2026 Key results

Trust in food labels has remained strong and stable since 2023, with highest trust in date marking (78%), the Nutrition Information Panel (76%), allergen information (75%), ingredients lists (73%), and advisory statements (71%).
Importance ratings have remained largely unchanged since 2023, with date marking consistently rated as the most important label element.
Ingredients lists and the Nutrition Information Panel (NIP) remain highly valued by consumers.
Trust in and importance of the Health Star Rating (HSR) have remained stable since 2023.
Most consumers are confident using food labels, with 80% reporting they can use labels to make informed food choices.
Among the 438 respondents who lack confidence using food labels, the key barriers were:
- small or difficult-to-read text
- lack of trust in food label information
- difficulty understanding label information.
Food additives are the most common type of information consumers looked for in ingredients lists (41%), followed by key ingredients (37%) and artificial sweeteners (34%).

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Trust, Use and Understanding of Food Labelling

Trust in Food Labelling

In 2026, the most highly trusted food labelling elements, trusted by 71 to 78% of consumers, were date marking (best before/use by dates), the NIP, allergen information, ingredients list and advisory statements. In comparison, health claims, the HSR system and nutrient content claims were the least trusted elements, trusted by only 42 to 57% of consumers.

Consumer trust in food labelling elements has remained generally moderate to high and stable between 2023 and 2026. While seven out of eight labelling elements recorded slightly higher trust scores in 2025 and 2026 than in earlier years, the overall pattern of trust remained largely unchanged. Trust in the HSR remained unchanged across the four years.

Line chart showing mean trust in food labelling information from 2023 to 2026. Trust was highest for date marking and lowest for health claims, with most measures increasing to 2025 before remaining steady or declining slightly in 2026. — Trust in labelling elements by year, 2023 – 2026.

Overall, 71.6% of consumers trusted FSANZ-regulated food labelling (all elements except for the HSR).

Pie chart showing overall trust in food labelling information. Seventy-two per cent trusted food labelling information, 19% were neutral and 13% expressed distrust. — Trust in FSANZ-regulated food labelling elements.

Importance of food labelling

Date marking, the ingredients list and the NIP were the 3 most important food labelling elements when consumers were deciding whether to buy a packaged food for the first time. Health claims were rated the least important.

Bar chart showing the importance of different types of food labelling information. Date marking was rated most important at 84%, followed by the ingredients list at 75% and Nutrition Information Panel at 74%. Health claims had the lowest importance rating at 46%. — Importance of labelling elements to initial food purchasing decisions. Question: Think about when you are making the decision to buy a packaged food or drink for the first time. How important is the following labelling information when deciding what to buy? Important = score of 5, 6, 7 on seven-point scale; neutral = score of 4; Not important = score of 1, 2, 3.

Generally, the importance consumers placed on food labelling elements increased in 2025 compared to earlier years, then slightly dropped in 2026. The perceived importance of the HSR and the overall rankings of the labelling elements remained largely unchanged across all four years.

Line chart showing the importance of food labelling information from 2023 to 2026. Date marking was consistently rated most important and health claims least important. Most labelling elements increased in importance in 2025 before declining slightly in 2026. — Importance of labelling elements by year, 2023 – 2026. Question: Think about when you are making the decision to buy a packaged food or drink for the first time. How important is the following labelling information when deciding what to buy? (1 = “Not important at all” and 7 = “Extremely important”). Note: Level of importance in date markings was not assessed in 2023.

Confidence in ability to use food labelling

Most consumers continue to feel confident using food labels to make informed choices. In 2026, 80.0% of respondents were confident, while only 6.0% were not confident.

Bar chart showing ratings from 1 to 7. Ratings of 5 and 6 were most common, selected by 34% and 32% respectively. Ratings of 4 and 7 were each selected by 14%, while 3 was selected by 3%, and 1 and 2 were each selected by 1%. — Perceived ability to use food labelling to make informed choices. *Question: How confident are you in your ability to make informed choices about foods from the information on food labels? (1 = “Not at all confident” and 7 = “Completely confident”).*

Ingredients list

Elements within the ingredients list

Like previous years, food additives remained the most commonly looked-for information in the ingredients list, followed by key ingredients and presence of artificial sweeteners.

Bar chart showing the ingredient information people are most interested in. Food additives ranked highest at 41%, followed by key ingredients at 37%, artificial sweeteners at 36% and the percentage of ingredients in a food at 34%. Interest in other types of ingredient information was 29% or lower. — Ingredients list elements respondents look for. Question: *What information do you usually look for in the ingredients list when buying products for the first time? (Please select all that apply).*

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