Red40
Red40 appears in 19 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
Red40 appears in 19 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.
- 19
- catalogued products
- #9,730
- usage rank of 247,206
- 10
- named brands represented
- 74%
- 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
52.6% of the linked products contain at least one separately flagged ingredient, making co-occurrence the dominant follow-up question. That figure does not identify Red40 as the trigger. Open records such as 6 CT WHITE & CHOCOLATE CUP WITH WHIPPED ICING; Chocolate Dip Star Cookies; cotton candy flavored candies and inspect which ingredient row carries the caution marker. The 76.1/100 product average is therefore a triage signal for this surrounding formulation set, not an ingredient verdict. Its 74% average label depth helps locate the term when checking the package.
52.6% of linked products contain a separately flagged ingredient
Processing is unusually concentrated here: Group 4 accounts for 18 of 18 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 Red40 - usage rank #9,730
- Usage rank
- #9,730
- of 247,206 ingredients that appear in at least one catalogued product, tied with 368 others that also appear in exactly 19 products.
- Typical depth in an ingredient list
- 74%
- Mean relative depth 74% across 19 parsed labels, slot 21.6 on average. Red40 tends to sit in the lower 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.
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 Red40
Products Containing Red40
High-volume slice (16 of 19) for products naming Red40:
Peer ingredients with comparable catalog mass
Top-decile company for Red40: 19 listings averaging 76.1/100.
Similar mean product score
Mean product-score neighbours (≥50 scored products), kept separate from the product-count peers above.
What to do with this Red40 record
Start from Red40's 19 catalogued appearances and the attached source fields, then open the product rows that match your use case.
- Open the product sample for Red40 and read how the term sits on real packages. Browse linked labels
- Move to a second ingredient page and compare registry fields plus catalog mass side by side. Open a peer record
- Read how PlainFoodSafe joins source records before treating a screening label as a personal food or health conclusion. Open methodology
This page describes published source classifications and product-label coverage. It is not dietary, allergy, or medical advice.
Questions readers ask about Red40
How should I read safety signals when Red40 sits in heavily flagged products? ▼
52.6% of linked products contain at least one separately flagged ingredient, so the first task is locating which row carries the caution marker — not assuming Red40 is the trigger. None of that replaces a product-, dose-, allergy-, or person-specific determination.
Which product shelves show up most often with Red40? ▼
Red40 ranks in the top decile by product count (#9,730 of 247,206), appearing in 19 indexed products led by Snacks. The sample list below is a slice of that footprint, not the full universe.
Why is Red40 so common on ingredient lists? ▼
The source record does not name a technical effect, yet Red40 appears in 19 products (#9,730 usage rank). High prevalence here describes formulation frequency, not an approved use level.
Regulatory status: FDA SAFFA (Red40). 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.