NAD & NMN: Where Things Stand in the EU

NAD+ is having a moment. In US longevity circles, plenty of people swear by NMN capsules that are supposed to slow the age-related decline in cellular energy. Online, you'll find every half-truth going – from “completely legal” to “totally banned” – and neither one quite gets it right. Try to have those same capsules shipped into the EU, though, and you run into a different problem – not about whether they work, but whether they're legal. NMN is classified as a “Novel Food” in the EU and can't be sold here as a food supplement. This article explains what NAD+ and NMN actually are biochemically, why the EU takes a different line than the US on this – and what any of it has to do with plain old nicotinamide, the vitamin already sitting on pharmacy shelves everywhere.

What Are NAD+ and NMN?

NAD+ (nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide) is a coenzyme at work in every single cell in your body. It shuttles electrons during the process of extracting energy from food – without NAD+, neither glycolysis nor cellular respiration would run. NAD+ is also a substrate for two enzyme families that have drawn a lot of research attention lately: sirtuins, which are involved in cell regulation, and PARPs, which handle DNA damage repair.

NMN (nicotinamide mononucleotide) isn't a distinct active substance with some new function of its own – it's an intermediate step on the way to NAD+. Your body already makes NMN, converting it from nicotinamide with the help of an enzyme called NAMPT, and then builds NAD+ from it in a further step. The idea behind NMN supplements is that taking NMN directly skips one production step and might raise NAD+ levels faster than nicotinamide alone would. Whether that actually makes a noticeable difference in humans is still an open question.

• Nicotinamide (niacinamide): a form of vitamin B3, approved EU-wide and freely available.
• NMN (nicotinamide mononucleotide): an intermediate on the way to NAD+, not approved as a food supplement in the EU.
• NR (nicotinamide riboside): another intermediate on the way to NAD+, approved EU-wide since 2020.
• NAD+/NADH: the coenzyme itself – not classed as novel as a food supplement ingredient, and permitted.

How Your Body Makes NAD+

There are several routes to NAD+, and that's the key to understanding this whole debate. The main pathway in humans runs through nicotinamide, the amide form of vitamin B3. Your body continuously recycles nicotinamide into NMN and then into NAD+ – a cycle that never stops, because NAD+ is constantly used up and rebuilt. A second, smaller route runs through tryptophan, from which the body can also produce some NAD+ via a longer chain of reactions. And there's a third contributor: nicotinamide riboside (NR), another precursor that's likewise converted into NAD+ via NMN – chemically a separate molecule, but travelling the same metabolic pathway.

NAD+ levels demonstrably decline with age in many tissues – one reason both researchers and the supplement industry are interested in these precursors. That decline is the core of the longevity story around NMN: the hope is that raising NAD+ levels back up could also restore sirtuin function and DNA repair. Solid evidence for that in humans – not in test tubes or mice – is still missing. So what this actually means in practice is more open-ended than some online shops suggest: a declining marker on its own doesn't tell you whether raising it artificially actually changes anything about the aging process.

Who Is This Relevant For?

You're probably here for one of three reasons. First: you've heard or read about NMN or NAD+ capsules from the US and want to know whether you can buy them in the EU too. Second: you've found an NAD+ or NMN product in an online shop and are wondering how that can be legal when everything else you read says it isn't – a contradiction that resolves itself once you understand the workarounds some shops use (more on that further down). Third: you landed here searching for “nicotinamide” and are actually after information on the vitamin B3 form – more on that shortly, because legally, it's a completely different case from NMN.

If you're actually here because of a face cream: niacinamide as a cosmetic ingredient for skin falls under a completely different legal framework – the Cosmetics Regulation, not food law – and none of this affects it.

Intake & Dosage: What's Even Legally Possible

There's no legitimate recommended intake for NMN anywhere in the EU that you could look up – because, as things stand today, there's no EU-wide approval for it as a food supplement. NMN appears on the EU's Union List of Novel Foods as a non-authorised ingredient. NAD+/NADH as a standalone ingredient is treated differently, though: it isn't considered novel in the context of food supplements, because it was already in use before 1997. That's why reputable sellers don't give a dosage for NMN – anyone selling you a “recommended daily dose of NMN” is legally selling you something false in the EU.

Its approved relatives are a different story. Nicotinamide riboside (NR) has been authorised EU-wide as a novel food ingredient for food supplements since 2020, for adults other than pregnant or breastfeeding women, with a set upper limit. Nicotinamide itself isn't a special case at all – it's the completely ordinary, decades-established form of vitamin B3, with a safety threshold of up to 900 mg per day for adults, far above what typical supplements contain. For comparison, the daily requirement for niacin sits at roughly 13 to 17 milligrams according to the D-A-CH reference values (the nutrient reference standards used in Germany, Austria and Switzerland) – a fraction of the amounts you'll see quoted for NMN in studies and marketing copy.

What to Watch for in NAD and NMN Products

You'll still find NMN in online shops, usually through one of two workarounds. One: the shop labels the product “not for human consumption” or as a pure lab-grade raw material, even though the packaging, capsule form, and customer reviews about its “effects” clearly point to people taking it. The other: the seller is based outside the EU and simply ships it without worrying about EU authorisation requirements – a risk that can get a shipment stopped at customs and, in the worst case, destroyed.

A simple reality check helps here: if a seller gives you a recommended intake, a daily dose, and promises of effects for pure NMN, they've either not checked the legal situation or are knowingly ignoring it. For this ingredient, proper labelling currently means no promised effects, no recommended intake, and often a note about its lab-grade status. That doesn't apply to NR or nicotinamide – there, normal, EU-compliant labelling with a recommended intake is the standard, and a good sign.

Another clue often sits right in the ingredients list: if it says “Nicotinamide Mononucleotide” or “NMN” without any nutritional information or recommended intake filled in, the seller usually knows about the Novel Food issue and is covering themselves legally – even if the marketing around it still makes the product look like an ordinary food supplement.

The Honest Take

That NAD+ declines with age and plays a central role in cellular metabolism is well established. Whether deliberately raising it with NMN or NR actually benefits humans beyond cell cultures and animal models is, as of today, still an open research question rather than a settled fact – which is exactly why the EU is reviewing it through the Novel Food procedure instead of waving it through.

The legal situation is also in motion: an authorisation process is underway for NMN, and one application received a positive safety assessment from the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) in 2026 – a procedural step, not an approval. Until the European Commission actually makes a decision, the status stays unchanged: not authorised. We'll update this article as soon as that changes.

Related Products from Scheunengut

We don't currently carry an NAD+ or NMN product – and we won't, for as long as NMN remains unauthorised as a food supplement in the EU. That's not a gap in our range; it's a deliberate choice. We don't sell anything through grey imports or mislabelling just because other sellers do. If you're after the regular, approved B3 form instead, you'll find nicotinamide as part of our B-vitamin supplements – declared exactly as it should be, with a recommended intake and the authorised claims about energy metabolism and the nervous system.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

Is NMN Banned in the EU?

Not a criminal offence for you as a buyer, but it isn't authorised as a food supplement. Sellers who market NMN as a food supplement with a recommended intake are the ones breaching the Novel Food Regulation – the legal risk sits with the seller, not with you as the consumer. One thing still matters, though: a product that isn't legally allowed to be sold as a food supplement also isn't monitored to the same standard by food safety authorities, so quality and purity are less well controlled.

Why Is NAD+ Itself Allowed, But Not NMN?

Because NAD+/NADH was already in use as a food supplement ingredient before the EU's 1997 cut-off date, so it doesn't count as “novel.” NMN in supplement form only reached the market later, so it has to go through the regular authorisation process for novel foods.

Is Nicotinamide the Same as NMN?

No. Nicotinamide is the regular, long-approved amide form of vitamin B3. NMN is a molecule your body makes from nicotinamide – an intermediate product on the way to NAD+, not vitamin B3 itself, and a completely different case legally.

Why Is NMN Freely Available in the US?

It wasn't consistently available there either, for a while. In 2022, the FDA stated that NMN no longer met the definition of a dietary supplement because of a parallel drug review. It took a lawsuit from an industry association before the FDA confirmed in September 2025 that NMN did in fact count as a dietary supplement after all. So the US situation was unsettled for several years too – since that reversal, NMN is once again treated there as an ordinary dietary supplement, with none of the EU-style authorisation process.

What's the Difference Between NMN and Nicotinamide Riboside (NR)?

Both are precursors on the way to NAD+, but chemically they're different molecules. The key difference is authorisation status: NR has been approved EU-wide as a novel food ingredient for food supplements since 2020, while NMN hasn't been so far.

Can I Legally Order NMN From Abroad for Personal Use?

Legally risky, and not something we'd recommend. Even for personal use, there are restrictions on importing food from non-EU countries, and shipments containing unauthorised Novel Food ingredients can be held at customs and destroyed. You only get legal certainty with products that are properly authorised for sale within the EU.