In recent years, CBD’s popularity has skyrocketed among people looking for natural substances with healing and therapeutic properties. It’s widely consumed for its anxiolytic, analgesic, and antioxidative properties.
A large number of people are now ditching regular pain and anxiety prescription medications for CBD products because of their non-dependency factor and healthy formulation.
As per a survey by Forbes Health, out of 2000 U.S.-based participants, more than 60% have tried CBD at some point in their lives. Positive clinical trials around CBD’s potential health benefits and testimonials from millions of users globally have positioned CBD as a go-to natural wellness remedy.
However, at some point, people do wonder if it’s possible to take too much of it. In this article, we’ll try to clear up all the confusion for both new and old users and uncover if it’s possible to overdose on CBD.
Can a person overdose on CBD?
The straight answer is both yes and no. You see, generally speaking, “taking CBD too much” or “overdosing” usually has negative connotations, and rightly so. It’s quite easy to overdose on even very small quantities of hard narcotics like cocaine, fentanyl, or ketamine. In those cases, it mostly leads to death or very severe long-term damage to the body.
But the same cannot be said about it. Of course, you can drink way too many CBD gummies or gulp down bottles of CBD oil, but still, it won’t be life-threatening. You can, of course, take more CBD than is required, but that doesn’t mean that it’ll be put in the hospital.
In fact, to date, there hasn’t been a reported case where someone overdosed on CBD. Studies have shown that humans can easily tolerate up to 1500 mg of CBD a day without facing any severe effects.
No sane person will do this on a daily basis, so even if you end up eating a few extra gummies, it still won’t be considered overdosing. As per this government source, for CBD to become toxic, a person will need to take around 2000 mg of CBD in one go; that’s like gulping between 20 to 30 CBD oil bottles in one sitting.
In short, by following the recommended dosage of 5–30 mg on product labels, you’ll be just fine even if you take CBD on a daily basis.
But that doesn’t mean that it’s completely safe to test the upper limit. When you take way too much more than is recommended, there are different negative effects. Let’s learn about them in detail. A word of caution: don’t try to mimic cannabis influencers who eat whole gummy bottles for testing. For them, it’s just fun and views, but for you, it can surely make you miss the next day of work.
What happens when you take too much CBD?
In general, CBD is well tolerated by humans. There are hardly any severe side effects, and many people just use it regularly without any concern. But let’s say on an odd day you had sudden cravings, and there are only CBD gummies around. You may end up eating more than recommended because they are delicious.
Or maybe you lost the dropper that came with your tincture bottle and consumed a bit more CBD tincture than was required. In such cases, there are some negative impacts that you might suffer from. Taking too much CBD usually results in conditions like extreme fatigue, drowsiness, dry mouth, dizziness, irritation, frequent mood swings, headaches, vomiting, and diarrhea.
There’s this one unique case of taking more than the recommended dosage, which led to toxic effects. In 2019, a 56-year-old person who had never used any substances decided to try CBD gummies for his back pain. The maximum recommended dosage was 30 mg, but he ended up eating two bottles of this flavored CBD gummy, which totaled 370 mg of CBD.
He started behaving erratically, his temperature increased, and he suffered from nausea, vomiting, and slurred speech. He was taken to the emergency room, where the doctor gave him IV fluids, oxygen, and anti-vomiting medicines. Still, he recovered quickly and was discharged the very next day.
In fact, doctors noted that maybe it happened because of some sort of contamination, which is quite common in cheap roadside gas station CBD products. This cannot be specifically treated as a case of overdose because there are many trials where even a 1000 to 1500 mg dose of CBD didn’t lead to fatal conditions.
That’s why it’s always recommended to buy your CBD from trusted and well-known brands like Colorado Botanicals, which provides you with the latest lab test reports.
What’s the right CBD dosage?
The perfect dosage usually varies from person to person. We all have different body chemistry, so a similar amount of CBD may work differently for you and differently for your friend.
Hence, it’s always recommended to start with a low dose of 10–20 mg of CBD per day. Or, 2mg to 5 mg of CBD per 10 pounds of body weight. Just make sure to stick to a routine, mix things up, and try different products until you find the dosage that works best for you.
Most CBD products come with a recommended dosage written on the label, so for beginners, that can be a good starting point. The same tactic should be followed for your pets; all pet CBD products come with a proper chart or set of guidelines that show the recommended dosage based on your furry friend’s weight.
There are no official dosage guidelines from government bodies because the FDA still hasn’t put CBD in the category of dietary supplement. The food regulatory body believes that more concrete studies are required on CBD’s efficacy to reach defined dosage guidelines.
The Final Thoughts
In conclusion, you can, of course, take too much CBD in one sitting, but you cannot overdose on it. Even at higher concentrations, CBD is well tolerated in humans, and most people will be just fine even if they take up to 1500 mg of CBD in a single day. But no sane person should try that; much higher levels are tested only in specific clinical trials.
For your day-to-day anxiety and stress issues, just sticking to 10–30 mg CBD/day initially will be more than enough. You can increase this gradually after observing the effects for some time. In the worst-case scenario, if you do end up taking too much CBD, it’ll result in slight drowsiness, dehydration, nausea, and fatigue.
As per studies and reports, the only possibility for CBD to become toxic is if someone consumes more than 20,000 mg in a single sitting. To date, there has hardly been a case of someone fatally suffering or dying from CBD overdosing.
But it’s essential to make sure that the product is of the highest quality. Inferior brands may have contaminants that can make you sick; hence, one should only buy CBD from reputed brands like Colorado Botanicals.