Since June 21, 2025, a new plain language labelling regime has governed natural health products sold in Canada. By mid 2028, every product on the market will have to comply. For a manufacturer, an importer or a distributor, this is not a cosmetic tweak: it is a packaging overhaul to plan for now.

A new regime already in force

The Regulations Amending the Natural Health Products Regulations (SOR/2022-146) introduced plain language labelling requirements. These requirements have been in force since June 21, 2025. Health Canada’s objective is simple: make information more legible, more complete and easier to compare for the consumer, in the same spirit as what already exists for over the counter drugs.

In practical terms, the regulations no longer just state what information must appear on the label. They now dictate how that information must be presented. Format becomes a condition of compliance, on the same footing as content.

Who is affected? Any business that manufactures, packages, labels, imports or distributes natural health products intended for the Canadian market. Product licence holders, private label manufacturers and foreign companies looking to enter Canada are all covered. There is no exemption based on company size or sales volume: the same standard applies to everyone.

The Product Facts table, the centrepiece

At the heart of the reform is a standardized table: the Product Facts table. It groups the essential information in a required order that the consumer will find from one product to the next.

According to Health Canada’s guidance document, the sections appear in this precise order:

• medicinal ingredients;
• uses or recommended purposes (at least one must appear);
• warnings;
• directions for use;
• other information;
• non-medicinal ingredients;
• contact information, in a section set aside for consumer questions.

All warnings prescribed in the market authorization must also appear in the right place within this table. In other words, the label must faithfully reflect the terms of your product licence.

Legibility becomes a requirement, not a suggestion

The guidance document spells out the formatting rules clearly. Text must be set in a standard sans serif type of at least 6 point, except for non-medicinal ingredients, which must be at least 5.5 point. Contrast must be high: text in the visual equivalent of solid black, on a white or neutral background.

These details may seem minor. They are not. A type size that is too small, a background that is too tinted or a decorative typeface can be enough to make a label non compliant, even if all the content is accurate. That is often where redesigns fall behind.

Contact information, allergens and mandatory statements

The table must let the consumer reach you. The contact information provided must include the full digital representation of a telephone number, an email address or a website address. At least one of these three contact routes is mandatory.

Allergen statements also gain visibility. Food allergen sources, the mention of gluten and its sources, and added sulphites at a concentration of 10 ppm or more must appear in bold. The statement indicating the presence of aspartame remains required where it applies.

The basic statements naturally remain: brand name, identification number (NPN or DIN-HM), dosage form, net quantity, lot number and expiry date. None of this disappears; it simply all has to fit within the new standardized framework.

Two deadlines not to be confused

This is where vigilance is essential, because the regulations provide two distinct treatments depending on the product’s licensing date.

Products licensed in Canada before June 21, 2025 benefit from an additional three year transition period. They must be compliant no later than June 22, 2028, which represents a total of six years after the registration of the amending regulations.

Products licensed on or after June 21, 2025 are covered by an exemption order, order SOR/2025-94, published in the Canada Gazette. This order lets them keep using the former labelling during the transition period. It is repealed on June 21, 2028. Without this measure, a product licensed in 2025 would have had to comply before an older product, an inconsistency that Health Canada chose to correct.

Three years is not a lot

The 2028 deadline can create a false sense of comfort. In practice, a labelling overhaul mobilizes several links in the chain: artwork revision, regulatory validation, new print plates, depletion of existing packaging stock and coordination with suppliers and contract manufacturers. Each step takes time and depends on the others.

For importers, the challenge is twofold. Labels designed for a foreign market must be adapted to the Canadian format, to bilingual requirements and to the standardized table. For companies managing dozens of products, the volume effect is real: it is better to plan the overhaul in waves than to defer everything to the final year. Starting with your highest volume products limits the risk of dead stock and spreads the cost over more than one budget cycle.

The risk is concrete. After the deadline, a non compliant label found during an inspection or a verification exposes the business to compliance action. A stock of packaging that has become unsellable is also a straight loss that planning helps avoid.

In short

The new labelling for natural health products is no longer on the horizon: it is already here, and the general compliance deadline is approaching. Companies that treat the overhaul as a structured project, rather than a last minute formality, will reach 2028 without stress and without regulatory risk. This is exactly the kind of undertaking that is planned better at twenty four months than at three.