Sodium alginate

E number E401INS 401CAS 9005-38-3

Used as an emulsifier — Codex also lists it as bulking agent, carrier, foaming, agent, gelling agent, glazing agent, humectant, sequestrant, stabilizer, thickener.

Sodium alginate is the most used of the alginates, a seaweed thickener that forms a gel instantly on contact with calcium. That reaction is what produces the spheres in modernist cooking and the pimento in stuffed olives.

Where it is and isn’t permitted

Status of Sodium alginate by jurisdiction. Every jurisdiction this site covers is listed, including those where the substance does not appear.
Jurisdiction	Status	Scope and limits	Citation
United StatesFood and Drug Administration	Permitted		21 CFR 184.1724retrieved 2026-09-07
Codex AlimentariusCodex Alimentarius Commission / JECFA	Permitted, with conditions	22 food categories no numerical limit (good manufacturing practice) Show every food category 01.2.1.1 Fermented milks (plain), not heat-treated after fermentation — GMP 01.2.1.2 Fermented milks (plain), heat-treated after fermentation — GMP 01.2.2 Renneted milk (plain) — GMP 01.4.1 Pasteurized cream (plain) — GMP 01.4.2 Sterilized and UHT creams, whipping and whipped creams, and reduced fat creams (plain) — GMP 04.1.1.2 Surface-treated fresh fruit — GMP 04.2.1.2 Surface-treated fresh vegetables, (including mushrooms and fungi, roots and tubers, pulses and legumes, and aloe vera), seaweeds and nuts and seeds — GMP 06.4.1 Fresh pastas and noodles and like products — GMP 06.4.2 Dried pastas and noodles and like products — GMP 08.1.1 Fresh meat, poultry and game, whole pieces or cuts — GMP 08.1.2 Fresh meat, poultry and game, comminuted — 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 09.2.4.1 Cooked fish and fish products — GMP 09.2.4.2 Cooked molluscs, crustaceans, and echinoderms — GMP 09.2.4.3 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 10.2.1 Liquid egg products — GMP 10.2.2 Frozen egg products — GMP 11.4 Other sugars and syrups (e.g. xylose, maple syrup, sugar toppings) — 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 401and 22 further provisionsretrieved 2026-09-07

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.

Sodium alginate

Where it is and isn’t permitted

What it is made from

Every name it appears under

E number

INS number

CAS registry number

As it appears in regulation

Other names

Hazard reference values

Evidence and how bodies read it

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