What Is the FDA Food Code?
The FDA Food Code is the national model for retail food safety — the science-based rulebook nearly every state adopts to regulate restaurants, groceries, and institutional kitchens. Here’s what it covers, how states adopt it, and the one state that goes its own way.
The definition
The FDA Food Code is a model food-safety code published by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. The current full edition is 2026 — FDA now issues a complete edition every four years, with interim Supplements between them.
It’s a model, not a federal law. The FDA writes it; states, localities, tribes, and territories choose to adopt it — and only once a jurisdiction adopts a version does it become enforceable there. It gives them a uniform, science-based framework for regulating restaurants, grocery stores, school and hospital cafeterias, nursing homes, childcare kitchens, and mobile food units.
It covers management and personnel, food handling, equipment, plumbing, physical facilities, and chemical use — the full scope of how food is sourced, stored, prepared, cooked, held, and served at retail.
How states adopt it
Because it’s a model, adoption varies — and not every state is on the newest edition:
- 01A state adopts a specific edition (2026, 2022, 2017, 2013 — some are on older versions still).
- 02The edition a state adopts is the one enforceable there — the FDA does not override state law, and an older adopted edition stays in force until the state completes a new adoption.
- 03Local health jurisdictions within a state can differ, so two kitchens can answer to different specifics.
The current edition is not necessarily the one your kitchen answers to. The version that governs you is the edition your state and local health jurisdiction has adopted — confirm which applies to you.
The one state that goes its own way: California
California does not use the FDA Food Code
California is the only state that has not adopted a version of the FDA Food Code. Instead, it enforces its own California Retail Food Code (CalCode) — a separate body of food-safety law administered through the state and its county health departments. A kitchen in California answers to CalCode, not the FDA Food Code.
What is the California Retail Food Code (CalCode)? →So the honest map is simple: nearly every state → a version of the FDA Food Code; California → CalCode.
What it takes to show you comply
Whichever code governs your kitchen, compliance is judged the same way at inspection: can you show the required practices, records, and corrections are in place? Food-safety compliance lives in documentation — temperature logs, certifications, corrective actions, and the records an inspector asks for. Those requirements trace back to HACCP, the system the code is built on.
- 01The records your adopted code requires, kept current and on schedule.
- 02Corrective actions documented when something is found and fixed.
- 03Everything retained and ready when the health inspector asks.
Where EvidLY fits
EvidLY is the record layer for commercial kitchen compliance — fire safety first, and food safety alongside it. The food-safety records your jurisdiction’s code requires are captured, dated, and held in one place, ready when the health inspector asks. Whether your kitchen answers to the FDA Food Code or California’s CalCode, the proof is where it needs to be.
Book a Demo →Food safety and your kitchen.
The FDA Food Code is built on HACCP principles — the temperatures, monitoring, and records that keep a kitchen inspection-ready. See how a kitchen keeps the whole compliance picture, fire and food, ready: How to Track Kitchen Compliance.
Food safety runs beyond the code itself to a kitchen’s sanitation systems — grease trap, backflow prevention, and pest control.
FDA Food Code — FAQ
What is the FDA Food Code?
A model food-safety code the FDA publishes for states and localities to adopt in regulating retail and food-service establishments. The current full edition is 2026; FDA issues a new edition every four years.
Is the FDA Food Code a law?
Not on its own — it’s a model. It becomes enforceable only when a state, local, tribal, or territorial jurisdiction adopts a version of it. The edition your jurisdiction adopted is the one that applies.
Which states use the FDA Food Code?
Nearly all of them adopt some version. California is the only state that has not — it uses its own California Retail Food Code (CalCode) instead. States otherwise vary in which edition they’ve adopted.
Which edition of the FDA Food Code applies to my kitchen?
The edition your state and local health jurisdiction has adopted, which may be 2026, 2022, 2017, or older. Confirm the adopted edition for your jurisdiction.
Ready to see it?
Book a 30-minute demo and see how EvidLY keeps every fire and food safety record ready — before anyone asks.
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