How CBD Regulations Shape What Consumers Buy and Why

CBD may be the same molecule from one country to another, but consumers do not encounter it in the same way. In Canada, it is regulated as cannabis and sold through authorized cannabis channels. In Australia and Aotearoa New Zealand, legal access is largely tied to medical prescribing. In the United Kingdom, CBD drinks, oils, and edibles can appear alongside ordinary consumer goods. The United States has an especially fragmented market in which CBD can be found online, in cannabis stores, and at everyday retailers.

A new international study of 79,644 people shows that these differences are not merely legal details. They help determine which CBD products people use, where they obtain them, and whether they understand CBD as cannabis medicine or as a conventional wellness product.¹

The findings also reveal a tension at the centre of the CBD market. Across all six countries examined, people frequently used CBD to manage pain, anxiety, depression, and sleep problems. However, commercial interest and consumer adoption have moved considerably faster than the clinical evidence supporting many of those uses.

CBD Use Changes With the Regulatory Environment

The researchers analyzed responses collected in 2024 from people aged 16 to 65 in Canada, the United States, Australia, Aotearoa New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and Germany. The survey used harmonized questions, allowing the team to compare behaviours across markets with very different CBD rules.

The United States recorded the highest CBD-only use at every measured interval. Lifetime use reached 46.4%, past-year use reached 19.3%, and past-month use reached 7.7%. Aotearoa New Zealand was at the opposite end, with lifetime use of 16.2%, past-year use of 5.5%, and past-month use of 2.1%.

Availability helps explain part of that divide. American consumers encounter hemp-derived CBD through numerous online and physical retailers, while CBD in Australia and New Zealand remains closely connected to clinical channels. Lower use in those markets may therefore reflect access friction as much as consumer interest.

Regulation acts like an invisible part of the product. A bottle obtained from a clinic communicates medical legitimacy, while the same ingredient sold beside beverages or supplements communicates general wellness.

Canada Treats CBD as Cannabis, Not a Supplement

Canada occupies a distinctive position in the comparison. Under Canada’s CBD regulatory framework, legal CBD products are subject to the Cannabis Act even when they contain little or no THC. They must come from a federally licensed source and are generally sold through provincially or territorially authorized cannabis retailers.

That system provides a regulated supply chain and standardized label information. It also separates CBD from the supplements consumers may expect to find at pharmacies or mainstream stores.

The study found that 15.4% of Canadian respondents had used a CBD-only product during the previous year. Edibles were the most commonly reported format at 31.6%, while 46.7% of users reported taking CBD for pain and 41.8% for anxiety. Canada also had the greatest overlap between CBD and broader cannabis use: 71.8% of Canadian CBD consumers had used cannabis for some purpose during the past year.

Canada has effectively built a CBD market understood through the lens of cannabis. That supports oversight but may discourage people who are uncomfortable entering a cannabis store.

Consumers Use CBD for Similar Reasons Worldwide

Although legal structures differed, consumers’ motivations were remarkably consistent. Pain was one of the leading physical reasons in every country, while anxiety and depression dominated reported mental-health uses. Sleep problems and headaches or migraines were also common.

The figures describe why respondents used CBD, not whether treatment worked. A survey can identify unmet needs and popular beliefs, but it cannot establish that CBD caused an improvement. Evidence remains limited or absent for many of the conditions reported.

Three issues make that gap especially important:

• Retail CBD doses can be far below those tested in clinical trials.
• Product quality and cannabinoid content can vary between markets.
• CBD can interact with medications and produce adverse effects.

The result is a market in which the language of wellness can imply more certainty than the research permits. A consumer who says CBD helps with anxiety may be reporting a genuine personal experience, but that does not establish the appropriate dose, long-term safety, or likely benefit for the wider population.

Where CBD Is Sold Changes What It Means

Clinical Channels Encourage a Medical Interpretation

In Australia and New Zealand, pharmacies and clinics were the most commonly reported purchasing sources. CBD is effectively positioned as part of the medical cannabis system, even though some consumers still obtain it through informal channels. Nearly 40% of people in those two countries who had ever used CBD said they had done so because they could not legally access medical cannabis.

Some people may therefore use CBD as a reachable alternative to medical cannabis. However, after adjustment for demographic and cannabis-use differences, the association between restrictive medical access and CBD substitution was no longer statistically significant. Availability, marketing, and cultural expectations also influence behaviour.

Ordinary Retail Channels Encourage a Wellness Interpretation

In the United Kingdom, CBD products are more visible in conventional retail settings. Drinks, edibles, and oils can be sold as consumer goods if they satisfy the applicable requirements. That availability helps separate CBD from medical cannabis in the public imagination.

Europe is still debating how much confidence that model deserves. The European Food Safety Authority established a highly cautious provisional intake level for certain purified CBD supplements, as covered in a recent report on hemp-derived CBD safety. MyCannabis has also reported on the first positive EU novel food opinion claimed by a CBD producer, illustrating how manufacturers are trying to move products through formal safety review rather than relying on a loosely governed wellness market.

At the same time, a separate European process has raised concerns about possible reproductive hazards. The proposed CBD reproductive toxicant classification does not itself prove that ordinary consumer exposure causes harm, but it shows why food authorization, chemical hazard assessment, dose, and intended use must not be collapsed into a single claim that CBD is either universally safe or universally dangerous.

CBD Policy Is Also Product Design

The study’s broader lesson is that regulators design consumer behaviour even when they are only trying to design a legal market. Rules governing retail locations, product formats, labels, health claims, and prescriptions create the context in which buyers decide what CBD is for.

Canada’s framework emphasizes cannabis controls and legal supply. Australia and New Zealand emphasize clinical access. The United Kingdom allows CBD to function more like a mainstream wellness category. The United States combines several models at once, producing high availability but also substantial inconsistency.

No framework solves every problem. Strict channels can improve oversight while discouraging access. Mainstream retail can normalize CBD while spreading weakly supported assumptions. Medical positioning can also blur the difference between approved medicines and unregistered products.

A better policy objective would be informed access. Consumers need accurate cannabinoid content, realistic explanations of the evidence, warnings about drug interactions, and a clear distinction between approved CBD medicines and commercial products. Regulators also need surveillance capable of identifying how people actually use these products after they reach the market.

The CBD Market Has Outrun the Evidence

The international consistency in reasons for use is arguably more important than the differences in prevalence. People across six countries are turning to CBD for many of the same difficult, persistent conditions. That indicates real demand for options addressing pain, anxiety, depression, and disrupted sleep.

It also creates an obligation not to confuse demand with proof. CBD may eventually earn a larger therapeutic role, but consumer enthusiasm cannot substitute for trials that establish which formulations work, at what doses, for which patients, and with what risks.

The next phase of CBD policy should therefore move beyond the simple question of whether products are legal. The more useful questions are whether consumers understand what they are buying, whether the product matches its label, whether its claims reflect credible evidence, and whether the retail environment directs people toward appropriate guidance. As this study demonstrates, where CBD is sold helps determine what consumers believe it can do.

References:

¹ Wadsworth, E., Graham, M., Rychert, M., Krowartz, E.-M., Pacula, R. L., Hoch, E., Freeman, T. P., & Hammond, D. (2026). Use of cannabidiol products in Canada, United States, Australia, Aotearoa New Zealand, United Kingdom and Germany: Products, sources and reasons for use. International Journal of Drug Policy, 157, 105506. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.drugpo.2026.105506