Ammonium sulphate is the acidity regulator the food industry lists as E517. In our table it is no risk identified: it takes no points off a product's score.
- The key finding, from EFSA: No need for a numerical ADI; exposure does not raise a safety concern at reported uses; low acute toxicity, no genotoxicity or carcinogenicity concern (EFSA Journal 2019;17(8):5868, doi:10.2903/j.efsa.2019.5868, Re-evaluation of sulphuric acid and its salts (E 513 to 517))
- No child flag. The class, and the points it costs, are the same for a child of any age.
- Where you meet it. It turns up in 1 of the 10,000 packaged foods scanned most on Open Food Facts. Nine in ten of those foods are sold in Europe (counted 26 Sep 2026).
- 1 citation from EFSA, each one below.
What Ammonium sulphate does to a score
A packaged food's additive subscore starts at 100 and loses points for each additive on the label; that subscore is a third of the final score. Ammonium sulphate takes no points off a product's score. Scan the pack in Sito and the score you get is the one for your own child's age, with this additive named in the reasons. How we score has the whole method.
See what is in your own cupboard
Scan a packaged food and Sito names the additives in it, then scores the product out of 100 for your child's age.
What the sources found
Every classification in our table comes from the citations below, and nothing else. Each finding is our one-line summary of what the source concluded, with the source and reference beside it.
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EFSA
Journal 2019;17(8):5868 — doi:10.2903/j.efsa.2019.5868, Re-evaluation of sulphuric acid and its salts (E 513–517)
No need for a numerical ADI; exposure does not raise a safety concern at reported uses; low acute toxicity, no genotoxicity or carcinogenicity concern.
Why this class
Clean current EFSA and FDA status. These rows exist so that an unfamiliar additive is never treated as a bad one: a missing row costs a product nothing, and a clean row says so with citations.
Our confidence in this row's classification is high. Medium or low does not mean the evidence is weak; it means something about the row is still being pinned down, usually a regulatory status confirmed from one source rather than two.
Questions parents ask
Is Ammonium sulphate (E517) safe for kids?
No risk identified. No regulator finding we score, so a product keeps its full additive subscore in Sito. The current status is clean: No need for a numerical ADI; exposure does not raise a safety concern at reported uses; low acute toxicity, no genotoxicity or carcinogenicity concern (EFSA Journal 2019;17(8):5868, doi:10.2903/j.efsa.2019.5868, Re-evaluation of sulphuric acid and its salts (E 513 to 517)).
What is E517?
E517 is the E number for Ammonium sulphate, an acidity regulator. Open Food Facts tags it en:e517.
Next to it on the label
The E numbers either side of E517 in our table, then the closest acidity regulators by number.
- Sodium sulphates (E514), no risk identified
- Calcium sulphate (E516), no risk identified
- Aluminium sulphate (E520), moderate risk, flagged for young children
- Aluminium sodium sulphate (E521), moderate risk, flagged for young children
- Aluminium potassium sulphate (E522), moderate risk, flagged for young children
- Aluminium ammonium sulphate (E523), moderate risk, flagged for young children