Yes. Section 781 of Public Law 119-37 defines a final hemp-derived cannabinoid product by route of administration and names topical application. Its container is the innermost vessel holding the retail product, “such as a jar”. A CBD balm or cream with more than 0.4 mg total THC in the jar falls outside the federal hemp definition once the section applies.
So the 0.4 mg THC per container cap applies to CBD topicals like balms and creams. What a label cannot tell you is whether a given jar passes.
Does the 0.4 mg THC per container cap apply to CBD topicals like balms and creams?
This desk read the enrolled text of Public Law 119-37 on September 19, 2026. Section 781 amends the hemp definition in the Agricultural Marketing Act, effective 365 days after enactment. The exclusion is clause (III): a final product with “greater than 0.4 milligrams combined total per container” of total tetrahydrocannabinols, THCA included.
Two definitions do the work for a topical. The final-product definition lists the routes of administration, “such as inhalation, ingestion, or topical application”. The container definition, paragraph (C), is “the innermost wrapping, packaging, or vessel in direct contact with” the product, and lists a jar first.
The same law keeps the 0.3% dry-weight test for hemp as a plant, which is where balm-label confusion starts.
Why “less than 0.3% THC” on a balm label does not answer it
NuLeaf Naturals’ Full Spectrum CBD Balm page, read on September 19, 2026, sells the balm in three jars: 0.5 ounces at 300 mg CBD, 1.0 ounce at 600 mg and 1.5 ounces at 900 mg. Its footnote states that the company’s hemp-derived products “contain less than 0.3% Δ9-THC on a dry weight basis”. In the page text we could read, no milligram THC figure appears anywhere.
That footnote is a ceiling, not a measurement. Here is what 0.3% of each jar’s mass would permit at 28.35 grams to the ounce; the arithmetic is ours.
| Jar (CBD on label) | Jar mass at 28.35 g/oz | 0.3% of jar mass (label ceiling) | Multiple of the 0.4 mg cap |
|---|---|---|---|
| 0.5 oz (300 mg CBD) | 14.2 g | about 42.5 mg | roughly 106 times |
| 1.0 oz (600 mg CBD) | 28.4 g | about 85 mg | roughly 213 times |
| 1.5 oz (900 mg CBD) | 42.5 g | about 128 mg | roughly 319 times |
None of that says the balm carries those amounts. The label’s percentage is compatible with a jar a hundred times over the cap and with one comfortably under it. Dry-weight basis is a plant-concentration idea borrowed onto a finished product; we do not know what the brand’s testing measured against.
Read the batch report, not the label
The number that answers it is total THC in milligrams for the whole jar, on the batch report. NuLeaf’s lab-reports page, read on September 19, 2026, lets you look up a report by batch number and lists three CBD Balm batch IDs: C525H226, C75A47-2 and 89E0F3. We did not open those reports, so we quote no THC figure from them.
When you open one, look for total THC rather than delta-9 alone. If the sheet reports milligrams per gram, multiply by the jar mass in the table; 0.4 mg or less for the whole jar is the pass line.
The balm page also prints a disclaimer listing 29 US states the product does not currently ship to, the same list for all three sizes, California, Colorado, New York and Oregon among them. That is the brand’s shipping policy on the read date, not a statement of any state’s law. We judged the rest of the range in NuLeaf Naturals, Judged on Its Own Price List.
What about broad-spectrum or THC-free topicals?
The contrast row is a broad-spectrum jar. Joy Organics’ Organic CBD Salve page, read on September 19, 2026, offers a 1-oz jar at 1000 mg CBD and a 2-oz jar at 2000 mg, calls the product broad spectrum and markets it as THC-free. “THC-free” is the brand’s claim; we read no certificate of analysis for it.
The cap does not care about the marketing word; a broad-spectrum jar is inside the definition only if its batch sheet shows 0.4 mg or less of total THC. We compared the brand’s THC-free shelf with Medterra’s in Joy Organics vs. Medterra on the THC-Free Shelf.
What to watch before November 12 and December 11, 2026
The law signed on November 12, 2025 takes effect on November 12, 2026. H.R. 6500, signed on September 2, 2026, adds in its Section 2019 that until December 11, 2026 the Section 781 amendments “shall only apply with respect to products described in” two paragraphs of the new definition. We re-read that text on September 19, 2026 and cannot say which products those paragraphs cover, so we will not say where a balm sits in those four weeks.
This is the third product class we have run through the cap. Bottles came first, in Does the 0.4 mg THC Cap Apply to Full-Spectrum CBD Oil?. Gummies followed in Will Cornbread Hemp Gummies Be Legal After the THC Cap?. Topicals are the awkward case: the label gives a percentage where the law wants milligrams. Here’s what to watch: whether brands start printing total THC per jar on the label.
Frequently asked questions
Does the 0.4 mg cap apply to CBD creams and balms? Yes. Section 781 defines a final hemp-derived cannabinoid product by its route of administration and lists topical application by name, and it defines the container as the innermost vessel holding the retail product, a jar included. A balm or cream carrying more than 0.4 mg combined total THC in the jar falls outside the federal hemp definition once the section applies to it.
Is the 0.4 mg THC limit per serving or per container? Per container. The statute measures combined total THC in the innermost wrapping, packaging or vessel in direct contact with the product, such as a jar, bottle, bag, box, packet, can, carton or cartridge, and it excludes bulk shipping containers and outer wrappings. For a balm that is the jar itself.
Does THCA count toward the 0.4 mg limit? Yes. The exclusion reads greater than 0.4 milligrams combined total per container of total tetrahydrocannabinols, including tetrahydrocannabinolic acid, so THCA is added to delta-9 and the other THC forms before the jar is measured. A delta-9-only label line would not show it; a batch report’s total-THC line does.
What about full-spectrum CBD products with trace THC? Trace is not a number the cap recognises. A full-spectrum balm whose batch report shows 0.4 mg or less of total THC in the whole jar stays inside the definition; one showing more does not. A label line reading less than 0.3% THC on a dry weight basis allows tens of milligrams in a one-ounce jar, so it cannot answer the question.
None of this is a verdict on NuLeaf, Joy Organics or any jar, and none of it is legal advice; state law is a separate question and we do not write “legal everywhere”. CBD topicals are not evaluated by the FDA, whatever a balm is marketed for is what users report rather than what it does, and the number that matters now is total THC per jar, read from the batch sheet, not the label.