Psilocybin · Psilocybe cubensis & cousins · dried fruiting bodies
Golden TeacherThe reference cultivar. Even, gentle ascent. The one to teach yourself with.
Body still calibrating.
Chew well. Hold sublingual. · peaks ~65min · 5h ride.
The Rule
Start low · go slow · journal often
Psilocybin is non-linear. Doubling the dose doesn't double the trip — it can triple the difficulty. Every body, every mushroom, every moon-phase comes in with its own variables. The number above is a map, not a guarantee. Eat lightly four hours before. Have a sober sitter for anything above a museum dose. Wait two weeks between sessions; tolerance returns slowly. And if it gets weird, breathe — the storm always passes.
Your dose window
mg psilocybin · recreational band
What it costs per session
Good
Golden Teacher · 3.5g
Better
Golden Teacher · 7g
Best
Golden Teacher · 28g
When it hits, and how long it lasts
subjective intensity over minutes
Where you land in the spore-cloud
mg psilocybin distribution
Your 9 mg sits around the 35th percentile — right where the music gets good.
Two-week tolerance rule
space sessions · 14 days minimum
Three steps · sixty seconds · honest math
A typical recreational dose is 10–15 mg of psilocybin, roughly 1.5–2.5 g of dried Golden Teacher. Microdoses sit at 1–3 mg; heroic doses above 25 mg.
For most cubensis strains around 0.7% potency: 0.1–0.4 g for a microdose, 1–2 g for a museum dose, 2.5–3.5 g for a full recreational trip, 4–5 g for a ceremonial journey.
Penis Envy runs ~2× the potency of Golden Teacher. Halve your usual dose. 1.5–2 g of PE feels closer to 3.5 g of GT. First-timers, skip this strain.
Use the Stamets stack — 4 days on, 3 days off — at 100–200 mg of dried mushroom (≈0.7–1.4 mg psilocybin). Keep a journal. Reset every 4–6 weeks.
Dried mushrooms: 4–6 hours, peaking around 60–90 minutes. Lemon tek: 3–4 hours, peaking in 25 minutes. Capsules: 5–6 hours with a slower onset.
Eat lightly four hours before. Have a sober sitter for anything above a museum dose. Wait two weeks between sessions for tolerance to reset. Avoid mixing with SSRIs, lithium, or tramadol.
Read once · refer back forever
Calibrated for an average 70 kg adult, ~0.7% psilocybin (Golden Teacher dried)
Dose isn't a number — it's a relationship between body weight, mushroom potency, your tolerance, and what you actually want from the day. The five tiers below describe intent, not a strict ladder. Most people never need to climb past Recreational.
| Tier | Dried (g) | Psilocybin (mg) | What it feels like |
|---|---|---|---|
| Microdose | 0.05–0.25 g | 0.5–2 mg | Sub-perceptual. Mood lift, focus, social ease. |
| Museum dose | 0.5–1.5 g | 3–10 mg | Light shimmer. Walks, music, conversation, colour. |
| Recreational | 1.5–3 g | 10–20 mg | Classic trip. Visuals, looping thought, time stretches. |
| Ceremonial | 3–5 g | 20–35 mg | Ego-soft. Ego-loud. Bring a sitter and an intention. |
| Heroic | 5 g+ | 35 mg+ | Terence McKenna's dose. Silent, dark, lying down. Not a party. |
And why mindset matters more
Psilocybin scales loosely with body weight — somewhere between 0.1 and 0.3 mg per kg for a recreational dose — but the variance between individuals is enormous. Two 70 kg adults at the same dose can have wildly different experiences. The calculator above adjusts for weight, but treats it as a starting point, not a verdict.
What actually moves the dial more than weight: tolerance (huge — see below), set (your headspace going in), setting (where you are, who's there, what's playing), and last meal (an empty stomach hits faster and harder).
The 14-day reset rule
Psilocybin tolerance builds fast and resets slowly. After a moderate trip, expect dramatically reduced effects within 24 hours and roughly 50% effect at the 5-day mark. Full reset takes about two weeks — there's no shortcut.
Cross-tolerance with LSD, DMT, mescaline and other classical psychedelics is real and substantial. If you tripped on acid Saturday, mushrooms Sunday will largely disappoint. Plan accordingly.
Stacking dose to "punch through" tolerance is a bad idea.
Doubling the dose on a tolerant brain doesn't double the effect — it scrambles the experience and increases nausea, anxiety, and bad-trip risk. Wait two weeks. Always.
Why "an eighth" means different things
Among Psilocybe cubensis alone, psilocybin content ranges from about 0.4% (Mazatapec on a low harvest) to 1.6% (Penis Envy at peak). That means 3.5 g of one strain can deliver four times the dose of 3.5 g of another. Volumetric eyeballing is how people end up white-knuckling on the kitchen floor.
Classic tier · ~0.6–0.8% psi
Golden Teacher. The honest, predictable workhorse. Best for first-timers and re-baselining your tolerance.
Spicy tier · ~0.9–1.1% psi
Albino Treasure Coast. Faster onset, more visual than standard cubensis. Drop your dose ~25% from your usual GT amount.
Heroic tier · ~1.3–1.5% psi
Penis Envy. Up to 2× a classic strain. Cut your dose in half. Not a beginner's strain.
Potency variance · same strain, different batch
Run-to-run variation runs ±15–20% even within a single cultivar. The calculator centres on lab-average figures — your result is always a starting estimate.
Same dose · different ride
How you take it shifts onset, peak, and duration — without changing the underlying milligrams. Pick the curve that matches your day.
| Method | Onset | Peak | Duration | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 🍄 Dried whole | 30–45 min | ~65 min | 4–6 hr | The default. Chew thoroughly, hold under tongue. |
| 🫖 Tea / decoct | 20–30 min | ~35 min | 3–4 hr | Easier on the stomach. Slightly less intense. |
| 🍋 Lemon tek | 10–20 min | ~25 min | 3–4 hr | Citric acid pre-converts psilocybin → psilocin. Faster, sharper, ~20% stronger feeling. |
| 💊 Capsules | 45–90 min | ~80 min | 5–6 hr | Slow ramp. Best for microdosing or anxious first-timers. |
| 🥔 Fresh truffle | 30–45 min | ~45 min | 4–5 hr | Use wet weight (~5× dried). Slightly mellower curve. |
Stamets · Fadiman · Nightcap
Stamets stack · 4 on / 3 off
Four days dosing (≈100–200 mg dried), three days off. Often paired with lion's mane and niacin. Run 4 weeks, rest 2.
Fadiman · 1 on / 2 off
Dose every third day. The original protocol. Easier to evaluate effects against the off-days as control.
Nightcap · 1 on / 1 off
Lower dose (≈50 mg) taken in the evening. Sleep, dreams, and next-morning lift. Less common, more anecdotal.
The 8-week limit
No protocol should run longer than 8 weeks without a 2–4 week reset. Tolerance, plus diminishing returns. A journal makes this obvious.
The non-pharmacological half of the experience
Set — your mindset going in. If you're anxious, exhausted, grieving, or unwell, postpone. Not because the trip will be "bad" but because the magnification effect of psilocybin doesn't discriminate. Whatever you bring, you'll see more of.
Setting — where you are physically. Indoors, with someone you trust, no obligations for the next 8 hours, phone on do-not-disturb, a curated playlist, water, blankets, an eye mask for the peak. Avoid: bars, parties for first trips, anywhere you'd be embarrassed to throw up.
The day around the dose — eat lightly 4 hours before. No coffee that morning (it potentiates anxiety). Schedule the next day off too — integration matters more than people think, and you'll likely sleep deeply and wake up tender.
When not to dose · seriously
It's almost always temporary
"Bad trips" are usually a phase of a difficult one, not the whole arc. Most pass within 30–60 minutes if you change the variable: move to a different room, change the music, drink water, lie down, talk to your sitter, splash your face with cold water.
The single most useful sentence to remember mid-trip: "This will end." Because it will. Psilocybin has a hard ceiling on duration — typically 6 hours, even at heroic doses. You will be back.
For severe acute panic, oral benzodiazepines (lorazepam, diazepam) reliably interrupt the experience. If you suspect this might be relevant, have one available before you start, prescribed appropriately.
The trip ends · the work begins
The dose is twenty minutes of measuring. The trip is six hours. Integration is the next six weeks. Without it, even profound experiences fade into novelty.
The simplest practice: write within 24 hours, re-read at one week, re-read at one month. The shroomDOSAGE Journal is built for exactly this — local-only, private, with patterns surfaced as you log more sessions.
Other useful integration practices: walks alone, talking it through with someone who's done their own work, body-based practices (yoga, breathwork, swimming), and — if it feels relevant — therapy with a clinician trained in psychedelic integration.
The shroomDOSAGE rule of thumb
When in doubt, dose lower. You can always take more next time. You cannot un-take what you took.
shroomDOSAGE operates only where psilocybin is legally permitted. This calculator is harm-reduction guidance, not medical advice. Adults 21+. Not for use during pregnancy, with SSRIs, or with a personal/family history of psychosis. Consult a clinician.
BUY
IT NOW:
≈ 5 sessions · A quarter. The household standard.