Buformin hydrochloride is a fine, white to slightly yellow, crystalline, odorless powder, with a weakly acidic bitter taste.

Its melting point is 174 to 177 °C, it is a strong base, and is freely soluble in water, methanol and ethanol, but insoluble in chloroform and ether.

[6] After oral administration of 50 mg of buformin to volunteers, almost 90% of the applied quantity was recovered in the urine; the rate constant of elimination was found to be 0.38 per hr.

Its use is contraindicated in diabetic coma, ketoacidosis, severe infection, trauma, other conditions where buformin is unlikely to control the hyperglycemia, renal or hepatic impairment, heart failure, recent myocardial infarct, dehydration, alcoholism, and conditions likely to predispose to lactic acidosis.

Buformin was withdrawn from the market in many countries due to an elevated risk of causing lactic acidosis (although not the US, where it was never sold).

[23][24][25][26][27] The anticancer property of these drugs is due to their ability to disrupt the Warburg effect and revert the cytosolic glycolysis characteristic of cancer cells to normal oxidation of pyruvate by the mitochondria.

[28] Metformin reduces liver glucose production in diabetics and disrupts the Warburg effect in cancer by AMPK activation and inhibition of the mTor pathway.

[36][37][38] Buformin is a metabolic antiviral that inhibits the mTOR pathway used by influenza [39] and Middle East respiratory syndrome-related coronavirus.