Sodium Hydroxide
Sodium Hydroxide carries a source-backed screening score of 3/5 and appears in 415 indexed US food products.
Source-backed answer
Sodium Hydroxide appears in 415 catalogued products. CSPI has no rating attached in this snapshot. 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.
- 415
- catalogued products
- #1,171
- usage rank of 247,206
- 125
- named brands represented
- 77%
- 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.
Sodium Hydroxide sits in the busiest tenth of the catalog (#1,171 / 247,206)
- Usage rank
- #1,171
- of 247,206 ingredients that appear in at least one catalogued product, tied with 2 others that also appear in exactly 415 products, listed in more products than 99.5% of them.
- Typical depth in an ingredient list
- 77%
- Of the way down the captured list, averaged across the 415 products listing it (mean slot 25.0). Sodium Hydroxide usually falls near the end of the captured 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.
How to use this page
Separate this ingredient from its product neighborhood
This is a mixed product neighborhood: 150 of 415 records have some flagged component, while the rest do not. Compare 8in german chocolate cake; A2 Organic Infant Formula; Acai Berry Spritz to see how surrounding formulations change; do not assign their 0–100 score range to Sodium Hydroxide itself. The ingredient most often sits near the end of the captured list, and Snacks supplies the most useful like-for-like starting point for a label review.
150 of 415 linked records have some flagged component
All 401 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 Sodium Hydroxide
Across the 415 products on this site that list Sodium Hydroxide, 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. Caramel Coloring shows up about 3.2x more often with Sodium Hydroxide than in the catalogue at large.
| Additive | Shared products | Share of Sodium Hydroxide products | Share of all products |
|---|---|---|---|
| Caramel Coloring | 76 | 18.3% | 5.7% |
| Red 40 | 63 | 15.2% | 5.4% |
| Blue 1 | 37 | 8.9% | 4.2% |
| Carrageenan | 26 | 6.3% | 4.5% |
| Yellow 5 | 17 | 4.1% | 4.8% |
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
COLOR OR COLORING ADJUNCT, DOUGH STRENGTHENER, FLAVOR ENHANCER, FLAVORING AGENT OR ADJUVANT, FLOUR TREATING AGENT, FUMIGANT, OXIDIZING OR REDUCING AGENT, PH CONTROL AGENT, PROCESSING AID, WASHING OR SURFACE REMOVAL 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 Sodium Hydroxide
Products Containing Sodium Hydroxide
A sample of 16 high-volume listings among the 415 indexed products containing Sodium Hydroxide:
Peer ingredients with comparable catalog mass (near “Bht For Freshness”)
High-volume peers for Sodium Hydroxide: 415 products, mean screening score 86.3/100. Catalog-mass neighbours in view: Bht For Freshness; Organic Radicchio; Beet Juice Concentrate. 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.
Using the Sodium Hydroxide evidence
Use the 415-product footprint and source labels as a starting point, then inspect the records most relevant to your question.
- Open the product sample for Sodium Hydroxide and read how the term sits on real packages. See listed products
- 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. 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 Sodium Hydroxide carry its own safety label in this catalog? ▼
This is a mixed neighborhood: some linked products carry a separate flag while others do not. Sodium Hydroxide itself carries 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 Sodium Hydroxide? ▼
Sodium Hydroxide ranks in the top decile by product count (#1,171 of 247,206), appearing in 415 indexed products led by Snacks. The sample list below is a slice of that footprint, not the full universe.
What does Sodium Hydroxide do in food? ▼
Sodium Hydroxide is recorded as a color or coloring adjunct, dough strengthener, flavor enhancer, flavoring agent or adjuvant, flour treating agent, fumigant, oxidizing or reducing agent, ph control agent, processing aid, washing or surface removal agent in source technical-effect fields.
Regulatory status: FDA SAFFA (Sodium Hydroxide). 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.