Cruelty-free CBD in the UK: what it means and how it differs from vegan
Cruelty-free and vegan are two different promises, and CBD shoppers often treat them as one. Cruelty-free is about animal testing. Vegan is about what’s actually in the bottle, tin or capsule. This guide explains what each claim covers in the UK, how certification schemes such as Leaping Bunny work, what the law already says for some CBD products, and how to read an ingredients list so you can pick the right product with confidence. We use our own range as a worked example, because it shows the difference neatly: most of it is vegan, and one product isn’t.
TL;DR:
- Cruelty-free means no animal testing in the supply chain, usually from a fixed cut-off date. Vegan means no animal-derived ingredients. A product can be one without being the other.
- “Cruelty-free” has no legal definition for CBD oils and capsules in the UK. Leaping Bunny is the best-known certification scheme, and it checks cut-off dates, suppliers and independent audits.
- CBD balms and salves are cosmetics, and testing cosmetics on animals has been banned in the UK since 1998.
- Vegan is the claim you can check yourself: read the full ingredients list for beeswax, gelatin or lanolin, and check whether a capsule shell is plant cellulose or gelatin.
- Our whole range is cruelty-free: none of our ingredients are, or ever have been, tested on animals. Our oils, capsules, paste, distillate and isolate crystals are vegan too. Our body salve contains beeswax, so it isn’t.
Table of Contents
- What ‘cruelty-free’ actually means for CBD products
- How cruelty-free certification works: Leaping Bunny, supplier checks and cut-off dates
- Safety and legal context in the UK: FSA guidance, novel food status and lab certificates
- Vegan versus cruelty-free: what each claim covers and what to prioritise
- Practical buying checklist: how to pick vegan and cruelty-free CBD in the UK
- Which Honest CBD Co products are vegan and cruelty-free
- Ethical CBD doesn’t have to mean overpaying
- Where to buy vegan CBD from Honest CBD Co
- Sources
- FAQ
What ‘cruelty-free’ actually means for CBD products
A cruelty-free claim means no animal testing took place in the ingredient and manufacturing chain, normally from a fixed date onwards. That date matters more than most shoppers realise. It’s the point from which a brand and its suppliers commit to no animal testing, and it’s the backbone of every serious certification scheme.
A cruelty-free stamp covers animal testing only. It says nothing about whether the product contains animal-derived ingredients, and nothing about environmental or sustainability practices either.
Because the word isn’t legally defined for most CBD products, it can mean slightly different things on different labels:
- It may describe a brand’s own policy rather than an independently audited standard.
- It may cover the finished product rather than every raw ingredient.
- It says nothing about whether the product is vegan.
None of that makes a claim wrong. It just helps to know which question each label is answering.
The law is clearer for some CBD products than others. A CBD balm or salve is a cosmetic, and testing cosmetics or their ingredients on animals has been banned in the UK since 1998, with selling cosmetics that were animal-tested elsewhere banned since 2013. CBD oils and capsules taken by mouth are sold as food supplements, which have no equivalent cosmetics-style rule, so for those a cruelty-free claim rests on the brand and its suppliers.
How cruelty-free certification works: Leaping Bunny, supplier checks and cut-off dates
The best-known standard in the UK is Leaping Bunny, run by Cruelty Free International. It requires brands to set a fixed cut-off date, check their supply chain down to ingredient level, and submit to independent audits. That combination of cut-off date, supplier checks and outside audit is what a certification logo is telling you.
Plenty of brands describe their own approach without a certification scheme. The details that make any cruelty-free statement useful are the same ones the schemes look at:
- A clear statement that no animal testing takes place on the finished product or its raw ingredients.
- Some idea of where the ingredients come from and who supplies them.
- A cut-off date, or a plain explanation of what the claim does and doesn’t cover.
Two things are worth a second look. One is a badge with no explanation of what it covers. The other is a page that calls a whole range vegan while one product’s ingredients list beeswax or gelatin. Good businesses are happy to answer questions about either, so if something isn’t clear, drop them a line.
Pro Tip: If vegan matters to you, check each product in a range separately rather than assuming one product speaks for the rest. A brand’s oils can be fully vegan while its balm contains beeswax. Ours is exactly that case.
Safety and legal context in the UK: FSA guidance, novel food status and lab certificates
Cruelty-free and safe are separate questions, and the safety side has its own UK guidance. The Food Standards Agency’s current advice is for healthy adults to keep to about 10mg of CBD a day, alongside a safe upper level of 70 micrograms a day for Δ9-THC. In our view the CBD figure is precautionary rather than a practical ceiling: the FSA’s own advice was 70mg a day until autumn 2023, clinical research uses doses in the hundreds of milligrams, and many regular users settle somewhere between 25mg and 100mg or more a day. A sensible pattern is to start at 10-20mg, give it a fair trial of a couple of weeks, and build up gradually until you find your level. With our capsules, 40mg is the usual starting point, 80mg suits regular users and 120mg is for experienced users who know what works for them. If you take prescription medication, or you’re pregnant or breastfeeding, have a word with your GP or pharmacist first.
THC is covered separately by UK law: a finished CBD product can contain no more than 1mg of THC per container, which is a different and much stricter rule than the 0.3% figure you’ll see quoted on American sites.
CBD is also classed as a novel food in the UK, which means CBD food products need to go through the FSA’s authorisation process, with clear labelling and warnings for groups such as children and pregnant women. The FSA publishes the science behind its decisions too, including its safety assessment of CBD isolate as a novel food for use in food supplements.
You’ll often hear about certificates of analysis (CoAs) alongside all this. When you’re handed one, it typically shows:
- The cannabinoid profile, including the CBD content and the Δ9-THC result.
- The date the sample was tested.
- Screening results for contaminants such as heavy metals, pesticides and residual solvents, where those tests were run.
Our own CBD is lab-tested at source, and we’re happy to share the certificates of analysis with anyone who’d like to see them.
Vegan versus cruelty-free: what each claim covers and what to prioritise
Vegan and cruelty-free answer different questions, and CBD shoppers often assume one implies the other. It doesn’t. Vegan means the finished product contains no animal-derived ingredients at all. Cruelty-free means no animal testing happened in the supply chain. A product can be one without being the other.
The difference shows up in real product types:
- A CBD body salve often uses beeswax for texture, which makes it non-vegan whatever its testing story. Our body salve is a good example: its base is shea butter, coconut oil and beeswax, with vitamin E and lavender and ylang ylang essential oils.
- A CBD capsule may use a gelatin shell, which is animal-derived, or a plant-cellulose shell, which is vegan. Our capsules use plant cellulose.
- Oils and isolates are usually the simplest vegan choice, because there’s little in them besides CBD and a plant carrier oil. Our Full Spectrum CBD Oil uses organic hemp seed oil, and our CBD Isolate Oil uses coconut-derived C8 MCT oil. We cover the differences between carriers in our guide to CBD carrier oils.
If both claims matter to you, check them separately rather than assuming a “cruelty-free” badge covers ingredients too. Vegan is the easier of the two to confirm for yourself, because it’s all on the ingredients list. Our full guide, Is CBD vegan?, goes through the label checks ingredient by ingredient.
Practical buying checklist: how to pick vegan and cruelty-free CBD in the UK
Work through these steps before you add anything to your basket:
- Decide which claim matters to you: cruelty-free (testing), vegan (ingredients) or both.
- Read the full ingredients list, not just the front of the pack. Beeswax, gelatin, lanolin, shellac and carmine are the usual animal-derived ingredients.
- For capsules, check the shell: plant cellulose is vegan, gelatin isn’t.
- Check each product in a range on its own merits, especially balms and salves.
- Look at the strength in mg, not just the percentage, and work out the price per mg. Our guide to reading CBD labels shows the maths.
- Check the UK basics: the product should carry the usual warnings for children, pregnancy and breastfeeding, and stay within the UK’s 1mg-per-container THC rule.
- Buy from a real, contactable business with a track record. Years of trading and plenty of genuine Trustpilot reviews tell you a lot about how a company treats its customers.
Pro Tip: If a product page doesn’t answer your question about ingredients or sourcing, email the business. A small UK maker will usually be glad to help.
Which Honest CBD Co products are vegan and cruelty-free
We’re a husband-and-wife business in Bolton, trading since 2018, and we make our own products in the UK in small batches. Every product we make is cruelty-free: none of our ingredients are, or ever have been, tested on animals. They’re lab-tested, and that’s it. Vegan is the one that varies, so here it is product by product:
- Full Spectrum CBD Oil: vegan. Hemp extract in organic hemp seed oil.
- CBD Isolate Oil: vegan. CBD isolate in coconut-derived C8 MCT oil.
- Full Spectrum CBD Capsules: vegan. Hemp oils in a plant-cellulose shell.
- Whole Plant Paste, 85% Distillate, 50% Amber Oil and 99.9% Isolate Crystals: vegan.
- CBD Body Salve: not vegan, because it contains beeswax. It also contains lavender and ylang ylang essential oils, which is worth knowing if you have sensitive skin.
That’s the same distinction this guide draws between the two claims, applied to our own shelf: cruelty-free across the board, vegan for everything except the salve. If you’d like to know anything else about how a product is made, email us and you’ll get an answer from the people who make it.
Ethical CBD doesn’t have to mean overpaying
Buying in line with your values shouldn’t mean paying a premium for a label. In the UK’s CBD market there’s no reason a plant-based, clearly labelled product should cost more per mg than anything else on the shelf.
We price per mg, and we’re happy for you to compare. Our 10% Full Spectrum CBD Oil is £25.99 for 1,000mg, about 2.6p per mg. Our 10% CBD Isolate Oil is £14.99 for 1,000mg, about 1.5p per mg. A 30-pack of 40mg capsules is £35.99 for 1,200mg, about 3p per mg. That pricing, plus eight years of looking after our customers, is why we’re rated Excellent on Trustpilot across more than 700 reviews.
Where to buy vegan CBD from Honest CBD Co
If you’re looking for vegan CBD from a UK business you can actually talk to, our range is a good place to start.
- New to CBD and want the simplest vegan option? Start with the CBD Isolate Oil, flavourless and THC-free, from £14.99 for 10ml.
- Want the whole hemp plant? The Full Spectrum CBD Oil starts at £25.99 for 1,000mg in organic hemp seed oil.
- Prefer no taste and a set dose? Our vegan Full Spectrum CBD Capsules come in 40mg, 80mg and 120mg, from £19.99 for 15.
- Looking for something for your skin? The CBD Body Salve is £19.99 for a 50ml tin with 500mg CBD. It’s cruelty-free, but it contains beeswax, so it’s not one for vegans.
Every order comes with free UK delivery and our 30-day money-back guarantee: if you’re not happy, you get a full refund, no questions asked. Browse the full range and pick the format that suits you.
Sources
For up-to-date rules, go direct to the source. The FSA’s CBD guidance covers safety advice, Cruelty Free International runs the Leaping Bunny scheme, and RCVS Knowledge covers veterinary use for pets.
This article is general information, not a substitute for advice from a qualified doctor. Consult a qualified healthcare professional about your own circumstances before acting on anything here.
- Cannabidiol (CBD) guidance | Food Standards Agency
- Our approval programme | Cruelty Free International
- Cannabidiol (CBD) guidance for business | Food Standards Agency
- Safety assessment on CBD isolate as a novel food (FSA science)
FAQ
Are there any vegan CBD gummies available in the UK?
Yes, some UK brands sell vegan gummies, usually set with pectin rather than gelatin. Plenty of gummies do use gelatin, though, so read the full ingredients list rather than relying on the front of the pack. We don’t make gummies ourselves. If you’re after a vegan, taste-free way to take a set dose, our capsules use plant-cellulose shells.
What CBD does Kerry Katona use?
We haven’t seen a publicly listed, verifiable answer to this, so we can’t name a specific product. Whatever a celebrity uses, the things that decide whether a product suits you are the same: the strength in mg, the ingredients, the price per mg and the business behind it.
Do vets recommend CBD for dogs?
There are currently no CBD products authorised as veterinary medicines in the UK, and the Veterinary Medicines Directorate oversees any veterinary claims, so your vet is the right person to ask. It helps to know that there’s no difference between “pet” CBD and human CBD: it’s the same cannabidiol, usually weaker and dearer per mg under a pet label, and plenty of our customers use our range with their animals. Carrier oil matters, especially for cats, and animals are more sensitive to THC than people are. Speak to your vet before giving a pet any CBD product, since it can interact with other medicines.
Is CBD hard on the liver or kidneys?
The FSA’s guidance is precautionary partly because there’s still uncertainty about the longer-term effects of higher doses, including on the liver. If you have a liver or kidney condition, take prescription medication, or are pregnant or breastfeeding, speak to your GP or pharmacist before using CBD. CBD isn’t recommended for under-18s.
What should I check before buying cruelty-free CBD in the UK?
Start by deciding whether you need cruelty-free (no animal testing), vegan (no animal ingredients) or both. Leaping Bunny is the best-known cruelty-free certification. For vegan, read the full ingredients list and check capsule shells. Then check the strength in mg, the price per mg, and that you’re buying from an established, contactable UK business.
Recommended
- Is CBD vegan? What to check on the label (UK guide)
- CBD age limit UK: what buyers need to know
- How to spot fake CBD oil in the UK: five one-minute checks
- Can you overdose on CBD? The honest UK answer
We are a husband-and-wife business making honest, lab-tested CBD in the UK since 2018. We pack every order by hand and answer every email ourselves. More about us.
