If you've bought supplements before, you've probably seen a Prop 65 warning label.
It looks alarming.
It's also one of the most misunderstood labels in retail—a product carrying it isn't necessarily less safe than one that doesn't.
What Is Prop 65?
Proposition 65—the Safe Drinking Water and Toxic Enforcement Act—passed by California voters in 1986.
It requires businesses to warn consumers about exposure to any of the 800+ chemicals California has listed as potential carcinogens or reproductive toxins, regardless of the actual amount present or the real-world risk.
If a product contains a detectable trace of a listed chemical above the threshold, it needs the label — full stop, no context provided on the label itself.
What Triggers the Warning
Common trigger categories include pesticide residues, food ingredients, dyes, manufacturing byproducts, and heavy metals like lead, arsenic, cadmium, and mercury.
Heavy metals are the most common trigger for supplements and herbal products specifically, because these elements occur naturally in soil and water — plants absorb trace amounts as they grow.
How Strict Is the Lead Limit, Really?
Prop 65's safe harbor level for lead is 0.5 micrograms per day.
For comparison:
A product can be well within FDA and international safety limits and still trigger a Prop 65 warning, because California's threshold isn't set relative to those standards.
It's set roughly 1,000x below the level where any effect has been observed in reproductive toxicity studies.
Why Some Herbal Products Never Show the Label
Lead is naturally present in soil at 50–400 ppm even without pollution, higher near industrial areas.
Root vegetables and herbs grown in that soil pick up trace amounts — it's part of how plants grow, not a sign of contamination.
This is also why the same natural lead trace shows up in ordinary foods most people eat without a warning label in sight — spinach, sweet potatoes, avocado, honey, dark chocolate.
Whether a product ends up needing the label comes down to lab-tested exposure levels per serving, not the category of product.
What We Test For
Wild Foods sets internal specs for lead, cadmium, mercury, and arsenic below FDA and California thresholds, and every batch is tested by an independent lab before it ships.
If you have questions about a specific product's test results, contact us—we can walk through the COA.
Does a Prop 65 warning mean a product is dangerous?
Not necessarily. It means a product contains a trace of a listed chemical above California's threshold — a threshold set far below the levels linked to any observed harm, and often below what's naturally present in everyday food.
Why do some supplements have a Prop 65 warning and others don't?
It depends on lab-tested exposure levels for that specific product, not the category. A company that tests below the threshold isn't required to add the label.
Is Prop 65's limit the same as the FDA's?
No. Prop 65's lead threshold (0.5mcg/day) is far below the FDA's (75mcg/day for adults). A product can meet FDA and international safety standards and still require a Prop 65 warning in California.
