Value and there’s no indication of how many probiotics you are getting in the product. 

Furthermore, the second ingredient in the product is maltodextrin which is a highly processed carbohydrate that has a higher GI than table sugar. 

This means that maltodextrin spikes blood sugar more significantly than pure table sugar, but is often added to products to improve the creaminess and texture (or “mouthfeel”) of a product. 

Protein Percent of Calories

Our rating: 1/5

Six Star only offers 16g of protein per serving, and 58% protein per scoop. This is below nearly all comparable products in the industry. 

Taste/Flavor

Our rating: 3.5/5

I found the flavor unremarkable, but I don’t mean that in a bad way. It didn’t stand out as being incredible, but it also didn’t stand out as being bland or gross. 

Sometimes when fruit and veggie extracts are added to products, it can cause a grittiness or bitter taste. The overall taste of the vanilla protein was pleasant, but nothing to write home about. 

Mixability

Our rating: 2.5/5

When used in a blender or stirred into oatmeal, the product mixed well. When trying to mix it in a traditional shaker cup, the protein was quite clumpy. 

Texture (Thick or Thin)

Our rating: thin

When mixed according to the instructions on the label (1 scoop with 180ml of cold water or milk), the product mixed up relatively thin, but not as thin as a pure isolate. 

Satiety

Our rating: 1/5

Not surprising as the product is only 110 calories and is low in protein, but I found myself hungry again within about an hour after taking this product. 

• Related Article: Best Whey Protein Powder With Creatine

Who Is Six Star Whey Protein Good For? 

Honestly, I don’t see any reason why someone should choose this product over some alternatives on the market. 

If you want a similar, budget-friendly protein then go for the Six Star Pro Nutrition 100% Whey Protein.

If you are more interested in a high protein meal replacement option with fruit and vegetable extracts, then try something like the Purely Inspired All-In-One Meal Replacement shake which has more protein (20g), as well as a proper multivitamin, probiotic and fibre blend. 

But, the best whey protein powder in my view is Transparent Labs Grass-Fed Whey Protein, which is great if you can afford a higher quality protein. 

Six Star Pro Nutrition Whey Protein Customer Reviews

My only source for reviews on this product was amazon.ca, because I cannot find the product listed anywhere else. 

The ratings on amazon.ca are definitely not in line with my personal experience with the product, and there are only 99 total reviews which is well below the typical 1000 or more on other products we’ve reviewed.

The product has a 4.4/5 star rating on Amazon.ca

Here’s a quick breakdown of Six Start user rating out of 5 stars:

• 5 stars: 68% 
• 4 stars: 16%
• 3 stars: 13%
• 2 stars: 0%
• 1 star: 3%

A breakdown of the rating by category provides more insight into how customers feel about Six Star:

• Flavor: 4.4/5
• Value: 4.4/5

Reading through the comments, they all mention that the product tastes good (though some users complain that it’s a bit too sweet), and that the product is good value. 

No reviewers mention how they feel while taking the product, or mention the quality of the product itself.

Is Six Star Pro Nutrition Whey Protein Worth It? 

All things considered, you should pass on this product. As mentioned, there are similar products available, even from the same brand, that are higher quality with a similar price point. 

Six Star Pro Nutrition Promotions & Discounts

Though the products are available on Amazon, I found that the best pricing actually came from the Six Star website itself. 

They also run some sweepstakes contests on their website where you can win prizes (the current one is a trip to see an NFL game) or free product (open to US residents only).

Where To Buy Six Star Pro Nutrition? 

You can find their most complete product lineup on their website, and most products are also available on amazon.com and walmart.com. 

The product reviewed today, Six Star Pro Nutrition 100% Whey Protein For Her, appears to only be available on amazon.ca. 

Frequently Asked Questions

Where are Six Star Pro Nutrition Supplements Made? 

Iovate Health Sciences, the company behind Six Star Pro Nutrition, has its headquarters in Oakville, Ontario, Canada. I could not find specifically where Six Star products are manufactured, but I presume they’re manufactured in the USA like their sister company, Muscletech.

What Is Six Star Pro Nutrition’s Shipping Policy? 

Products will be shipped within 5-10 business days to the 48 contiguous states in the US. They can ship to Alaska and Hawaii, but additional fees may apply. Shipping is free on orders of $30 or more (after discounts, before taxes), and is otherwise $5.99. They can not ship to PO boxes or APO/FPO/DPO addresses.

What Is Six Star Pro Nutrition’s Return Policy? 

You may return or exchange an item that is unused and unopened within 30 days of purchase for a full refund (less shipping and handling charges). Returns can be done through your account or their contact form. Customer is responsible for return shipping fees. Returns are not accepted from third party retailers.

Is Six Star Pro Nutrition Third Party Tested? 

Nowhere on the label or website could we find any information that specified that this product was third party tested. 

Is Six Star Pro Nutrition Whey Protein Good For Weight Loss? 

Six Star Pro WPFH is not a good option for weight loss. It’s low in protein and high in carbohydrates, and only offers 110 calories per serving. While low calorie is typically good for weight loss, the low protein means it does not keep you full for long (<1 hour), which could lead to extra snacking throughout the day. 

Is Six Star Pro Nutrition Whey Protein Keto Friendly? 

This product is not keto friendly. It has 7g of carbohydrates per serving, and has added maltodextrin which can cause higher blood sugar spikes than table sugar.

Is Six Star Pro Nutrition Whey Protein Gluten Free? 

This product is not certified gluten-free, but does not outright contain gluten-containing ingredients. It is processed in a facility that processes wheat.

What Are The Best Ways To Mix Six Star Pro Nutrition Whey Protein? 

I didn’t find this product mixed well in cold water or milk, but did mix well in a blender or stirred into oatmeal. 

What Flavors Are Available For Six Star Pro Nutrition Whey Protein? 

Six Star is available in French Vanilla. 

Does Six Star Pro Nutrition Whey Protein Make You Gain Weight? 

Six Star is low calorie at 110 calories per serving. Being so low calorie, it’s very likely to cause weight gain. 

Can you use Six Star Pro Nutrition Whey Protein as A Meal Replacement? 

Since this product is so low calorie (110 per serving), even at 2 scoops it’s not calorie dense enough to work as a complete meal replacement. It could be used as part of a meal to supplement the protein content.

When Is The Best Time To Take Six Star Pro Nutrition Whey Protein? 

My honest recommendation is not to take this product, but if you already have it then I would use one scoop post workout or blended into a smoothie with fruit, vegetables, and plain greek yogurt to make a high protein, balanced meal replacement.

How To Contact Six Star Pro Nutrition

You can reach Six Star Pro Nutrition through the contact form on their website. 

You can also find them on the most popular social media platforms, including TikTok, Youtube, Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook. 

Other Protein Powder Reviews

• Ghost Whey Protein Review