Is caramel colour gluten-free? Yes, the colouring is

Yes. Caramel colour is gluten-free. It’s the brown food colouring listed as caramel colour or E150a, E150b, E150c or E150d, and it’s made by heating sugars such as glucose syrup or sucrose.

Even when it starts from wheat?

Yes. When the sugar is a wheat-based glucose syrup, it’s one of the exceptions EU law names (“wheat based glucose syrups including dextrose”): the processing leaves no significant gluten. You’ll see caramel colour in colas, gravy browning, sauces, dark bread and spirits.

Don’t mix it up with

• Caramel sweets, toffee and caramel sauce: these are foods, not a colouring. Some use barley malt or wheat, so read their ingredient list.
• Malt colouring or roasted barley: used in some dark breads and drinks, and they do contain gluten.
• The product around it: a gravy browning with caramel colour can still contain wheat flour. The colour is fine; check the rest.

Keep reading

• The Hidden-Gluten Watchlist: the 15 forbidden names and the ones to check
• Is glucose syrup gluten-free?
• Is malt extract gluten-free?
• Label Lab: check an ingredient list

Sources: EU Regulation 1169/2011 (Annex II), EU Regulation 828/2014, Coeliac UK, US FDA gluten-free labelling rule and FALCPA, Codex Alimentarius (gluten-free = 20 mg/kg or less). Checked 28 September 2026. We inform, we don’t diagnose: for medical questions, your doctor or dietitian has the last word.