Is THC legal in Austria?

Formal status

At EU level, hemp may be grown and used where THC does not exceed 0.3 per cent, the figure set for agricultural hemp by Regulation (EU) 2021/2115. Member states remain free to set their own rules for finished consumer products, and many do.

Austria's figure is also 0.3 per cent, but it is a narcotics-law figure and it predates the EU agricultural change by more than five years. The Narcotic Substances Ordinance, as amended with effect from 30 October 2017, exempts products of industrial hemp varieties listed in the EU common catalogue or the Austrian variety list where two conditions are met together: THC does not exceed 0.3 per cent before, during and after the production process, and no narcotic can easily or economically profitably be obtained from the product in a concentration or quantity suitable for misuse. Both limbs must hold, and the variety condition is a real one - Austrian narcotics prosecutions in this sector have turned on the use of unapproved varieties rather than on the percentage.

Separately from narcotics law, Austrian food authorities apply an acute reference dose for THC of 1 microgram per kilogram of body weight per day, drawn from the 2015 EFSA opinion. Foods whose intended consumption clearly exceeds it are assessed as potentially harmful to health, and an administrative court endorsed that approach in April 2025. This test applies independently of a product's novel-food status.

The maximum levels for THC set by Regulation (EU) 2023/915 apply to hemp seed and hemp seed oil products and are not the test for an extract.

Do we sell here?

Yes, for now: Sleep spray, Sleep capsules.

Yes, we ship to Austria.

Austria exempts products made from approved industrial hemp varieties from its narcotics law, provided THC stays at or below 0.3 per cent throughout production and no narcotic can readily be extracted from the finished product. Our third-party batch testing sits comfortably below that figure, and we publish it.

Austrian food authorities apply a second and stricter test, an acute reference dose measured per daily serving rather than as a percentage. It applies to any food containing THC regardless of anything else, and it is the constraint we design around. You can see what each batch actually tested at on our batch testing page.

Our CBD page for Austria sets out the fuller country picture.

Outlook

Austria's industrial hemp exemption has been in place since 2017 and there is no sign of it being narrowed. The part of it worth watching is not the percentage but the variety condition, which is the limb Austrian prosecutions have actually turned on.

The food-side acute reference dose is the more active constraint, because it applies whatever a product's novel-food status and because it is assessed per daily dose rather than per gram. Austrian assessments have noted that a capsule can carry more extract than an equivalent number of drops, so the same formula can be treated differently in different presentations. That is a live consideration for any product sold in more than one format.

Timeline

October 2017

An amendment to the Narcotic Substances Ordinance inserts the industrial-hemp exemption: products of listed hemp varieties are exempt where THC does not exceed 0.3% before, during and after processing and no narcotic can easily or economically be extracted from them.

BGBl. II Nr. 292/2017

August 2021

Styrian authorities report a multi-year narcotics operation against four hemp shops and three CBD-flower production sites: 159 house searches, ten arrests and around 90 customers searched, on the ground that non-approved hemp varieties fell outside the statutory industrial-hemp exemption.

ORF Steiermark (report date; individual raid dates not stated)

September 2024

A joint customs, consumer-health and food-safety control action at the Vienna postal distribution centre examines 50 parcels of food supplements ordered from outside the EU; 44% were objected to and 21 were unauthorised novel foods, returned to sender under customs supervision with no penalty on the recipient.

BMF / BAVG / AGES press release

April 2025

The Burgenland Administrative Court quashes a food-law marketing ban for want of competence, holding that website disease claims made the products medicinal by presentation, and records the acute reference dose for THC and a provisional daily intake figure for CBD as applying independently of novel-food status.

Landesverwaltungsgericht Burgenland, E 156/02/2020.001/063

September 2025

The health ministry publishes its foreign-webshop control figures for 2024: 150 controls with a 62% objection rate, including 77 food supplements checked and 40 objected to, under a federal programme that expressly claims competence over sellers established in other EU and EEA states.

BMSGPK, Internetkontrolle (Stand 01.09.2025)