Label rules › Mexico

Mexico label requirements: NOM-051 and the warning seals

Prepackaged food and non-alcoholic drinks sold in Mexico follow NOM-051-SCFI/SSA1-2010, as modified in 2020, under the Secretaría de Economía and COFEPRIS. The label is in Spanish. Products over the nutrient limits carry black octagonal seals on the front; the third and final phase of the limits applies since 1 October 2025. Non-food goods follow NOM-050-SCFI-2004.

Checked: 29 October 2026

Mandatory items

Every label

Name, ingredient list with allergens, net contents, name and tax address of the maker or importer, country of origin, lot, expiry or best-before date and the nutrition declaration — in Spanish. Imported products must carry the Spanish label when they enter, or be labelled in a verified customs warehouse.

The warning seals

One black octagon per excess — “EXCESO CALORÍAS”, “EXCESO AZÚCARES”, “EXCESO GRASAS SATURADAS”, “EXCESO GRASAS TRANS”, “EXCESO SODIO” — in the upper right of the front panel, at the size the norm’s table gives for the panel’s area. Packs whose front is 40 cm² or less show one seal with the number of excesses. Products with sweeteners or caffeine add the legends “CONTIENE EDULCORANTES – NO RECOMENDABLE EN NIÑOS” and “CONTIENE CAFEÍNA – EVITAR EN NIÑOS”.

No characters for children

A product that carries a seal or a legend may not use children’s characters, cartoons, celebrities, toys, games or downloadable content on the pack to promote it to children.

Why the rules look like this

Mexico changed its fronts because it had one of the highest rates of childhood obesity and of soft-drink consumption in the world:

1. 2014 — a tax of one peso per litre on sugary drinks is introduced, one of the first national soda taxes.
2. 2020 — the modified NOM-051 is published on 27 March and the black seals appear from 1 October. Overnight, cartoon mascots vanished from famous cereal boxes, because a pack with seals may not use them to appeal to children.
3. 2020 — Oaxaca and then Tabasco ban the sale of junk food to minors, taking the logic of the seals into law.
4. 2025 — the third and final phase of the limits starts on 1 October. More products cross the thresholds; a pack designed in 2023 without seals may need them now.

Seasons that sell packs

Día de Muertos (1–2 November) sells pan de muerto and sugar skulls in boxes and bags with full labels; the Rosca de Reyes on 6 January closes the holiday season. El Buen Fin, Mexico’s November sales weekend, moves packaged goods in volume. Seasonal designs keep the seals: a festive sleeve never covers them.

Who answers for the label

The producer or importer named on the label, who answers before PROFECO and COFEPRIS; the shop whose products are immobilised loses its stock until they are fixed.

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

PROFECO checks shops and can immobilise products and order them off the shelves until they carry the right seals and Spanish label, and fine the business under the Federal Consumer Protection Law; COFEPRIS acts on health risks such as undeclared allergens. Imports that arrive without a Spanish label must be labelled in a verified warehouse before they can be sold.

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.

How the seals are sized and placed

The seals sit in the upper right of the principal display surface, in the order the norm sets (calories, sugars, saturated fat, trans fat, sodium), with no other text or picture over them. Their size comes from the norm’s table by the area of that surface. A surface of 40 cm² or less carries one seal with the number of excesses; the smallest packs follow the norm’s own rules for them. The legends “CONTIENE EDULCORANTES…” and “CONTIENE CAFEÍNA…” sit under the seals.

Mistakes, and a check before printing

The usual problems: seals moved to the back or the side; a cartoon mascot kept on a pack that now needs seals; the legends in a smaller size than the norm allows; an imported pack with an English label only.

1. Work out the excesses from the nutrition declaration with the third-phase limits.
2. Place one seal per excess, in order, in the upper right of the front, at the table’s size.
3. Add the sweetener and caffeine legends where they apply.
4. Remove children’s characters, toys and games from a pack with seals or legends.
5. Write every item in Spanish, with the importer’s tax address for imports.

Cosmetics, textiles and electronics

Cosmetics follow NOM-141-SSA1/SCFI-2012: the product’s name and function, ingredients, net contents, lot, the maker or importer, the country of origin and precautionary legends, in Spanish. Textiles and clothing follow NOM-004-SE-2021 (fibre content, size, care and the maker or importer); electronic and household appliances follow NOM-024-SCFI-2013 on commercial information. Everything else follows NOM-050-SCFI-2004.

Worked example: a 200 g box of butter cookies

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

1. [EXCESO CALORÍAS] [EXCESO AZÚCARES] [EXCESO GRASAS SATURADAS] — arriba a la derecha, si aplican
2. GALLETAS DE MANTEQUILLA
3. Ingredientes: harina de trigo, mantequilla (leche), azúcar, huevo, sal, bicarbonato de sodio.
4. Contiene: trigo, leche, huevo.
5. Contenido neto: 200 g
6. Consumir preferentemente antes del: [día mes año] · Lote: [ ]
7. Hecho en Vietnam · Importado por: [nombre, domicilio fiscal, RFC]
8. Información nutrimental por 100 g y por envase

Why it reads this way

Butter cookies usually reach the limits for calories, sugars and saturated fat, so three seals go in the upper right, and any mascot comes off the box.

How Drint helps

Three kinds of people make packs for Mexico 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 Mexico 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 Mexico 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. Diario Oficial de la Federación (NOM-051)
2. COFEPRIS
3. PROFECO

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 NOM-051-SCFI/SSA1-2010 as published in the Diario Oficial de la Federación, and the product’s COFEPRIS status, before printing.