Learn · Comparisons

Iboga vs psilocybin, ketamine and MDMA

People shopping for a psychedelic treatment usually compare four medicines. They are not interchangeable: they last from forty minutes to a full day, they act on different systems, and they are good for different things. Here is the comparison, without a favorite.

8-minute read · Updated September 2026 · Reviewed by the Bwiti Life medical team

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At a glance

  • Iboga. Twelve hours or more. Lucid, introspective, a review of one's own life. Interrupts opioid withdrawal and resets craving. Cardiac screening essential. Unregulated in Mexico, Schedule I in the US.
  • Psilocybin. Four to six hours. Visual, emotional, often mystical; loosens rigid patterns. Studied for depression, end-of-life anxiety, alcohol use. Physically mild; psychiatric screening matters. Decriminalized or regulated in a few places, illegal in most.
  • Ketamine. Forty minutes to two hours. Dissociative, dreamlike, short. Rapid antidepressant effect that fades in days to weeks without repetition. Legal as a medicine almost everywhere; clinics in most US cities.
  • MDMA. Four to six hours. Warmth, openness, reduced fear; not classically psychedelic. Studied for PTSD in therapy sessions. Cardiac and temperature risks; Schedule I in the US, with regulatory review ongoing.

Duration and depth

Ketamine is a session; psilocybin and MDMA are an afternoon; iboga is a night and the day after. The length is not incidental. Iboga's long, lucid review is what guests describe as the work, and its long-lived metabolite keeps acting for weeks. Shorter medicines are repeated to build an effect; iboga is usually taken once or a few times in a life.

  • Iboga

    Once, or a few times in a life. Noribogaine acts for weeks (outer ring).

  • Psilocybin

    Repeated to build an effect.

  • MDMA

    In therapy sessions, repeated.

  • Ketamine

    A session; effect fades in days to weeks.

Each ring is one 24-hour day. Ketamine is a session, psilocybin and MDMA an afternoon, iboga a night and the day after.

What each is best at

For opioid or alcohol dependence, iboga is the only one of the four with a direct effect on withdrawal and craving. For trauma with a strong fear component, MDMA-assisted therapy has the best trial data, and iboga's life review offers a different route to the same material. For depression, ketamine acts fastest and fades fastest, psilocybin has strong trial results with lasting effects for some, and iboga is described by guests as a reset with a long tail, with less formal research. For burnout, grief and life direction, psilocybin and iboga are the two people choose between; the answer is usually the frame: a few hours of vision, or a night of review.

Safety

Ketamine and psilocybin are physically the safest, with the risks mostly psychiatric and situational. MDMA carries cardiovascular and overheating risks and interacts with SSRIs. Iboga carries the most serious physical risk, cardiac, and therefore the heaviest screening: an ECG, a blood panel, a medication review, and a physician in the room. It is the medicine that most needs a medical frame, which is why we built one around it. See the Safety page.

Ketamine is a prescription medicine nearly everywhere. Psilocybin is regulated for therapy in Oregon and Colorado, decriminalized in a few cities, and legal in the Netherlands as truffles. MDMA remains Schedule I in the US after the 2024 FDA decision, with further trials required. Iboga and ibogaine are unregulated in Mexico and Gabon, Schedule I in the US. See Is iboga legal?

Combining them

Not close together. Each needs the body clear of the other and its own integration, and SSRIs and other medications interact differently with each. Many people work with more than one medicine over years, for different questions. Tell the physician about any recent experience during screening.

Questions people ask

Is iboga stronger than psilocybin?

Longer, heavier on the body and less visual. Stronger is not the word; it is a different kind of experience, closer to a review than a trip.

I have done ketamine therapy. Will iboga feel similar?

Only in the dissociation of the body. Ketamine is short and dreamlike; iboga is long, lucid and autobiographical. Guests with ketamine experience are often surprised by how much they remember.

Which is best for PTSD?

MDMA has the strongest trial data in therapy settings; ibogaine showed large effects in the 2024 Stanford veterans study; iboga in ceremony adds a container and days of processing. Ask which frame you want, and what else you are carrying: dependence tips the balance toward iboga.

Can I take iboga if I take psilocybin regularly?

Stop several weeks before and tell the physician. Regular psilocybin use is not a contraindication in itself, but the screening needs the full picture.