The most popular proteins on the market have evolved to become technical nightmares for newcomers to navigate. Also, as I show below, even the most diligent shopper is thwarted in their attempts to compare and contrast like products due to the lack of standardization of the dreaded "Serving size". What is a serving size?. Well to advertisers it's anything they want it to be that lets them sell you the story they want. See how below they use it to create facts from fiction.
Protein best sellers per the Nutritional information on the packs.
Syntha 6 Protein Powder
Brand name / Protein per serving/ Serving size /Calories per serving/ Approx cost
Muscle Milk / 25g / 70g / 300 cals / /Lb
Muscle Milk light / 25g / 50g / 195 cals / /Lb
Elite Whey (USA) / 24g / 31g / 114 cals / /Lb
BSN Syntha 6 / 22g / 44g / 200 cals / .5/Lb
BSN Lean Dessert / 21g / 35g / 150 cals / /Lb
BSN True Mass / 46g / 145g / 630 cals / Lb
Monster Milk (USA) / 50g / 84g / 350 cals / /Lb
EAS Myoplex / 42g / 78g / 300 cals / /Lb
ISO 100 (Isolate) / 25g / 28g / 106 cals / /Lb
*Note the Approx cost in dollars per pound is subject to change, does not include postage, and is an average internet price, so they are not guaranteed but should be read as relative comparisons that were true at one point in time.
Looking at the data above it would appear reasonable to expect that BSN True mass and Monster Milk to have one of the highest protein contents... in fact the table below shows that True mass is actually the lowest, which to be fair is reflected in their price, and Monster Milk is in the mid-range. Also True mass boasts "630 calories per serving", yet has less calories weight for weight than Syntha 6. Lean Dessert is actually mid-range and only 5 calories less than the True Mass product! My advice it to take the scoop measure and throw it away and use cup sizes and the chart below along with the knowledge that you cannot absorb more than 30g protein per serving. 100g is about 3 scoops, so for True Mass you only need one scoop to get the 30g of protein not the three scoops they advise, the bonus is that it will last three times longer.
BTW the problem in reading label information has been solved in European countries by standardizing all foods label information to 100g. Any standard weight unit would do, however the additional nice thing about 100g is that it is 100 so 77g of protein for instance is also 77% protein, pretty cool eh! This allows any food substance to be measured and compared against any other food substance and easily understood by consumers.
Quality of Protein ranking (all normalized to 100g or about 3 scoops)
Brand name /Protein /Serving /Calories /*Approx cost
BSN True Mass / 32g / 100g / 434 cals / /Lb
Muscle Milk / 36g / 100g / 428 cals / /Lb
Muscle Milk light / 50g / 100g / 390 cals / /Lb
Elite Whey (USA) / 77g / 100g / 368 cals / /Lb
BSN Syntha 6 / 50g / 100g / 455 cals / .5/Lb
BSN Lean Dessert / 60g / 100g / 429cals / /Lb
Monster Milk (USA) / 60g / 100g / 417 cals / /Lb
EAS Myoplex / 54g / 100g / 385 cals / /Lb
ISO 100 (Isolate) / 90g / 100g / 378 cals / /Lb
*Note the Approx Cost in dollars per pound is subject to change, does not include postage, and is an average internet price, so they are not guaranteed but should be read as relative comparisons that were true at one point in time.
Other considerations.
Buying Creatine, glutamine and Branch Chain Amino Acids (BCAA's)separately allows one to optimize or tailor to their workout needs, for example you may want to take them at a higher frequency or at different times in the workout cycle than your protein shake.
The low quality cheap multivitamins in my opinion are a waste of time (pass out in your urine). I recommend separately sourcing a food based Men's / Woman's Multivitamin, which have far better absorption rates.
Another tip:
Your body can only absorb about 30 g protein in a meal so if you get the 42g-46g or 50g per serving proteins, decrease the serving quantity, saving money and making a "lighter" shake.
My Recommendations:
It depends who you are and what you want but personally but for obvious reasons I am currently an Elite Whey fan which I supplement with Creatine Ethyl Ester and a Mens food based multi-vitamin. After that BSN's Syntha 6 looks good, though I'm not certain from the packaging how much Enzyme, BCAA and L-Glutamine is in it. It also has the highest amount of calories per 100g in the list. If additional calories are a concern then it's Elite whey, then ISO 100, then surprisingly Myoplex, with Myoplex being cheaper and more convenient especially if going on a short trip, but ISO 100 has the highest purity level.
If it comes down to deciding between Monster milk or True mass I would go the Monster Milk route marginally on cost and higher L-Glutamine, BCAA, and even some creatine which you would need to source separately with True Mass, which is the cheaper option.
What about Muscle Milk?
With the largest market share, it is the third cheapest per pound, and if you can digest it without enzymes and like the flavor, and do not want L-Glutamine and extra BCAA's or creatine then all is well.
Flavor is a personal choice thing that is very important, personally I like plain vanilla as I can add whatever fruit flavor I like to it. I have also kept the non-dairy products off the analysis for now as none of the above is relevant if you are allergic to milk proteins.
Lastly, there are many other brands on the market and I'll be adding some of them to the above list as I get the data in. Also the maths to convert is fairly easy so just calculate for 100g and compare to the above. If you find a better product be sure to share it back with me.