In Depth Baby Product Reviews Led by a Pediatrician
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Searching for a tasty multivitamin for your children? We hear you, us too! We researched more than 20 potential options to find the best vitamins available before purchasing 8 impressive contenders for testing. We performed side-by-side testing of each vitamin for taste, quality, other benefit claims, and formulations for special diets to provide you with the detailed information you need to find the best vitamin for your kids and needs. Read on to learn more about these competitors.
The MaryRuth's Vegan Kids Multivitamin Gummies are vegan-friendly multiple vitamins that taste as good as they smell. These vitamins require a 2-per-day dose and are yellow and orangeish in color. The vitamins aren't sticky, are easy to dispense, and never stick together. Our kid testers enjoyed the taste and remarked how much they were like candy. We like how easy the bottle is to use, that they didn't clump together, and that the kids took the vitamins without fighting. One bottle should last a single child for a month if taken daily. These vitamins have organic ingredients that are non-GMO and sugar-free.
MaryRuth's are sort of hard and not as chewy as a traditional gummy. This feature means the texture is strange if you expect a gummy type of candy. If a traditional gummy is what your kids crave, the L'il Critters Gummy Vites is softer and virtually indistinguishable from regular gummy bears. However, we feel confident kids will quickly get used to the texture once after a handful of doses. Overall, we love this high-quality vitamin, and our kid testers indicate it is their favorite of the group.
Testers love the Mary Ruth's taste and texture making it a winning combination.
The L'il Critters Gummy Vites is a budget-friendly vitamin that comes in a bottle of 190 gummies, which would last a single child about 90 days at the recommended dose of 2 a day. These vitamins smell like fruit and have a very gummy texture, at times sticking together in the way gummy candy does. Kids liked the texture and taste of these vitamins, remarking they could eat the whole bottle (keep them out of the reach of children).
The gummy texture makes these vitamins sticky, which can lead to the clumping of the vitamins with a need to over-handle them to pick them apart. We recommend washing your hands before dispensing the vitamins to avoid passing germs from your hands to the clump of vitamins. Alternatively, you could try using a utensil to release them from the pack. If you want to avoid stickiness, the MaryRuth's Vegan Kids Multivitamin Gummies doesn't clump in the bottle, but the texture wasn't as pleasing to testers. Overall, the price of L'il Critters can't be beaten, especially given how long it will last. We think these tasty vitamins are an excellent choice for multiple children and anyone struggling to get vitamin compliance from little ones.
L'il Critters is a budget-friendly fan favorite with tot testers in our tests.
The MAV Multivitamins for Kids Gummies are well-formed gumdrops that aren't sticky. The drops are smooth with no coating, and they smell like candy. They are marketed as non-GMO, which many parents favor. Kid testers enjoyed the test, and one tester remarked he'd like to eat the whole bottle. These vitamins have a 2-a-day dose, so an average bottle should last one child 45 days.
These vitamins are somewhat firm and have an odd texture that is not gummy-like as you'd expect. However, kid testers were not discouraged by their consistency and felt the taste was more important than the texture. If your little ones want more of a gummy feeling, then the L'il Critters Gummy Vites are the better pick, despite getting stuck together in the bottle. Overall, the MAV vitamin offers a lot for non-GMO parents to love, with a taste kids can't resist.
The MAV has a good taste but an unexpected texture that while not bad, was surprising for some testers.
The SmartyPants Organic with Probiotics is a multivitamin that includes probiotics. They have a strong fruit smell and are a flat dot shape that is well-formed and didn't stick together or clump in our bottle during testing. The taste isn't the best in the group, but testers at least ate the daily dose without complaining. One bottle will last one child 30 days following the four gummy-a-day dose.
These vitamins have a strange texture, and at least one tester thought they tasted like flavored medicine. Also, if your child doesn't like them, four could be hard to gain compliance with every day. The L'il Critters Gummy Vites might be a more traditional option that offers a gummy texture with better taste and fewer gummies per dose. However, if you want a vitamin that includes a daily dose of probiotics, this could be the all-in-one option you are looking for.
If you are looking for added probiotics, this Smarty Pants option could be the one for you.
The SmartyPants Daily Gummy Multivitamin with Omegas is a sugar-covered gummy drop in multiple colors. The gummies are well-formed and didn't stick together in our bottle. The dose is 4-a-day, and the bottle should last one child for about 30 days. Testers thought the taste was okay and readily ate them during testing but would choose other vitamins over this one if they had the chance. This vitamin is non-GMO and includes Omega 3s.
This is a 4-a-day dose, which seems like a lot and could be hard to meet if your child doesn't like the taste. Also, our testers felt the texture was strange and didn't care for the granulated coating. The L'il Critters Gummy Vites and the MaryRuth's Vegan Kids Multivitamin Gummies were both better received than these SmartyPants. While this vitamin might prevent the need for an additional Omega-specific supplement, we think the high number per dose and questionable taste response from testers means compliance could be an issue. However, if you want something with Omega 3s and avoid stocking more than one kind of vitamin, this might be your go-to choice.
The rolled sugar granules of the Smarty Pants Omega left some testers wanting.
The L'il Critters Paw Patrol are the L'il Critters vitamins in shapes that Paw Patrol fans will love (isn't that every toddler?). The vitamins have a traditional gummy texture and are somewhat sticky, like a gummy bear. Most kids' dose is 2 daily, and our taste testers enjoyed the flavor. With a bottle capacity of 60, you'll get one month of use out of this option for one child.
This bottle is smaller than the L'il Critters Gummy Vites, making it better for a single child as they aren't as budget-friendly. The L'il Critters Gummy Vites is a 90+ day supply for one child at half the price. The Paw Patrol vitamins stick together somewhat and require a certain amount of manipulation to pry them apart, which means excessive touching of the clump. If clumping is annoying to you, the MaryRuth's Vegan Kids Multivitamin Gummies didn't suffer this issue. Despite the over-handling required, we like the Paw Patrol vitamins, and our kid testers easily consumed them without so much as a wrinkled nose, making them a great choice for something fun and super tasty, or perhaps the finicky Paw Patrol fan.
Paw Patrol L'il Critters is a great way to engage toddlers in the vitamin process.
The Garden of Life - mykind Organics Kids Gummy is a certified organic, non-GMO, vegan multivitamin for kids. They are gluten, soy, and dairy-free and have a defined shape in our tests.
These vitamins have a 4-gummy dose, which is a lot compared to the 2-a-day average. It could be more than you can convince some little ones to consume. They are also somewhat sticky, which resulted in clumping and dispensing challenges that got worse over time. They have a strange crumbly texture, less like a gummy and more like Playdoh, which was off-putting to more than one tester. Our testers preferred the gummy texture and taste of the L'il Critters Gummy Vites. Also, when we opened our Garden of Life bottle, we caught the scent of spoiled fruit, and one tester refused to try the vitamin based on its smell alone. Our other child tester said there were "too many different fruit flavors" in one vitamin, and he spit it out after chewing it. Overall, this vitamin has a strange look, feel, odor, and taste, and we think most children will take a hard pass on this option, making it unlikely you'll get kids to eat four a day.
Testers didn't care for the taste of the Mykind vitamins.
The Zarbee's Children's Multivitamin + Immune Gummies were strange, with a powerful odor when we first opened the bottle. These vitamins look rolled in sugar and are a peculiar dark red or brown color with a Bee shape. The individual vitamins are separated but stuck together over time in a single clump, making them hard to dispense. The directions require a dose of two at a time. Our kid testers didn't like the flavor of this particular vitamin. Our first tester only ate one and refused to eat the second. Our second tester smelled the vitamin and tried to eat one but spit it out before swallowing. Both indicated they felt the taste was terrible and wouldn't eat them going forward. Our child testers put this option at the bottom of the ranking for taste. Pretty much any other option was preffered by our testers, but the L'il Critters Gummy Vites was a standout favorite over time. Regardless of the positive attributes the Zarbee vitamins may offer, it is not possible for us to recommend a product that tasted so yucky that our kid testers refused to eat them.
Zarbees were a miss for taste, smell, and texture with all testers in our testing agreeing they were a disappointment.
Credit: BabyGearLab Staff
Finding vitamins little ones will reliably take without complaint is harder for some kids than you'd think.
Credit: BabyGearLab Staff
Why You Should Trust Us
BabyGearLab has been testing gear for babies, kids, and pregnancy hands-on since 2012. We purchase and test products to find the best available options for our readers. For the vitamin review, we chose products based on our research of popular products and those that offer special formulations, like being gluten-free or free of GMOs.
Wendy Schmitz, Senior Review Editor and mother of 2 has been with the lab since 2014. She has a degree in Biology, was a certified Personal Trainer, and has researched vitamin efficacy and quality. We tested the vitamins in this review side-by-side for taste, quality, and other additives to find the right vitamin for different needs and goals.
We had multiple child testers partake of each vitamin in this review over several months to determine our winners.
Credit: BabyGearLab Staff
Analysis and Test Results
We purchased top multivitamins for kids in this review. We focused on quality, taste, and finding options for various special needs, from gluten and peanut-free options to vegan and more.
Disclaimer
We are not medical professionals and are not making vitamin suggestions based on a specific diet or vitamin content. You should discuss all supplements, including vitamins, with your pediatrician before giving them to your child. Our review and award winners are based on the taste and quality of the products, not on any implied or assumed health or medical benefit claims of any specific product. Our goal is to help you find a palatable vitamin choice your children will love based on your pediatrician's recommendations for supplementation.
If your child doesn't like the taste of your vitamins, it could be a daily struggle to gain compliance.
Credit: BabyGearLab Staff
Taste
Taste is what matters when considering children's vitamins. It doesn't matter how high the quality or pure the ingredients are if your child refuses to eat it; the rest is moot. We tested each option in this review with real kids, some who will eat just about anything and others who refuse to eat almost everything. For the most part, testers agreed unanimously on which selections were tasty and terrible, with at least one vitamin described as "poop" and "disgusting."
In our tests, kids preferred the taste of the MAV Nutrition, L'il Critters, and Mary Ruth's over the competitors. They each remarked that these vitamins tasted so good they'd eat the entire bottle, and the Mary Ruth's were given the highest seal of approval with a "they taste like candy!" description. This exuberance reminds us that you might need to keep vitamins out of the reach of children if they taste too good or have a discussion with older kids on why you can't eat them like candy.
The worst-tasting vitamins in our tests are, hands down, the Zarbees, which one tester spit out and another said tasted like poo. Our adult tester felt the texture was strange, and the vitamins looked sort of like blood clots. We couldn't get any child to consume the full dose during testing. Also earning below average rank for taste is the MyKind vitamins, which smell like rotten fruit (in our opinion) and didn't taste much better (according to testers). The remainder of the vitamins we tested are middle of the road, and even if they didn't get a thumbs up from testers, they at least didn't refuse to eat them.
Some of the vitamins, like the Zarbees shown here, had less uniformity than the competition and a strange texture kids didn't like.
Credit: BabyGearLab Staff
Quality
Quality might be viewed as a subjective metric as we did not test the content or ingredients or even the vitamin level claims of the products. We based our assessment of quality on how the vitamins presented in the bottle we purchased. We looked for consistency between the vitamins themselves in shape and size, texture, how well-formed they were, if they clumped, and if they smelled "off."
The Zarbee vitamins were all sort of different in shape, and we wonder if this isn't due to the crumbling texture or the granulated coating. Still, no matter the reason, it seems like a poor design or quality, in our opinion. They also clumped together in the bottle we purchased, making dispensing challenging at best. We had to touch almost every vitamin with each dispensing to peel off the dosage amount. This practice is not very sanitary and could impact longevity. The My Kind vitamins struggled to be the same size and shape. Once again, the crumbly texture could be the possible culprit. It makes us wonder how consistent the vitamin doses are if the vitamins themselves vary significantly in size. The L'il Critters were all the same size and shape, but they tended to stick and clump together as they were moist and sticky. This clumping can become more of an issue as the bottle ages and the gummies start to stick together at the bottom. It is hard to say if this is a quality issue or an intentional design choice, but it makes dispensing the vitamins problematic, and we didn't have the same problem with every gummy brand. However, given the low price and our testers' thumbs up for taste, we think it could be worth the hassle for the L'il Critter brand.
Alternatively, the MAV vitamins were identical; these firm little bears were easy to dispense and consistent throughout the entire bottle. They were dry and felt somewhat hard, with no clumping of bears or sticking to the bottom of the bottle. The Mary Ruth's was also impressive in size, shape, color, and smell consistency. The SmartyPants products were consistent in our tests as well.
The L'il Critters vitamins clumped together regularly as the gummies were sticky, making it challenging to remove them from the bottle.
Credit: BabyGearLab Staff
Conclusion
Finding a palatable vitamin that your kids will consume willingly without a fuss can help support your child's nutritional goals. Choosing a vitamin shouldn't be a frustrating venture. Whether your child eats every vegetable on the planet or has a picky palate rivaling only that of a fine wine connoisseur, we believe there is a kids' vitamin in our group of test supplements for almost every child. No matter your goals or budget, there is an option for your family in our award winners and top-ranking options.
