Sodium Metabisulfite
Sodium Metabisulfite carries a source-backed screening score of 3/5 and appears in 1,991 indexed US food products.
Source-backed answer
Sodium Metabisulfite appears in 1,991 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.
- 1,991
- catalogued products
- #407
- usage rank of 247,206
- 581
- named brands represented
- 79%
- 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 Metabisulfite sits in the busiest tenth of the catalog (#407 / 247,206)
- Usage rank
- #407
- 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
- 79%
- Averaged label depth puts Sodium Metabisulfite near the end of the captured list (79% of list length, mean slot 21.6). Compound ingredients and OCR noise mean this cannot stand in for quantity.
Derived by this site from the ingredient lists of every catalogued product (Open Food Facts), recomputed on each data refresh. 247,206 ingredients have at least one appearance and are ranked here. Usage and list position describe prevalence, not safety.
Reading this ingredient record
Separate this ingredient from its product neighborhood
This is a mixed product neighborhood: 604 of 1991 records have some flagged component, while the rest do not. Compare 100% Juice; 100% Juice Lemon; 100% Lemon Juice to see how surrounding formulations change; do not assign their 0–100 score range to Sodium Metabisulfite 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.
604 of 1,991 linked records have some flagged component
All 1924 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 Metabisulfite
Across the 1,991 products on this site that list Sodium Metabisulfite, 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. Yellow 5 shows up about 2.3x more often with Sodium Metabisulfite than in the catalogue at large.
| Additive | Shared products | Share of Sodium Metabisulfite products | Share of all products |
|---|---|---|---|
| Yellow 5 | 223 | 11.2% | 4.8% |
| Caramel Coloring | 158 | 7.9% | 5.7% |
| Yellow 6 | 126 | 6.3% | 3.4% |
| Carrageenan | 103 | 5.2% | 4.5% |
| Polysorbate 60 | 91 | 4.6% | 1.4% |
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
ANTIMICROBIAL AGENT, ANTIOXIDANT, COLOR OR COLORING ADJUNCT, DOUGH STRENGTHENER, FLOUR TREATING AGENT, FREEZING OR COOLING AGENT, DIRECT CONTACT, OXIDIZING OR REDUCING 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 Metabisulfite
Products Containing Sodium Metabisulfite
A sample of 16 high-volume listings among the 1,991 indexed products containing Sodium Metabisulfite:
Peer ingredients with comparable catalog mass (near “Sodium Propionate”)
Sodium Metabisulfite sits among other busy catalog rows (1,991 products, mean score 91.2/100). Catalog-mass neighbours in view: Sodium Propionate; Peaches; Antioxidant. 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
Score-axis peers only, mean screening score among ingredients with ≥50 scored products, not a second count list.
Using the Sodium Metabisulfite evidence
1,991 product rows plus any FDA/CSPI fields on Sodium Metabisulfite are the evidence base — drill into the listings that matter for your decision.
- Review the sampled product records that list Sodium Metabisulfite to see how the ingredient appears in actual labels. Browse linked labels
- Compare Sodium Metabisulfite with a peer such as “Sodium Propionate” on source-backed rating, FDA status, and product footprint. Browse ingredient records
- 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 Metabisulfite 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 Metabisulfite 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 Metabisulfite? ▼
Sodium Metabisulfite ranks in the top decile by product count (#407 of 247,206), appearing in 1,991 indexed products led by Snacks. The sample list below is a slice of that footprint, not the full universe.
What does Sodium Metabisulfite do in food? ▼
Sodium Metabisulfite is recorded as a antimicrobial agent, antioxidant, color or coloring adjunct, dough strengthener, flour treating agent, freezing or cooling agent, direct contact, oxidizing or reducing agent in source technical-effect fields.
Regulatory status: FDA SAFFA (Sodium Metabisulfite). 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.