Bacon

Bacon appears in 1,455 indexed US food products. No FDA SAFFA status or CSPI rating is attached in this snapshot, so this page reports prevalence rather than a safety verdict.

What the data can answer

Bacon appears in 1,455 catalogued products, but this snapshot has no FDA SAFFA status or CSPI Chemical Cuisine rating attached to it. This page therefore cannot answer whether the ingredient is safe from those sources. It can show how often it occurs, where it tends to sit on labels, and which kinds of products contain it.

1,455
catalogued products
#520
usage rank of 247,206
385
named brands represented
42%
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.

Reading this ingredient record

Audit the co-occurring flags first

80.5% of the linked products contain at least one separately flagged ingredient, making co-occurrence the dominant follow-up question. That figure does not identify Bacon as the trigger. Open records such as 100% Bacon Bits; 2 Quarter Pounder Bee, Bbq, Bacon & Cheese Patties; 4 Quarter Pound Beef, Bbq & Bacon Patties and inspect which ingredient row carries the caution marker. The 84.8/100 product average is therefore a triage signal for this surrounding formulation set, not an ingredient verdict. Its 42% average label depth helps locate the term when checking the package.

80.5% of linked products contain a separately flagged ingredient

Processing is unusually concentrated here: Group 4 accounts for 1342 of 1438 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.

High-volume listing for Bacon - usage rank #520

Usage rank
#520
of 247,206 ingredients that appear in at least one catalogued product, listed in more products than 99.8% of them.
Typical depth in an ingredient list
42%
Mean relative depth 42% across 1,455 parsed labels, slot 18.0 on average. Bacon tends to sit in the upper half of the list. Depth is location on the label, not a measured dose.

Computed from parsed product ingredient lists (Open Food Facts). The ranking covers 247,206 ingredients that appear at least once. Neither usage rank nor label depth is a safety clearance.

What else is usually in the same product as Bacon

Across the 1,455 products on this site that list Bacon, 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. Sodium Nitrite shows up about 28.3x more often with Bacon than in the catalogue at large.

Sodium Nitrite: +65.4ppSodium Nitrite+65.4ppCaramel Coloring: +14.5ppCaramel Coloring+14.5ppCarrageenan: +3.7ppCarrageenan+3.7ppSodium Nitrate: +5.5ppSodium Nitrate+5.5ppBHA: +3.1ppBHA+3.1pp
Percentage-point gap vs the catalogue baseline rate for each additive, Bacon products only. Source: Open Food Facts ingredient lists.
Chart values as text

Unit: percentage points above/below baseline. Data current as of September 2026.

Sodium Nitrite
65.4pp
Caramel Coloring
14.5pp
Carrageenan
3.7pp
Sodium Nitrate
5.5pp
BHA
3.1pp
Additive Shared products Share of Bacon products Share of all products
Sodium Nitrite 986 67.8% 2.4%
Caramel Coloring 294 20.2% 5.7%
Carrageenan 119 8.2% 4.5%
Sodium Nitrate 83 5.7% 0.2%
BHA 56 3.8% 0.7%

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, 2026-09-01.

How do the sampled products compare?

Each point is one of the 16 sampled products listed below: its overall safety score against how many separately flagged ingredients its label carries. Bubble size is the number of ingredient rows the label actually resolved to.

Safety score vs. flagged-ingredient count for products containing Bacon

Per-product safety score and flagged-ingredient count from the same sampled listings shown below. Bubble size = linked ingredient rows. Source: Open Food Facts labels x FDA SAFFA x CSPI Chemical Cuisine. 2×2 strategic matrix plotting 16 entities by Safety score (X) and Flagged ingredients on label (Y), with a crosshair dividing the plot into four quadrants. High score, still flaggedLow score, more flaggedHigh score, fewer flaggedLow score, fewer flagged 7580859095100105 00.511.522.5 Safety score Flagged ingredients on label Safety score vs. flagged-ingredient count for products containing Bacon
Per-product safety score and flagged-ingredient count from the same sampled listings shown below. Bubble size = linked ingredient rows. Source: Open Food Facts labels x FDA SAFFA x CSPI Chemical Cuisine.

Peer ingredients with comparable catalog mass (near “Unsalted Butter”)

High-volume peers for Bacon: 1,455 products, mean screening score 84.8/100. Comparable product-count neighbours: Unsalted Butter · Rice Vinegar · Sulfites. Axes below stay distinct so count-neighbors do not duplicate score-neighbors.

Similar product count

Nearest other ingredients by Open Food Facts product count (floored at ≥50).

Similar mean product score

Mean product-score neighbours (≥50 scored products), kept separate from the product-count peers above.

Next steps from the Bacon page

Start from Bacon's 1,455 catalogued appearances and the attached source fields, then open the product rows that match your use case.

  • Check the listed products containing Bacon before treating the aggregate count as a personal conclusion. See listed products
  • Compare Bacon with a peer such as “Unsalted Butter” on source-backed rating, FDA status, and product footprint. Browse ingredient records
  • Check the methodology for how FDA SAFFA, CSPI, and Open Food Facts rows are joined on this site. Read the methodology

This page describes published source classifications and product-label coverage. It is not dietary, allergy, or medical advice.

Bacon — common follow-ups

How should I read safety signals when Bacon sits in heavily flagged products?

80.5% of linked products contain at least one separately flagged ingredient, so the first task is locating which row carries the caution marker — not assuming Bacon is the trigger. None of that replaces a product-, dose-, allergy-, or person-specific determination.

Which product shelves show up most often with Bacon?

Bacon ranks in the top decile by product count (#520 of 247,206), appearing in 1,455 indexed products led by Meals. The sample list below is a slice of that footprint, not the full universe.

Why is Bacon so common on ingredient lists?

The source record does not name a technical effect, yet Bacon appears in 1,455 products (#520 usage rank). High prevalence here describes formulation frequency, not an approved use level.

Regulatory status: FDA SAFFA (Bacon). Safety ratings: CSPI Chemical Cuisine; product presence: Open Food Facts via PlainFoodSafe (September 2026). Figures are computed from those sources, no editor-typed counts. Methodology · State regulations.