Sodium Metabisulphite
Sodium Metabisulphite appears in 380 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
Sodium Metabisulphite appears in 380 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.
- 380
- catalogued products
- #1,251
- usage rank of 247,206
- 174
- named brands represented
- 84%
- 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 Metabisulphite sits in the busiest tenth of the catalog (#1,251 / 247,206)
- Usage rank
- #1,251
- of 247,206 ingredients that appear in at least one catalogued product, tied with 2 others that also appear in exactly 380 products, listed in more products than 99.5% of them.
- Typical depth in an ingredient list
- 84%
- Of the way down the captured list, averaged across the 380 products listing it (mean slot 16.2). Sodium Metabisulphite 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
Use prevalence before concern
Only 9.2% of linked products carry any separately flagged ingredient. The stronger differentiator here is market placement: Sodium Metabisulphite spans 174 named brands and is led by the Snacks group. Start with 100% whole wheat soft taco; 5050; 6 Apple Pies when comparing real formulations. Because the flagged component may be something else, neither the low co-occurrence rate nor the 96.9/100 product average proves this ingredient safe.
174 named brands carry this ingredient
The processing evidence is heterogeneous rather than a single shelf pattern: the largest NOVA group contains 291 of 365 classified products, leaving a meaningful remainder elsewhere. This breadth is why the page reports label depth, category, and product examples separately. Those dimensions help locate comparable products; combining them into a stronger safety claim would hide the variation the catalog actually contains.
Next check: compare label position across two brands before treating prevalence as equivalent exposure.
What else is usually in the same product as Sodium Metabisulphite
Across the 380 products on this site that list Sodium Metabisulphite, 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. Polysorbate 60 shows up about 3.8x more often with Sodium Metabisulphite than in the catalogue at large.
| Additive | Shared products | Share of Sodium Metabisulphite products | Share of all products |
|---|---|---|---|
| Polysorbate 60 | 20 | 5.3% | 1.4% |
| Red 40 | 9 | 2.4% | 5.4% |
| Yellow 6 | 9 | 2.4% | 3.4% |
| Yellow 5 | 8 | 2.1% | 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.
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 Metabisulphite
Products Containing Sodium Metabisulphite
16 busy labels from the 380 indexed products that list Sodium Metabisulphite:
High-volume peers for Sodium Metabisulphite beside “Ripe Olives”
Top-decile company for Sodium Metabisulphite: 380 listings averaging 96.9/100. Comparable product-count neighbours: Ripe Olives · Sour Cream Powder · Organic Carrot Juice.
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 Metabisulphite evidence
Start from Sodium Metabisulphite's 380 catalogued appearances and the attached source fields, then open the product rows that match your use case.
- Open the product sample for Sodium Metabisulphite and read how the term sits on real packages. Browse linked labels
- Place Sodium Metabisulphite next to “Sour Cream Powder” (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.
Sodium Metabisulphite — common follow-ups
Why is there no FDA/CSPI verdict on Sodium Metabisulphite? ▼
This snapshot has no FDA SAFFA status or CSPI Chemical Cuisine rating attached to Sodium Metabisulphite, so PlainFoodSafe does not present a source-backed safety verdict. The page reports catalog prevalence (#1,251 of 247,206 ingredients) and label position instead.
Which product shelves show up most often with Sodium Metabisulphite? ▼
Sodium Metabisulphite ranks in the top decile by product count (#1,251 of 247,206), appearing in 380 indexed products led by Snacks. The sample list below is a slice of that footprint, not the full universe.
Why is Sodium Metabisulphite so common on ingredient lists? ▼
The source record does not name a technical effect, yet Sodium Metabisulphite appears in 380 products (#1,251 usage rank). High prevalence here describes formulation frequency, not an approved use level.
Regulatory status: FDA SAFFA (Sodium Metabisulphite). 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.