Tobacco-free snus: what's inside a nicotine pouch

What “tobacco-free” actually means

On a pouch can, tobacco-free means there’s no tobacco leaf in the product. It doesn’t mean there’s no connection to the tobacco plant. The US Food and Drug Administration says nicotine pouches contain nicotine as a powder or salt, “chemically synthesized or extracted from tobacco leaf,” but that they “do not contain cut, ground, powdered, or leaf tobacco itself.” The FDA still classes nicotine pouches as a type of tobacco product.

Swedish law puts it differently. The Swedish Food Agency defines snus as a product that contains tobacco, and calls the tobacco-free equivalents “snus-like products.” So in Sweden, “tobacco-free snus” is a contradiction in terms: the product is a snus-like product, and only the tobacco version is snus. The original is described on what is snus.

The ingredient list

Two primary sources give the same short recipe. The FDA lists nicotine plus fillers such as microcrystalline cellulose (“a term for refined wood pulp”), sweeteners such as xylitol or maltitol, other flavours and preservatives. Swedish Match lists ZYN’s contents as “nicotine, fillers, pH adjusters, stabilizer, sweetener and flavors,” and adds that every ingredient apart from nicotine is widely used in food products.

1. Filler. Microcrystalline cellulose is the FDA’s example. It gives the pouch its body and replaces the ground tobacco of snus. It’s also why the contents are white.
2. Nicotine. Tobacco-derived or synthetic, per the FDA. Its concentration sets the printed strength.
3. pH adjusters and stabilisers. Listed by Swedish Match for ZYN. Labels name the specific compounds.
4. Sweeteners and flavours. Named on the can. ZYN’s US FAQ, for example, lists the sweeteners and the “flavorings” as separate ingredients.

Compare that with snus, which Swedish Match makes from ground tobacco, water, salt and sodium carbonate, heat-treated in a step it calls pasteurisation. The two side by side are on snus vs nicotine pouches.

Tobacco-free terms, and what each one means

Several words circle the same products, and they don’t all mean the same thing:

• Tobacco-free or without tobacco: no tobacco leaf in the pouch. It says nothing about where the nicotine came from.
• Tobacco-leaf-free: ZYN’s UK wording for the same idea. Its site adds that the nicotine in ZYN is derived from tobacco.
• Non-tobacco nicotine (NTN): the FDA’s term for nicotine that did not come from a tobacco plant, including synthetic nicotine. A tobacco-free pouch can contain either kind, and since 14 April 2022 the FDA regulates products with nicotine from any source.
• Snus-like product (snusliknande produkt): the Swedish Food Agency’s category for tobacco-free pouches, which it says are sometimes called white snus.
• Tobacco-free nicotine product (tobaksfri nikotinprodukt): the Swedish legal term. Lag (2022:1257) defines it as a product without tobacco that contains nicotine for consumption.
• White snus: the everyday name, used for both the tobacco-free pouch and, in Sweden, white portion tobacco snus. The term’s history is on the white snus explainer.

Why it’s white

Traditional snus is brown because ground tobacco is brown. A tobacco-free pouch is white because its filler is white cellulose and there’s no leaf to colour it. Whiteness isn’t a design flourish here; it’s what the material looks like, and it’s how the category ended up called white snus, as told on the white snus explainer.

One caveat. A white pouch isn’t proof of a tobacco-free one. White portion snus is tobacco snus made to look whiter, and Swedish Match says its pouches sold in Norway contain a small amount of tobacco for regulatory reasons. Read the ingredient list, not the colour.

Reading strength: mg/g versus mg per pouch

The most misread number on any can. Most pouch brands print strength as milligrams of nicotine per gram of pouch contents (mg/g). A pouch rarely weighs a full gram, so the nicotine in one pouch is usually lower than the headline figure. As a worked example, a 10 mg/g pouch weighing half a gram would hold about 5 mg of nicotine. Some brands print per-pouch figures instead; the ZYN products on the FDA’s list of authorised pouches, for example, are labelled 3 mg and 6 mg, and ZYN ULTRA 9 mg and 11 mg, per pouch. Before comparing two cans, check which convention each one uses.

Examples listed in a retail catalogue:

• CLEW Cool Mint: 10 mg/g, 20 pouches per can. The brand puts the number in the product name, which is refreshingly clear.
• White Fox All White Portion: 10 mg/g in a slim format, 20 pouches per can.
• The NEAFS range is a clear ladder: each flavour at roughly 6 mg/g (Regular), 12 mg/g (Strong) and 16 mg/g (Extra Strong).
• KLINT Arctic Mint X-Strong: 16 mg/g, at the top of many ranges.

Higher numbers mean more nicotine per gram, not a better product. A strength chart that groups pouches by mg/g is useful for reading labels, not as a ladder to climb.

Formats: slim, mini and the count on the lid

Most tobacco-free pouches are slim: a narrow rectangle that sits under the lip. Mini pouches are smaller and lighter. Here the mg/g convention matters, because a mini pouch at a high mg/g figure holds less nicotine per pouch than a slim one at the same figure, simply because each pouch weighs less. One example: 77 GHOST Mini Mango Extra Strong is listed at 16 mg/g in a mini format with 24 pouches to the can, where most slim cans in the same catalogue carry 20. The size differences between slim, mini and superslim are laid out in nicopodstore’s guide to pouch formats.

What this page is not

This is a materials-and-terminology guide, not health guidance. The FDA notes that nicotine pouches contain nicotine, “which is highly addictive.” The NHS says nicotine pouches “are not licensed stop smoking products in the UK.” What these products contain and how the labels work is what this site can tell you plainly.