Monosodium L-glutamate

INS 621CAS 6106-04-3

Used as a flavour enhancer.

Monosodium glutamate is the best known flavour enhancer, giving the savoury taste called umami. Glutamate occurs naturally in tomatoes, cheese and mushrooms; MSG is the isolated sodium salt of the same compound.

Where it is and isn’t permitted

Status of Monosodium L-glutamate by jurisdiction. Every jurisdiction this site covers is listed, including those where the substance does not appear.
JurisdictionStatusScope and limitsCitation
United StatesFood and Drug AdministrationNot listedDoes not appear on this jurisdiction’s permitted list. That is not the same as being prohibited.
Codex AlimentariusCodex Alimentarius Commission / JECFAPermitted, with conditions

11 food categories

no numerical limit (good manufacturing practice)

Show every food category
  • 04.2.2.1 Frozen vegetables (including mushrooms and fungi, roots and tubers, pulses and legumes, and aloe vera), seaweeds and nuts and seeds — GMP
  • 04.2.2.7 Fermented vegetable (including mushrooms and fungi, roots and tubers, pulses and legumes, and aloe vera) and seaweed products, excluding fermented soybean products of food categories 06.8.6, 06.8.7, 12.9.1, — GMP
  • 06.4.2 Dried pastas and noodles and like products — GMP
  • 08.1 Fresh meat, poultry, and game — GMP
  • 09.2.1 Frozen fish, fish fillets, and fish products, including molluscs, crustaceans, and echinoderms — GMP
  • 09.2.2 Frozen battered fish, fish fillets and fish products, including molluscs, crustaceans, and echinoderms — GMP
  • 09.2.3 Frozen minced and creamed fish products, including molluscs, crustaceans, and echinoderms — GMP
  • 09.2.4 Cooked and/or fried fish and fish products, including molluscs, crustaceans, and echinoderms — GMP
  • 09.2.5 Smoked, dried, fermented, and/or salted fish and fish products, including molluscs, crustaceans, and echinoderms — GMP
  • 12.1.2 Salt substitutes — GMP
  • 14.1.5 Coffee, coffee substitutes, tea, herbal infusions, and other hot cereal and grain beverages, excluding cocoa — GMP
CXS 192-1995 Table Three, INS 621and 11 further provisionsretrieved 2026-09-07

What it is made from

Produced by fermenting a carbohydrate feedstock — usually sugar cane molasses, beet or starch — with Corynebacterium bacteria, then neutralising with sodium and crystallising. It has not been made from wheat gluten commercially for decades, despite the name.

  • Vegan
  • Vegetarian
CAS registry number
6106-04-3
InChIKey
FMGRPEQSMWQKHM-QTNFYWBSSA-N
PubChem
CID 87090819

Every name it appears under

13 recorded names. A label may use any of them.

INS number

  • 621

CAS registry number

  • 6106-04-3

Other names

  • L(+)-Monosodium glutamate monohydrate
  • L-Glutamic acid monosodium salt monohydrate
  • L-Glutamic acid monosodium salt monohydrate, >=98.0% (NT)
  • L-Glutamic acid monosodium salt monohydrate, p.a., 99.0%
  • L-Glutamic acid monosodium salt monohydrate, SAJ special grade, >=99.0%
  • L-glutamic acid, sodium salt hydrate
  • Monosodium glutamate, United States Pharmacopeia (USP) Reference Standard
  • MONOSODIUM L-GLUTAMATE
  • Sodium glutamate monohydrate
  • SodiuM L-GlutaMate Monohydrate

Systematic names

  • sodium (2S)-2-amino-4-carboxybutanoate hydrate

Hazard reference values

Values set by assessing bodies. A body that has not set a value is not listed here.
TypeValuePopulationAssessed byOpinion
ADI30 mg/kg bw/dayconsumersEFSAnot identified in the dataset

Evidence and how bodies read it

Studies, and the differing conclusions regulators drew from them, are curated by hand rather than machine-read, and none has been written for this substance yet.

Sources for this page

  • gsfa retrieved 2026-09-07

Full licence terms and publisher details on Sources. How this page is built and updated: Method.

Machine-readable:/api/v1/additives/monosodium-l-glutamate.json