Food recalls in 2026: fewer than last year, but Salmonella at a five-year high

Are food recalls going up in 2026? We counted every food recall the FDA classified from January through September, for each year since 2022. The total is slightly down from 2025. But recalls for Salmonella have reached a five-year high, and recalls for undeclared food dyes have multiplied by six.

The total: the second-highest in five years

From January 1 to September 30, 2026, the FDA classified 384 food recalls. Over the same nine months it classified 408 in 2025, 353 in 2024, 375 in 2023 and 351 in 2022.

That is 6% fewer than in 2025, the busiest year of the five, but more than in any other year since 2022. Of the 384 recalls, 146 are Class I, the FDA's most serious category: a reasonable probability that the product will cause serious health problems or death.

Salmonella: the highest count in five years

The FDA classified 63 recalls for Salmonella in the first nine months of 2026, more than in any year since at least 2022, and four times as many as in 2023. They are not one outbreak counted many times: the 63 recalls come from 62 different companies, from broccoli sprouts and spices to chocolate, nuts and salad dressing.

Listeria moved the other way: 18 recalls, the lowest of the five years.

Undeclared dyes: from 4 recalls to 25

Recalls for color additives not declared on the label — Yellow No. 5, Yellow No. 6, Red No. 40 and others — went from 4 in the first nine months of 2022 to 7, 8, 18 and now 25 in 2026. One ice cream maker alone recalled 48 products for undeclared Yellow No. 5 this year, and in October the Gatorade recall, not yet counted here, added another.

An undeclared dye matters for people who react to it, and for parents who choose to avoid it. The rise in recalls shows labels being checked more closely; the data does not say whether more products contain these dyes.

Allergens remain the first cause

Undeclared allergens are still the most common reason: 138 recalls in 2026, about one in three. Milk, wheat, soy, peanuts, tree nuts, sesame, eggs, fish and shellfish must be declared on U.S. labels; a missing word can be dangerous for someone with a severe allergy. The largest single recall of the year by number of products is one of them: 121 products from one grocery company whose label did not declare salmon.

What these numbers do not say

More recalls do not necessarily mean less safe food. A recall is often the result of a check that worked: a company's own testing, a state laboratory sample, an FDA inspection. FDA records do not let us tell more contamination apart from closer scrutiny, and we do not try to.

They do show one practical thing: the FDA classifies more than nine food recalls a week on average, and these figures do not even include meat, poultry and egg products, which the USDA oversees separately. Nobody can follow them all by hand.

Method

We counted FDA food recall events with a center classification date between January 1 and September 30 of each year, from 2022 to 2026, using the openFDA food enforcement data. One event can cover several products; counts are by event. Reasons (Salmonella, allergens, dyes) are classified by Numeline from the FDA's "reason for recall" field. Recent records can be added to the FDA database a few weeks late, so the 2026 figures may still rise slightly.