When Did Semaglutide Come Out — and What's Changed Since?

Why the launch date matters for the decision you're making now

If you're researching semaglutide because you're weighing up whether to start treatment, the history isn't just background, it tells you something about how thoroughly this medicine has been studied. Semaglutide has been in clinical use for nearly a decade across its diabetes and weight-management forms. That's a substantial body of real-world data sitting behind it, which is one reason regulators and clinicians discuss it with a degree of confidence that newer compounds don't yet have.

The practical question is which form of semaglutide is relevant to you, and whether the approvals that have accumulated since 2017 match your situation. The timeline below walks through each step. If you want to read about when Wegovy specifically launched in the UK, that page goes into more detail on the commercial rollout alongside the regulatory dates.

One thing to hold in mind as you read: the approval history is not the same as your personal eligibility. A clinician reviews that separately, weighing your BMI, health history and any current medicines.

From diabetes drug to weight-loss medicine: the semaglutide approval sequence

Semaglutide entered the market in 2017 as Ozempic, a once-weekly injection for type 2 diabetes. Novo Nordisk's trials showed it reduced blood sugar effectively, but researchers also noticed meaningful weight loss as a secondary finding, which prompted dedicated weight-management trials.

Those trials, published in the New England Journal of Medicine in 2021 (STEP 1), showed an average body-weight reduction of around 15% over 68 weeks at the 2.4 mg dose. The MHRA subsequently granted UK marketing authorisation for Wegovy (the 2.4 mg weekly injection branded specifically for weight management) and the Wegovy injection page covers the full clinical detail.

NICE recommended semaglutide (TA875) for NHS use in March 2023, but with important restrictions: a maximum treatment duration of two years, use within a specialist weight management service, and specific BMI thresholds. The NHS rollout has been gradual because of those conditions and significant demand.

Then came the dose escalation. In January 2026 the MHRA approved a 7.2 mg maintenance dose (trialled to push average weight loss closer to 20%) and on 14 April 2026 a dedicated single-dose 7.2 mg pen was approved, making weekly administration simpler. Our page on Wegovy's UK availability explains the supply picture around the higher dose.

The most recent addition is significant. On 11 June 2026 the MHRA approved Wegovy tablets, making semaglutide the first oral GLP-1 medicine licensed in the UK for weight management, the UK was first in Europe to grant that authorisation. Starting at 1.5 mg daily and titrating to 25 mg, the tablet keeps in a handbag or gym bag without refrigeration, which changes the logistics of treatment meaningfully for some people. If you're deciding between injection and tablet, our semaglutide overview compares both forms.

What the NHS access picture looks like after these approvals

Knowing when semaglutide came out is partly useful because it explains the current NHS access gap. The injection has been recommended since 2023, but NHS England routes it through specialist weight management services with multidisciplinary support, and waiting lists in many areas remain long. Details on how quickly Wegovy works once started are a separate question from how quickly you can access it on the NHS, and the two are easily conflated.

The oral tablet is not yet assessed by NICE, so it is not available on the NHS. Private prescription is the only current route. According to NICE's guidance on semaglutide (TA875), NHS eligibility requires a BMI of at least 35 alongside at least one weight-related comorbidity and access to a qualifying specialist service, thresholds are 2.5 kg/m² lower for certain ethnic backgrounds under UK guidance. Private routes through a regulated pharmacy don't carry the two-year NHS limit or the specialist-service requirement, though clinical assessment is still required before any prescription is issued.

For a clearer sense of what private treatment currently costs, the Wegovy price page gives the relevant context without the noise.

Semaglutide's newer indications, and what they don't change for weight management

Since the weight-management approval, semaglutide has picked up two further UK licences. A cardiovascular risk-reduction indication allows use in certain adults at high cardiac risk. Then, on 3 July 2026, the MHRA granted conditional approval for semaglutide in MASH, a form of fatty liver disease involving moderate-to-advanced fibrosis. That makes semaglutide one of very few medicines with a liver-disease indication in the UK.

These newer indications don't change the weight-management eligibility rules, but they matter if you have one of those conditions and are wondering how the clinical conversation might go. A prescriber can only authorise semaglutide for weight management on the basis of the weight-management licence; any overlap with other conditions is part of what a full clinical assessment weighs up. The guidance on when to take semaglutide and injection timing are practical questions that come after that assessment, not before. If any side effects concern you, sleep-related effects of semaglutide is one of the more frequently asked topics on our site.

The NHS medicines page for semaglutide is the most reliable plain-English source for what to expect once you're on treatment. If you'd like a prescriber to review whether semaglutide is appropriate for you, you can speak to our prescribers through a free consultation, reviewed the same day by a GPhC-registered clinician, not software.