Is 6-APB legal in Austria?

Legal status

Controlled in Austria under the new psychoactive substances regime, and not as a narcotic or a psychotrope. The placement is group 2 of the NPS regulation's structural annexes: 6-APB is reached through Annex II group 2's phenethylamine base structure together with the expressly permitted benzofuran and dihydrobenzofuran ring replacements. The benzofuran ring standing in for the phenyl ring is written into the permitted structures, and 6-APB carries the alpha-methyl substituent as well. The Act's scope and intent conditions still apply on top of the structural fit. NPSG §3(2) authorises the Minister to define chemical substance classes where that is better suited than naming individual substances, and NPSV §1(1) includes both Annex I's named substances and every substance encompassed by Annex II's chemical definitions, with §1(2) enumerating the permitted substituent structures and Annex III illustrating rather than exhausting the groups. A structural overlap does not create simultaneous narcotics and NPS liability: the Suchtmittelgesetz is applied first and this regime only reaches what the SMG does not.

Consequences if caught

Capital exposure: none. The ceiling is the one to ten years in NPSG §4(2), reached through the aggravated consequence limb of the §4(1) offence, in a system that has abolished the death penalty and attaches no life term to this Act. 6-APB is on the NPS route because its ring replacement is expressly permitted, not because of any general analogue reasoning. The §4(1) offence sits at two years and reaches supply rather than holding. Section 4 specifies imprisonment with no cumulative fine, which is a different structure from the narcotics and psychotrope offences. Separately from that, and carried forward from this site's published Austria entry rather than re-derived from the Suchtmittelgesetz in this pass, the published penalties are these. Austrian practice is depenalised and not legalised, and the published entry says so in those terms. There is no legal minimum quantity, and possession of any amount for personal use is punishable under section 27, up to six months in prison or a fine. Under Therapie statt Strafe at section 35, small quantity personal use is typically provisionally suspended from prosecution on one to two years of probation where the person accepts counselling or treatment. Consumption itself is not criminalised, but the possession that precedes it is. Above the Grenzmenge, the threshold quantity, the offence becomes dealing or trafficking under sections 28 and 28a, up to one to three years, escalating to ten to fifteen years for commercial or organised cases. Every figure in this paragraph is a penalty range or a fine and none of them is a quantity threshold. This row is placed outside that regime, so they are recorded as Austria's published drug penalties and not as this substance's exposure.

If prescribed or medical

There is one country level rule here and it is SMG §5(1): medical, dental, veterinary and scientific purposes are the only ones for which a Suchtmittel may be acquired, possessed, carried, imported or exported, and only on the Act's own terms. Travel exemptions, professional licensing and medical dispensing sit inside their own provisions, so no free standing traveller allowance exists above them. Because this substance is reached by the new psychoactive substances regime rather than by the narcotics or psychotrope lists, neither the SMG §30(3) medicine exception nor the psychotrope travel certificate applies to it. NPSG §2 excludes lawful medicinal channels from that regime, which is a carve out for products that already hold a medicinal authorisation and not a route a traveller can claim for themselves. 6-APB's benzofuran ring replacement is expressly permitted by the structural definitions, so its coverage does not rest on an argument about resemblance that a carrier could contest.

Documentation

Carry no prescription for this, because none is established anywhere in the material read: NPSG §2 only removes channels that already exist elsewhere. The benzofuran substitution is expressly named in the Austrian structural definitions, so 6-APB is not an unlisted compound. The NPS structural annexes were read at their 18 September 2026 consolidation, with Annexes II and III last amended by BGBl II 106/2024 of 18 April 2024 and Annex I last amended by BGBl II 168/2019.

Drug laws and enforcement change and vary within a country. This is not legal advice. Always confirm with Austria’s embassy or official drug authority before traveling; penalties can be severe, including imprisonment.