Acesulfame Potassium
PlainFoodSafe flags Acesulfame Potassium as a controversial additive. CSPI Chemical Cuisine rates it “Avoid.” It appears in 7,386 indexed US food products.
Source-backed answer
Acesulfame Potassium appears in 7,386 catalogued products. CSPI rates it “Avoid.” Its FDA SAFFA status is “Approved.” Those source labels describe the ingredient; they do not establish whether a particular product, dose, allergy, or diet is safe.
- 7,386
- catalogued products
- #156
- usage rank of 248,027
- 989
- named brands represented
- 71%
- average depth down ingredient lists
Catalog prevalence comes from Open Food Facts ingredient lists. FDA SAFFA and CSPI Chemical Cuisine labels are shown only when the source record contains them.
1/5 from FDA SAFFA + CSPI Chemical Cuisine
Where Acesulfame Potassium sits among catalogued ingredients
- Usage rank
- #156
- of 248,027 ingredients that appear in at least one catalogued product, tied with 1 other that also appear in exactly 7,390 products, listed in more products than 99.9% of them.
- Typical depth in an ingredient list
- 71%
- Of the way down the captured list, averaged across the 7,390 products listing it (mean slot 11.7). Acesulfame Potassium usually falls in the lower half of the list; this position does not measure its amount because source formatting, compound ingredients and labeling exceptions vary.
Derived by this site from the ingredient lists of every catalogued product (Open Food Facts), recomputed on each data refresh. 248,027 ingredients have at least one appearance and are ranked here. Usage and list position describe prevalence, not safety.
How common is Acesulfame Potassium vs other flagged additives?
Number of indexed products containing each of the most common flagged additives - Acesulfame Potassium highlighted.
How to use this page
Audit the co-occurring flags first
100% of the linked products contain at least one separately flagged ingredient, making co-occurrence the dominant follow-up question. That figure does not identify Acesulfame Potassium as the trigger. Open records such as 100 Calorie Quick Cooking Oatmeal Cinnamon Roll; 100 calories protein nutrition shake; 100% Gold Standard Whey and inspect which ingredient row carries the caution marker. The 54.4/100 product average is therefore a triage signal for this surrounding formulation set, not an ingredient verdict. Its 71% average label depth helps locate the term when checking the package.
Processing is unusually concentrated here: Group 4 accounts for 7363 of 7363 NOVA-tagged records. That describes the surrounding products, not the substance. For a useful comparison, hold category and processing level constant, then inspect which named component changes alongside the caution flag; otherwise the product mix will confound the ingredient question.
Next check: open the lowest-scoring linked formulation and locate the exact caution-marked component.
What else is usually in the same product as Acesulfame Potassium
Across the 7,386 products on this site that list Acesulfame Potassium, these flagged additives appear alongside it most often. The comparison column is how often each one appears across every product with a parsed ingredient list, so the two figures are measured over the same set. Sucralose shows up about 23.6x more often with Acesulfame Potassium than in the catalogue at large.
| Additive | Shared products | Share of Acesulfame Potassium products | Share of all products |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sucralose | 4,708 | 63.7% | 2.7% |
| Aspartame | 2,442 | 33.1% | 0.9% |
| Red 40 | 1,529 | 20.7% | 5.4% |
| Blue 1 | 1,141 | 15.4% | 4.2% |
| Caramel Coloring | 911 | 12.3% | 5.7% |
Co-occurrence describes what manufacturers formulate together. It is not a claim that these additives interact, and it carries no regulatory meaning. Counted over products with parsed ingredient lists; Open Food Facts, 2026-08-02.
Function
NON-NUTRITIVE SWEETENER
Safety Concerns
Controversial additive
Safety Profile at a Glance
| Source | Classification | Year |
|---|---|---|
| FDA SAFFA | Approved | 2024 |
| CSPI Chemical Cuisine | Avoid | 2024 |
| PlainFoodSafe Score | 1/5 | 2026 |
| Product footprint | 7,386 products | OpenFoodFacts |
FDA SAFFA database, CSPI Chemical Cuisine ratings, OpenFoodFacts product index. See methodology.
Products Containing Acesulfame Potassium
A sample of 16 of the 7,386 indexed products containing Acesulfame Potassium, with each product's overall safety score.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is Acesulfame Potassium safe to eat? ▼
Acesulfame Potassium has a PlainFoodSafe ingredient-screening score of 1/5. CSPI rates it "Avoid." FDA SAFFA status: Approved. These labels are not a product-, dose-, allergy-, or person-specific safety determination.
What products contain Acesulfame Potassium? ▼
Acesulfame Potassium is found in 7,386 products in our database, spanning various food categories and brands.
What does Acesulfame Potassium do in food? ▼
Acesulfame Potassium is used as a non-nutritive sweetener in food products.
Citation notes
Regulatory status from FDA SAFFA; safety ratings from CSPI Chemical Cuisine; product presence from Open Food Facts. See our methodology. Retrieved and formatted by PlainFoodSafe.Every figure on PlainFoodSafe is rendered directly from OpenFoodFacts and FDA data, no number is typed in by an editor. Ingredient figures are computed directly from OpenFoodFacts, FDA SAFFA, and CSPI Chemical Cuisine data, no figure is typed in by an editor. See our editorial standards & corrections policy, the methodology behind these numbers, or report a data error. Data current as of August 2026.
