Best before or use by? Getting the date right

Two dates, one small word of difference between them, and a genuinely different legal meaning. Picking the wrong one isn’t just a labelling technicality; it can mean telling a customer a product is safe to eat after the point it actually isn’t.

Use by is about safety

Use by goes on food that can become unsafe to eat after a certain point, not just less nice: typically chilled and highly perishable products: fresh meat and fish, dairy, ready meals, salads, anything where bacteria can grow to a level that makes you ill. The Food Standards Agency’s guidance is direct about this one: don’t eat, cook, or freeze food after its use-by date has passed, even if it looks, smells, or tastes fine. Looking fine is exactly the problem: many of the organisms that make use-by-dated food genuinely dangerous don’t announce themselves before they do.

Most of these foods can be frozen safely right up to the use-by date, which is often the better option to reduce waste rather than a reason to relax the date itself, but always follow the specific storage instructions on the pack you’re using, since guidance varies by product.

Best before is about quality

Best before goes on food that stays safe past the date, even if it isn’t at its best any more: dried goods, tinned food, most baked goods, anything where the main risk after the date is staleness or a drop in texture and flavour, not a safety hazard. Past a best-before date, it’s squarely your own judgement whether something’s still worth eating, in a way it genuinely isn’t for a use-by date.

The rule in one line

If it’s use by, don’t sell it or serve it past the date, full stop; that’s a safety matter, not a quality one. If it’s best before, the date is informative, not a hard cut-off.

Getting the choice right on your own products

The two dates aren’t interchangeable labels for the same thing dressed up differently. They’re a genuine judgement about what actually happens to a specific product over time, and it’s the product that decides which one applies, not preference or habit. A perishable filling (fresh cream, a dairy-based custard, anything freshly made without preservatives that needs refrigeration) is a use-by candidate. A dry biscuit, a jar of jam properly processed and sealed, most confectionery, is typically best before. If you’re not certain which side of the line a specific product sits on, that’s a fair question to put to your local Environmental Health team. See our guide on what an EHO wants to see.

ProvenBatch defaults every new product to “best before: quality” and asks you to actively choose “use by: safety” for anything chilled or highly perishable, with the choice overridable per batch if a specific run genuinely needs it. The label prints whichever word you’ve actually selected, next to the actual date, not a default nobody checked.

Sources

• Food Standards Agency: best before and use-by dates