The date on the calendar for FD&C Red No. 3 is firm again, and dietary supplements are written into it. The deadline was set by the order published on 16 January 2025 (90 FR 4628); what changed this month is that the objections holding it in suspense were dealt with.
On 5 August 2026 the Federal Register carried the FDA’s response to objections and requests for a public hearing on the repeal of the regulations authorising the dye. The agency denied the hearing requests and lifted the administrative stay that objections triggered in February 2025, under Docket No. FDA-2023-N-0437, and confirmed both effective dates the January 2025 order set: 15 January 2027 for food, dietary supplements included, and 18 January 2028 for ingested drugs.
The scope is the part worth reading twice. The agency’s own parenthesis puts dietary supplements inside “food”, which is what makes this a supplement story rather than only a confectionery one — and what puts supplements under the earlier of the two dates.
What the order is, and what it is not
It is an authorisation being withdrawn. It is not a safety verdict on any particular tub, it names no product, and it sets no date for clearing what is already in distribution. Nothing in it concerns what is in your cupboard tonight.
It is also a United States action. Colour-additive permissions differ by market, and so do the dye names printed on labels; a tub bought elsewhere is not covered by this.
Why under five months is tight
Colour is not a line item you swap on a Friday. A replacement has to survive the same acidity, flavour system and shelf life, artwork has to be redrawn and re-printed, and inventory already in distribution does not reformulate itself. Brands that started when the repeal was first published have room. Brands that waited to see whether the stay held have considerably less.
For a category that reformulates constantly anyway — usually for marketing reasons rather than regulatory ones — this is an unusual thing: a change with a fixed deadline attached.
The practical read
If you want to know whether a powder you buy uses it, look at the other-ingredients line beneath the supplement facts panel, on the physical tub, for the batch in your hand. Product pages lag labels, and over the next few months they will lag them more than usual.
A colour additive leaving a formula changes nothing else about what is in the tub. None of these products is evaluated by the FDA, none is intended to diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any disease, and none of the above is medical advice.