Home / Additive Table / Riboflavin (E101)

Riboflavin (E101)

Table v1.3 (data as of 14 Aug 2026), page updated 26 Sep 2026

Riboflavin is the color the food industry lists as E101. In our table it is no risk identified: it takes no points off a product's score.

In short
  • The key finding, from EFSA: Riboflavin (E101(i)) and riboflavin-5'-phosphate sodium (E101(ii)) are unlikely to be of safety concern at the reported uses and use levels (10.2903/j.efsa.2013.3357)
  • 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 32 of the 10,000 packaged foods scanned most on Open Food Facts, most often in soft drinks, plant-based milks and cookies. Nine in ten of those foods are sold in Europe (counted 26 Sep 2026).
  • 1 citation from EFSA, each one below.

What Riboflavin 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. Riboflavin 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.

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Sito app: a cereal scored 30 out of 100 for a child's age Sito app: logging a child's meal from a photo

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.

  • EFSA 10.2903/j.efsa.2013.3357
    Riboflavin (E101(i)) and riboflavin-5'-phosphate sodium (E101(ii)) are unlikely to be of safety concern at the reported uses and use levels.

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 Riboflavin (E101) 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: Riboflavin (E101(i)) and riboflavin-5'-phosphate sodium (E101(ii)) are unlikely to be of safety concern at the reported uses and use levels (EFSA, 10.2903/j.efsa.2013.3357).

What is E101?

E101 is the E number for Riboflavin, a color. Open Food Facts tags it en:e101.

Next to it on the label

The E numbers either side of E101 in our table, then the closest colors by number.

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