You know the moment. The yogurt says yesterday, the cheese says Tuesday, and your hand is already hovering over the bin lid. 🗑️ I think most of us treat every printed date like a tiny legal verdict. It is not one. A best before date is a manufacturer’s guess about peak quality, and it has very little to do with whether the food will hurt you. 🤔
Here is the plain version. Two labels do two different jobs, the rules behind them are looser than you probably assume, and the confusion costs real money and real food. Let’s sort it out. 🌱
Two dates, two very different jobs
The European Food Safety Authority explains the split cleanly. A use by date is about safety. A best before date is about quality, and the food is still safe after it if you stored it properly, though it may lose some flavor, texture, or freshness. 🥣 That is the whole trick, and yet people mix the two up constantly.
Here is a quick cheat sheet:
Best before: a quality marker. The food may taste a little duller after it, but it is not suddenly dangerous. 🍪
Use by: a safety line. Eat it by then, not after, even if it looks and smells fine. 🥩
Sell by: a note for store staff about shelf display. It is not meant for you.
Freeze by: the USDA says this marks when to freeze food to keep peak quality, and it is not a safety date. 🧊
One more thing about use by: it only works if you store the food the way the label says. EFSA points to a fridge temperature below 5°C as an example. A warm fridge makes that date meaningless. 🌡️
The rules are vaguer than you think
In the United States, the USDA’s Food Safety and Inspection Service says that, except for infant formula, product dating is not required by federal regulations. It also says that dates are mostly about quality. Even a “Use-By” date is not a safety date, except on infant formula. 🍼 So yes, there is no single national system. Some states require dates on certain foods and others do not.
The European Union is tidier on paper. Most prepacked food must carry either a use by or a best before date. But the food business picks which one, with a few exceptions such as eggs and fresh poultry meat. 🥚 That is how the same product ends up with different labels in different countries.
Shoppers get confused anyway. European Commission consumer research found that nearly a quarter of respondents wrongly believed food should not be eaten past its best before date. 😬 That is a lot of people tossing a lot of cereal.
So what actually lasts? A few examples:
Canned goods: the USDA says low-acid canned foods, like canned vegetables and meats, keep their quality for 2 to 5 years if the can is in good condition. Cornell’s USDA-based guide lays out the details. 🥫
Infant formula: never use it after the date. This is the one product where the label is a real rule. 👶
Eggs: federal dating is not required, though some states ask for it.
What the confusion costs
This is the part that irritates me. The European Commission estimates that up to 10% of the 88 million tonnes of food wasted in the EU each year is linked to date marking. 🌍 In the United States, a 2026 paper in Business & Society cites the FDA’s estimate that date label confusion accounts for 20% of consumer food waste. The estimates differ, and I would not treat any single number as gospel. But they all point the same way. 📈
A January 2026 ReFED and YouGov survey of 1,000 U.S. consumers found that nearly everyone uses date labels when deciding about food, though many also check with their eyes and nose. That sounds sensible. The trouble is that the label still gets a vote, and often the loudest one. 🗳️
The costs stack up like this:
Money: ReFED has estimated that date label confusion leads U.S. consumers to throw away about 3 billion pounds of food, worth around $7 billion a year. 💸
Climate: wasted food carries all the water, land, and fuel that went into growing it. ♻️
Habit: if you bin food on the date, you probably also buy extra to cover for it. 🛒
Be honest with yourself for a second. When did you last throw away something only because of the printed date? Hold that thought for the next section. 💡
How to decide at the fridge door
The goal is not to ignore labels. It is to read them for what they are. Some supermarkets are already moving this way. For instance, UK chain Morrisons dropped use by dates on milk in favor of a best before date and the sniff test. 🥛 I like the idea, though I would still be careful with high-risk foods.
Try this routine:
Check the word first. If it says use by, follow it. If it says best before, keep reading your food, not the label. 🔍
Use your senses on best before items. Look for mold, odd smells, strange textures, or bulging cans. 👃
Respect the fridge. Keep it cold and the dates mean more. 🧊
Freeze early. If a use by date is close and you will not cook in time, freeze it before the date passes. 🥘
Plan before you shop. Fewer surprise leftovers means fewer date decisions. 📝
For more background on why so much food goes uneaten worldwide, the Wikipedia article on food waste is a decent place to start. 📚
Now look at your fridge. Which item is sitting there past its best before date, and will you give it a fair sniff before it goes in the bin? 🤨