55.72% of all capsules are being re-engineered.
Here is the English translation. I have kept the structure, tone, and “UnicornShell” branding, and translated technical terms in standard nutraceutical/pharma English. Where the original cites specific market figures, I have preserved them as stated in the source text.
55.72% of capsules are being redesigned
In China, capsules account for more than half of all filed health-food products. That is a large installed base. Yet over the past few years, capsules have rarely appeared at the center of dosage-form innovation discussions—because their changes are not visible on the outside. They are happening inside the shell: in shell materials, in what the shell carries, and in how shells are combined with one another.
1. Start with 55.72%
Two sets of public data help explain why this matters.
The first comes from China’s State Administration for Market Regulation. In the first half of 2026, 1,136 health-food products were approved through filing. By dosage form, capsules—including hard capsules and soft capsules—accounted for about 55.72%, tablets about 16.90%, and powders, oral liquids, granules, teas, beverages, pastes, candies and other forms together accounted for about 27%.
The second comes from the U.S. NBJ 2026 Supplement Business Report. In the 2025 U.S. dietary supplement market, gummies represented 24.6%, powders 18.9%, liquids 12.6%, softgels 12.3%, capsules 10.5%, tablets 7.4%, and vegetarian capsules 2.5%.
Put together, the contrast becomes interesting.
In China’s filing data, capsules are the clear majority, accounting for more than half. In the U.S. market, gummies are the leading format, while capsule-type products—softgels, capsules and vegetarian capsules—together account for roughly 25%, still one of the top three delivery forms.
In other words, the formats that attract the most industry discussion are not always the same formats that are shipping the most volume. Gummies, orally disintegrating films and dual-chamber bottles represent incremental growth and new usage scenarios, so they generate a lot of attention. Capsules represent the existing base and the core volume, so they generate less noise.
Low visibility can make it seem as if nothing is changing. But the opposite is true. Capsule technology has been iterating in places that are not immediately visible—so deep that you cannot see the change unless you open the capsule. “Redesigned” here means three things: the shell material, the payload inside the shell, and the structure between shells.
2. Capsules sit on all three innovation lines
Looking at publicly available products and technologies from the past five years, dosage-form innovation has followed roughly three lines.
First, food-like formats.
Gummies, jellies, orally disintegrating films, functional chocolates and oral sprays move nutritional supplementation into everyday consumer rituals.
Second, composite structures.
Bilayer tablets, dual-chamber bottles and capsules-within-capsules use physical structure to solve compatibility problems that formulation alone cannot resolve.
Third, precision delivery.
Pellets, coatings, enteric release, sustained release, liposomes and microencapsulation help ingredients release at the right place and at the right rate.
Capsules actually touch all three lines. They do not need to become a completely new format to innovate. The shell material can be upgraded for food-like positioning and clean-label communication; the payload can be rethought for structural compatibility and delivery performance; and the internal architecture can be redesigned for controlled release.
Below is what has been happening along each line.
3. Line one: shell materials are changing
Traditional capsule shells are mainly gelatin, derived from animal collagen. Another path uses plant-based materials such as HPMC, or hydroxypropyl methylcellulose. In recent years, industrialization has advanced significantly, and plant-based shells can now accommodate powders, granules, pellets and liquid fills.
From publicly available information, brands are moving toward plant-based shells for roughly three reasons: clear demand from vegetarian and plant-based consumers; clean-label and ingredient-transparency positioning; and labeling or compliance requirements for animal-derived materials in certain markets.
Two technical differences are worth noting.
Moisture content.
HPMC shells generally contain less moisture than gelatin shells, which is more favorable for humidity-sensitive fills. Some botanical extracts, probiotics, combined vitamin-mineral blends, and highly hygroscopic water-soluble ingredients show more controllable stability inside low-moisture shells. Plant-based shells are also more chemically inert, reducing the risk of cross-linking with the fill.
Transparency.
Fully transparent plant-based shells allow the contents to be seen. This has real value in product communication, as the examples below will show.
4. Line two: what goes inside the shell is changing
Capsule fills used to be mostly powders and granules. Now there is another category: liquids.
Liquid-filled hard capsules, or LFHCs, are hard capsules filled with oils, oil suspensions, or molten matrices. This turns the capsule from a “powder container” into an “oil container,” and introduces two new process thresholds.
Threshold one: the fill must be a non-aqueous system.
Both gelatin and HPMC shells are hydrophilic. When they contact water, they can absorb moisture, soften, swell, or even dissolve. So liquid-filled capsules can only contain vegetable oils, algal oils, oil suspensions, or molten matrices—materials without free water. Aqueous solutions, water extracts, and water-containing emulsions are generally unsuitable for direct filling. Water also brings microbial risk and can accelerate hydrolysis of some active ingredients.
What about water-soluble ingredients? They can be converted into solid forms—pellets, granules, or powders—and then suspended in the oil phase. When they enter the capsule, they are dry particles, not an aqueous solution. This boundary looks like a limitation, but it actually defines the technical threshold for liquid-filled formats: what can be filled depends on how the material is made into a water-free, stable form.
Threshold two: sealing.
After the cap and body are joined, the capsule must be sealed, often through band sealing, to prevent leakage. Powders do not flow like liquids, but oil does. If the seal is inadequate, the capsule can leak, stick together, or allow oxidation. Fill precision, shell-fill compatibility, and seal quality are all essential.
Once these thresholds are met, the design space opens up:
- Lipid-soluble ingredients such as vitamin D3, K2, coenzyme Q10, carotenoids, and algal oil can be dissolved directly in the oil phase and delivered with the oil.
- Water-soluble ingredients can be made into pellets suspended in oil, creating a beadlets-in-oil structure. Minerals are separated by their own pellet coating, so they do not catalyze oil oxidation. Oil stays in the oil phase; minerals stay inside their shells. They share the same capsule without directly contacting each other.
- Pellets can be further coated to control release location, such as enteric release, so the ingredient is released in the intestine.
When plant-based HPMC shells are combined with liquid filling, the low moisture content adds another layer of stability. This is why plant-based capsules and liquid-fill technology are often discussed together in industry practice.
5. Line three: the structure itself is being designed
The third approach goes further: the capsule is treated as a structural component.
“Capsule-in-capsule” places an inner unit inside an outer capsule. The inner unit can be a tablet, pellets, granules, or even another capsule. The logic is similar to beadlets-in-oil: compatibility problems at the formulation level are converted into structural problems. Ingredients that interfere with each other are physically separated, and ingredients that must release in sequence are controlled by structure.
One often-overlooked fact is that capsule-in-capsule systems can also use plant-based shells. Plant-based capsules are not just “powder shells.” They can also be used in nested-capsule and liquid-fill structures. For upstream material suppliers, this represents a real product opportunity—not all innovation happens inside the formula; some of it happens between shells.
6. Two industry examples: how capsules enter product definition
After outlining the technology paths, here are two brands that have turned them into product-level advantages.
Wholier is a North American vegan nutrition brand serving plant-based consumers. Its flagship product, Multi for Plant-Based People, covers several nutrients that are commonly low in plant-based diets: methylcobalamin B12, algal-oil DHA/EPA, lichen-sourced D3, fermented chickpea K2, ferrous bisglycinate, kelp iodine, selenomethionine, and zinc citrate. The format is a fully transparent plant-based shell with a beadlets-in-oil structure: lipid-soluble ingredients are dissolved in algal oil, while water-soluble minerals are suspended as pellets. The pellets are coated for intestinal release. The product page lists two capsules per day, 60 capsules per bottle, a price of $39.99, a subscription price starting at $30.60, and a recent monthly sales indicator of 10,000+ units.
Ritual is a U.S. DTC brand taking a different route. Its product expression is subtractive: it first identifies nutrients commonly missing from daily diets, then covers them in a single capsule, with its supply chain publicly traceable on its website under the Made Traceable program. The format is also a high-transparency plant-based shell with a liquid-fill structure. Each bottle includes a food-grade mint or citrus scent strip, so the first sensory cue upon opening is aroma. According to public reports, the brand’s annual revenue has exceeded $250 million, and its disclosed subscriber repurchase rate is about 92%.
The two brands follow different product logics, but they reach the same conclusion about capsules: the dosage form is not just a container; it participates in product definition. The transparent shell makes “beadlets in oil” a visible story. The liquid-fill structure allows otherwise incompatible raw materials to coexist in one capsule. The pellets determine where release occurs. Together, these elements become the product’s selling point, its communication asset, and its reason for repeat purchase.
7. “Redesign” happens where it cannot be seen
Return to the 55.72% at the beginning. Capsules account for more than half of China’s health-food filings and roughly a quarter of the U.S. market. That share comes from stability, maturity, and scalability, and it is unlikely to change in the short term.
Beneath that share, however, the internal structure is diverging: gelatin shells versus plant-based shells; powder fills versus liquid fills; single-chamber versus nested structures; immediate release versus enteric or sustained release. Two capsules that look the same on the outside may contain completely different technical solutions.
That is what “redesign” means here. It does not change what a capsule looks like. It changes what the shell is made of, what form of material the shell can carry, and how shells are combined. None of these are appearance issues. They are materials and process issues.
The real threshold for dosage-form innovation often lies not in the outer shape, but in the invisible layer of structure beneath it.
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