Wegovy Dosage UK 2026: Every Dose and the New 7.2mg

Almost everyone who starts Wegovy asks the same question within the first fortnight: when do I move up, and how high does this go? Fair enough. You're injecting something once a week, the box says 0.25mg, and somewhere in the back of your mind you know that number is supposed to climb. The Wegovy dosage schedule is fixed, published, and easier to follow than most people expect.

It's also slower than most people expect. The steps are spaced to let your gut catch up with the medicine, and in January 2026 the MHRA added a new rung at the top that changed what "maximum dose" means in the UK.

The full Wegovy dosage schedule

Wegovy (semaglutide) is a once-weekly injection. Every four weeks, the dose goes up one step, until you reach a maintenance dose you stay on long-term. The schedule below comes directly from the Wegovy Summary of Product Characteristics, which is the regulatory document your prescriber works from.

So it takes a minimum of 16 weeks to reach 2.4mg. Four months. That surprises people who expected results by Christmas after starting in November.

Why the four-week steps aren't arbitrary

The titration exists for one reason: your stomach. Semaglutide slows gastric emptying, and if you go from nothing to a therapeutic dose overnight, the nausea can be rough enough that you stop taking it.

The trial data shows how common those effects are even with a careful build. Across 68 weeks on the 2.4mg dose, nausea affected 43.9% of patients compared with 16.1% on placebo, diarrhoea 29.7% against 15.9%, and vomiting 24.5% against 6.3%. Most of it was mild to moderate, most of it was short-lived, and most of it clustered in the weeks right after a dose increase. So if you feel rough in week 5 or week 9, you're usually feeling the step rather than the drug, and it tends to settle within a fortnight.

What the new 7.2mg Wegovy dose actually involves

On 6 January 2026 the MHRA approved a maximum Wegovy dose of 7.2mg per week. It's a meaningful change, but it comes with tighter boundaries than the headlines suggested.

The dose is licensed for weight management in adults with obesity only, meaning a BMI of 30kg/m² or higher. If you're using Wegovy at a BMI below 30, or you're taking it to reduce cardiovascular risk rather than for weight management, 7.2mg isn't licensed for you. You also can't jump to it. You need at least four weeks at 2.4mg first, which puts the earliest possible switch at week 21.

The practical side is less tidy than a single injection. Depending on the device supplied, 7.2mg is given either as one 7.2mg injection or as three separate 2.4mg injections taken one after another on the same day. Where three injections are needed, the MHRA advises keeping them in the same body area but at least 5cm apart, with a fresh needle for each one. Each 2.4mg pen holds four doses, so you'll want to check you have enough pens in the fridge before you start injecting rather than halfway through.

How much more weight loss does 7.2mg give you?

The STEP UP trial ran for 72 weeks and randomised 1,407 adults with obesity to 7.2mg, 2.4mg, or placebo. The results were published in The Lancet Diabetes & Endocrinology and appear in full in the SmPC.

The gap between the two active doses is narrower than the headlines suggested. Three percentage points of average weight loss. For someone starting at 110kg, that works out at roughly 3kg more over eighteen months. Where the higher dose pulls away is at the far end of the range: twice as many people crossed the 25% threshold.

The trade-off that comes with the higher dose

Higher doses bring more side effects, and one in particular showed up in STEP UP that barely registers at 2.4mg.

Hair shedding also rose, from 2.5% on 2.4mg to 5.3% on 7.2mg, and it was reported more often in people who lost 20% or more of their body weight. That points at the weight loss itself as much as the medicine.

When to increase your Wegovy dose, and when to hold

The default is every four weeks. The default is not the rule.

The SmPC is explicit that where gastrointestinal symptoms are significant, your prescriber should consider delaying the increase, or dropping back to the previous dose until things improve. Holding at 1mg for eight weeks instead of four is not failure. It's the schedule working as designed.

Reasons to hold at your current dose rather than step up:

• You're still being sick, or eating almost nothing, in week three or four of your current dose
• Your appetite is already well controlled and the weight is coming off steadily
• You've had a rough patch with dehydration
• You're heading into a fortnight where feeling unwell would be badly timed, like a holiday or a work deadline
• You've just changed something else that affects your stomach, such as a new medication

The second reason on that list is the one people argue with. There's a widespread assumption that more milligrams always means more weight loss, so people push to the top of the ladder even when the dose they're on is doing its job. If 1.7mg has quietened the food noise and the scale is moving, there's no prize for reaching 2.4mg faster.

Can you stay on a lower dose of Wegovy?

Often, yes. The SmPC frames 2.4mg as the target maintenance dose, and for adolescents it says the dose should be increased until 2.4mg or the maximum tolerated dose is reached. That phrase matters. Tolerability is part of the target, not an obstacle to it.

What your prescriber will want to see is progress. There's a checkpoint written into the licence: if you haven't lost at least 5% of your starting body weight after six months of treatment, you and your clinician need to decide together whether continuing makes sense. That's a review point, not a threat, and it's the same logic the NHS applies to weight management pathways.

Reading your pen: colours, not clicks

A lot of people arrive at this question from Mounjaro forums, where counting clicks on a KwikPen is a whole subculture. Wegovy doesn't work that way.

Each Wegovy strength comes as its own pen, pre-set to deliver that dose. There's no dial to turn and no clicks to count, because you can't select a dose on the device. When you move up a step, you move to a different pen. The pens are colour-coded to help you tell them apart at a glance, but colours change between presentations and countries, so check the strength printed on the label and carton every time rather than trusting the colour.

Which also answers a question that comes up a lot: no, you shouldn't split a Wegovy dose or try to stretch a pen across two weeks to save money. Raise cost with your provider instead. Our breakdown of what Wegovy costs in the UK shows where the differences between services sit.

What to do if you miss a Wegovy dose

This is the most searched practical question about Wegovy dosing, and the answer is refreshingly clear-cut.

If it has been five days or less since your scheduled injection, take it as soon as you remember, then take your next dose seven days after that on your usual day.

If it has been more than five days, skip the missed dose entirely. Take your next one on your normal scheduled day. Never double up to catch up.

If you've missed several weeks in a row, don't restart where you left off. The SmPC advises considering a reduced starting dose for re-initiation, because tolerance to semaglutide fades when you stop, and picking straight back up at 2.4mg after a month off can feel like starting from scratch with none of the gentleness.

Changing your injection day

You can move your injection day as long as at least three days have passed since your last dose. Pick the new day, inject, then carry on weekly from there. Most people who do this are shifting away from a day where feeling queasy is inconvenient. Wednesday injections mean the roughest 48 hours land midweek rather than eating your weekend.

How Wegovy dosing compares with Mounjaro

Both are once-weekly injections that titrate over months, but the shape of the two schedules differs. Wegovy has five steps to its standard maintenance dose and a single optional step above it. Mounjaro climbs in 2.5mg increments and has more maintenance options along the way, which gives a bit more room to settle at a dose that suits you. Our Mounjaro dosage guide lays that schedule out in full.

If you're weighing up the two medications rather than just the schedules, the comparison of Wegovy and Mounjaro covers efficacy, side effects and cost side by side. And if you're already on Mounjaro and considering a change, switching from Mounjaro to Wegovy walks through how the dose translates, because the two aren't interchangeable milligram for milligram.

One more distinction, since it trips people up at the pharmacy counter: Wegovy and Ozempic contain the same active ingredient at different licensed doses and for different conditions, which is why Wegovy and Ozempic aren't interchangeable.

How long do you stay on your maintenance dose?

Wegovy is licensed for long-term use. Once you reach 2.4mg, or 7.2mg if you and your prescriber go that route, that's the dose you stay on for as long as it keeps helping and you can tolerate it.

Obesity is treated as a chronic condition, and semaglutide manages it rather than curing it. Appetite regulation reverts when treatment stops, so the maintenance dose isn't a finish line. Understanding how GLP-1 medications work makes that much easier to accept early on than to hear about a year in.

If you're weighing whether NHS access might be possible for you rather than paying privately, our guide to NHS eligibility for weight loss injections sets out the criteria. And if injections aren't for you at all, oral semaglutide is now a real option, covered in our piece on GLP-1 tablets in the UK.

Wherever you land on dose, technique matters more than most people expect. Rotating sites properly reduces irritation and keeps absorption consistent, which our guide on where to inject Wegovy covers step by step.

Do report anything that worries you. Side effects can be logged directly with the MHRA Yellow Card scheme as well as raised with your prescriber, and that reporting is part of how the safety picture for these medicines keeps improving.

This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute medical advice. Always consult with a qualified healthcare professional before starting any treatment.