What Is and Isn’t Vegan: Complete Guide [List]

This is a huge list of ingredients and food products that are and aren’t vegan.

There’s a link to a detailed explanation of why each item is or isn’t vegan, but also a short answer if you’re in a rush.

It’s ongoing, so I’m probably missing some things. If you think of any that are missing, leave me a comment at the bottom and I’ll add them.

Otherwise, I highly recommend using “Ctrl + f” (find) if you’re looking for a specific ingredient.

Note that if something says it “might” be vegan, that’s because there are controversial ingredients in it that some vegans are okay with, and others are not.

Food Ingredients

Anything that is usually found on an ingredients label that a vegan might not be sure about fell into this category.

If something says “Usually Vegan”, that means that most vegans can be comfortable assuming that it is vegan when they see it on an ingredients list.

Packaged Foods

This section includes foods you can buy off the shelf in grocery stores.

There are quite a few foods in this section, so I’ve divided it into a few smaller sections to make it a bit more manageable.

Cereals

Many cereals are close to being vegan, but unfortunately have vitamin D from an animal source (here’s why vitamin D3 isn’t vegan).

You may be interested in my guide to vegan cereals with B12.

Drinks

I’ve only looked at popular drinks you can buy at stores. See my guide to vegan energy drinks if you’re not interested in the specific ones below.

Chips

The most basic chip is just made from potato, so whether or not a brand of chips are vegan depends on what else they add.

Candy

If you’re not strict about things like bone char in sugar and artificial colors, you’ll consider many candies to be vegan.

Otherwise, you’ll want to look for companies that specifically make candy that’s vegan-friendly.

I’ve also written a vegan jelly bean guide since they can be hard to find.

Baking and Cooking

Here’s a mix of ingredients typically used for cooking, and packaged foods that you buy and still have to cook.

General

These are foods that don’t fit into any of the above categories.

Eating Out

The final food section is a small collection of posts I’ve written about foods at restaurants.

If there’s anything you’d really like to see added, just let me know.

Non Food Items

And here’s…everything non-edible that I’ve looked at before.

You’ll notice that medicine in general is given a little leeway in what’s considered vegan. But some medicine is more vegan than others. For examples, see my guide to vegan sore throat lozenges and cough drops.

Beauty Products

These are mainly collections of good vegan skin and hair products.

Clothing

I’ve created guides to certain types of clothing and accessories that it can be hard to find vegan versions for.