Carboxymethyl Cellulose
Carboxymethyl Cellulose carries a source-backed screening score of 2/5 and appears in 163 indexed US food products. CSPI rates it “Caution.”
Source-backed answer
Carboxymethyl Cellulose appears in 163 catalogued products. CSPI rates it “Caution.” Its FDA SAFFA status is “GRAS.” Those source labels describe the ingredient; they do not establish whether a particular product, dose, allergy, or diet is safe.
- 163
- catalogued products
- #2,231
- usage rank of 247,206
- 76
- named brands represented
- 67%
- 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.
High-volume listing for Carboxymethyl Cellulose - usage rank #2,231
- Usage rank
- #2,231
- of 247,206 ingredients that appear in at least one catalogued product, tied with 8 others that also appear in exactly 163 products, listed in more products than 99.1% of them.
- Typical depth in an ingredient list
- 67%
- Of the way down the captured list, averaged across the 163 products listing it (mean slot 19.3). Carboxymethyl Cellulose 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.
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.
Reading this ingredient record
Separate this ingredient from its product neighborhood
This is a mixed product neighborhood: 79 of 163 records have some flagged component, while the rest do not. Compare 100% whole wheat tortillas; 6\fajitaflourtortillas; 8 fruit horns to see how surrounding formulations change; do not assign their 0–100 score range to Carboxymethyl Cellulose itself. The ingredient most often sits in the lower half of the list, and Snacks supplies the most useful like-for-like starting point for a label review.
79 of 163 linked records have some flagged component
All 163 NOVA-classified records cluster most heavily in Group 4, while the first-category labels split across several shelves. That makes the 0–100 score spread more informative than the average alone: investigate the low end, identify the actual flagged row, and compare it with a similar unflagged formulation before drawing a conclusion.
Next check: pair one flagged product with a similar unflagged product from the same shelf category.
What else is usually in the same product as Carboxymethyl Cellulose
Across the 163 products on this site that list Carboxymethyl Cellulose, 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. Red 40 shows up about 3.2x more often with Carboxymethyl Cellulose than in the catalogue at large.
| Additive | Shared products | Share of Carboxymethyl Cellulose products | Share of all products |
|---|---|---|---|
| Red 40 | 28 | 17.2% | 5.4% |
| Yellow 5 | 27 | 16.6% | 4.8% |
| Carrageenan | 22 | 13.5% | 4.5% |
| Yellow 6 | 19 | 11.7% | 3.4% |
| Blue 1 | 17 | 10.4% | 4.2% |
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.
Function
ANTICAKING AGENT OR FREE-FLOW AGENT, DRYING AGENT, EMULSIFIER OR EMULSIFIER SALT, HUMECTANT, SOLVENT OR VEHICLE, STABILIZER OR THICKENER, SURFACE-ACTIVE AGENT
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 Carboxymethyl Cellulose
Products Containing Carboxymethyl Cellulose
16 busy labels from the 163 indexed products that list Carboxymethyl Cellulose:
Carboxymethyl Cellulose vs other top-decile catalog footprints
Carboxymethyl Cellulose sits among other busy catalog rows (163 products, mean score 79.6/100). Catalog-mass neighbours in view: Organic Alfalfa; Cooked Enriched Macaroni Product; Cracked Rye. Count peers and score peers are listed separately on purpose.
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 Carboxymethyl Cellulose page
Use the 163-product footprint and source labels as a starting point, then inspect the records most relevant to your question.
- Review the sampled product records that list Carboxymethyl Cellulose to see how the ingredient appears in actual labels. Open product sample
- Place Carboxymethyl Cellulose next to “Cooked Enriched Macaroni Product” (or another peer) using the same FDA/CSPI and prevalence fields. Compare a peer
- See the join rules behind screening scores before reading them as dietary advice. See source joins
This page describes published source classifications and product-label coverage. It is not dietary, allergy, or medical advice.
Frequently Asked Questions
Does Carboxymethyl Cellulose carry its own safety label in this catalog? ▼
This is a mixed neighborhood: some linked products carry a separate flag while others do not. Carboxymethyl Cellulose itself carries a CSPI "Caution" rating and FDA SAFFA status "GRAS" where the source record supplies them. Compare like-for-like products before treating the average screening score as an ingredient verdict.
Which product shelves show up most often with Carboxymethyl Cellulose? ▼
Carboxymethyl Cellulose ranks in the top decile by product count (#2,231 of 247,206), appearing in 163 indexed products led by Snacks. The sample list below is a slice of that footprint, not the full universe.
What does Carboxymethyl Cellulose do in food? ▼
Carboxymethyl Cellulose is recorded as a anticaking agent or free-flow agent, drying agent, emulsifier or emulsifier salt, humectant, solvent or vehicle, stabilizer or thickener, surface-active agent in source technical-effect fields.
Regulatory status: FDA SAFFA (Carboxymethyl Cellulose). 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.