Label rules › United Kingdom

UK label requirements: food information, Natasha’s Law and packaging

Food sold in the UK follows the Food Information Regulations 2014 and Regulation 1169/2011 as kept in UK law (assimilated law), in English. Great Britain and Northern Ireland differ since the Windsor Framework: Northern Ireland still follows EU food law. Since 1 January 2024 food sold in Great Britain needs a UK address for the business responsible.

Checked: 29 October 2026

Mandatory items

Every food label

Name, ingredients with the 14 allergens emphasised, quantity of characterising ingredients, net quantity, date, storage and use, the name and UK address of the business responsible, origin where required and the nutrition declaration. Mandatory text has an x-height of at least 1.2 mm (0.9 mm on packs whose largest surface is under 80 cm²). Front-of-pack traffic-light labels are voluntary but widely used.

Natasha’s Law

Since 1 October 2021, food prepacked for direct sale (PPDS) — packed on the premises before a customer orders it, such as sandwiches in a café — carries its name and a full ingredient list with the allergens emphasised.

Quantity and packaging

Net quantity follows the Weights and Measures (Packaged Goods) Regulations 2006; the ℮ mark is optional. Under packaging extended producer responsibility, the plan to make “Recycle / Do not recycle” labels mandatory from April 2027 was reported dropped in 2026 because of the Windsor Framework; OPRL labels stay voluntary. Check Defra’s current guidance.

Why the rules look like this

British labels changed most after a death and after Brexit:

1. 2016 — Natasha Ednan-Laperouse, fifteen, dies after eating a baguette with sesame baked into the bread, bought from a shop that did not have to list its ingredients. Natasha’s Law (October 2021) closes that gap for food prepacked for direct sale.
2. 2021–2024 — after Brexit, EU food law is kept as UK law, and from January 2024 a pack for Great Britain needs a UK address. One artwork for the UK and the EU now carries two addresses.
3. 2022–2026 — rules on less healthy food restrict where it may be placed in shops (2022), multibuy offers (October 2025) and advertising (January 2026). A pack design no longer sells a high-fat snack from the checkout.

Seasons that sell packs

Christmas — selection boxes, biscuit tins, mince pies, crackers — and Easter eggs are the UK’s packaging peaks; brands have cut plastic from Easter egg packs year after year under shopper pressure. A seasonal pack keeps the full label, the UK address and, if used, the same traffic-light colours as the everyday pack.

Who answers for the label

As in the EU rules kept in UK law: the business under whose name the food is sold, or its UK importer; for PPDS food, the café or shop that packs it.

The designer and the printer are not named by these laws — but a contract can make them pay for the reprint. Keep the client’s written approval of the final copy; Drint’s review link records it.

If the label is wrong

Local Trading Standards and Environmental Health officers enforce the Food Information Regulations: they serve improvement notices and prosecute when a notice is ignored, and courts in England and Wales can impose unlimited fines. The Food Standards Agency publishes allergy alerts and recalls for every undeclared allergen. For a café, missing PPDS ingredients can mean prosecution — the reason Natasha’s Law exists.

Who else loses, beyond the fine

A wrong label costs more than its fine, and the cost travels down the chain:

1. The shopper — an undeclared allergen can put someone in hospital; that is why recalls for allergens move fastest.
2. The brand — a recall notice with its name stays online for years, and retailers may delist the product.
3. The importer and distributor — stock held at the port or in a warehouse, storage fees, relabelling labour, sometimes a whole container sent back.
4. The shop — products immobilised or pulled from shelves in the middle of a season.
5. The printer — a reprint at its own cost if the contract says so, and a lost client either way.
6. The designer — the reprint blamed on the artwork, unless the client’s approval is on record.

Great Britain and Northern Ireland

A pack sold in both carries a UK address for Great Britain, and an address in the UK or the EU for Northern Ireland — one Northern Ireland or UK address serves both. Goods moving from Great Britain to Northern Ireland under the Windsor Framework’s retail scheme may need “Not for EU” marking; check the current rules for your product. Front-of-pack traffic lights follow the Department of Health’s guidance: red, amber and green for fat, saturates, sugars and salt, with energy, per portion and as % of reference intake.

Mistakes, and a check before printing

The usual problems: only an EU importer’s address on a pack for Great Britain; PPDS food in a café with a name but no ingredients; the ℮ mark under 3 mm; traffic-light colours drawn freely instead of from the guidance’s criteria.

1. Write everything in English.
2. Give a UK address for the business responsible.
3. Emphasise the 14 allergens; for PPDS food, give the full ingredients.
4. Check the x-height: 1.2 mm, or 0.9 mm under 80 cm².
5. If using traffic lights, work them out from the guidance’s thresholds.

Cosmetics and other goods

Cosmetics sold in Great Britain name a Responsible Person with a UK address, list the ingredients by INCI name, and give the contents, batch, function, precautions and a date of minimum durability or period after opening, as the UK Cosmetic Products Regulation asks. The UKCA mark exists, but the government has said the CE mark stays accepted in Great Britain for most product types; Northern Ireland follows the EU rules, the GPSR included.

Worked example: a 200 g box of butter cookies

Made in Vietnam and sold in Great Britain, the pack reads, line by line (the client’s own names and numbers replace those in brackets):

1. Butter Biscuits
2. Ingredients: wheat flour, butter (milk) (18%), sugar, egg, salt, raising agent: sodium carbonates.
3. 200 g ℮
4. Best before end: see base
5. [Importer name], [UK address]
6. Product of Vietnam
7. Nutrition per 100 g: energy, fat, saturates, carbohydrate, sugars, protein, salt

Why it reads this way

The same particulars as in the EU, but with a UK address; a front traffic-light label is optional and, if used, would likely show amber or red for fat, saturates and sugars.

How Drint helps

Three kinds of people make packs for the United Kingdom with Drint, and each needs something different:

Free, no account: the barcode generator, the mm to inches converter and the paper sizes table.

1. A business with its own brand — Drint has no label kit for the United Kingdom yet, so the checklist on this page is your check before export. See the pack in 3D before it is printed, send the design to the person who must approve it with a review link, and hand the printer one CMYK PDF/X-4 with the die on its own layer, so nobody retypes the label.
2. A household business — start from a ready dieline cut to your exact box or bag size instead of paying for a die drawing, use your own photos on 3D mockups for your online shop, and keep the mandatory text exactly as you wrote it: Drint never translates or rewords a client’s copy.
3. A designer — lay out several markets from one design, each with its own language and items, keep every client’s approvals in one place, and show finished packs on a portfolio page at drint.io/your-name.

Laying it out in Drint

1. Drint has no label kit for the United Kingdom yet: add a text block for each item of the table above, in the order the law lists them.
2. Paste the client’s copy as they wrote it — Drint does not translate or reword it.
3. Place official marks (symbols, numbers, logos) from the authority’s own files at their stated size; export the CMYK PDF/X-4 with the die on its own layer for your printer.

Official sources

1. The Food Information Regulations 2014 — legislation.gov.uk
2. Food Standards Agency — Packaging and labelling
3. The Weights and Measures (Packaged Goods) Regulations 2006

Drint checks this label while you design, for 47 countries: see how the label-law check works.

Lay out the label in Drint

Questions

A summary written to design packs, not legal advice. Check the Food Information Regulations 2014, the Food Standards Agency’s guidance, and Defra’s packaging EPR guidance before printing.