Is Xanax (Alprazolam) legal in United Arab Emirates?

Legal status

Alprazolam is individually scheduled in Schedule 8 of Decision No. 158 of 2025, the branch the dossier describes as the psychotropic Schedule IV equivalent, at the printed entry «ألبرازولام». The dossier's finding on this row is that the benzodiazepine class label is not the legal unit of control here: the schedule names alprazolam itself, and the six benzodiazepines carried in this table are each named separately in the same schedule. So the placement rests on the individual entry and not on a class rule, and a benzodiazepine the schedule does not name is not placed by this row. The row runs through Articles 11, 43 and 58, with Schedule 10 carrying the quantity bands. The placement was read on 20 September 2026.

Consequences if caught

Article 58 reaches Schedules 3, 6, 7 and 8, and alprazolam is in Schedule 8, so a widely prescribed anxiolytic is inside a capital trafficking article. The dossier records Article 58 as providing death or life imprisonment as alternatives for its stated trafficking or promotion trigger, so death is discretionary rather than mandatory on this row, and it records that the article states no quantity. The Schedule 10 bands do not gate that route. The distance between the ordinariness of the medicine and the severity of the article is the finding: Schedule 8 is the lowest of the psychotropic schedules and it is still inside Article 58, so placement low in the scheduling does not put a substance outside the capital provision. Article 43 carries the personal use route for this branch, with no tariff stated in the dossier.

If prescribed or medical

The dossier records at the modafinil row that a 268 entry ministry travellers list was checked and expressly not used as a schedule. Attached to this substance: alprazolam is individually named in Schedule 8, so a traveller's prescription describes a substance that the schedule reaches by name and not by class. The dossier records no prescribing route, no traveller quantity allowance and no import permit procedure for the Schedule 8 branch, so what a foreign prescription achieves at the border is the question it does not answer, and it is deferred.

Documentation

Carry the prescription and the original dispensing packaging naming alprazolam as the active ingredient, together with a physician's letter, and put the permit question to the health ministry before travelling because no Emirati procedure is recorded here. Provenance: the Schedule 8 placement and the entry «ألبرازولام» were read on 20 September 2026, with the capital analysis resting on Article 58 and its death or life alternative rather than on the Schedule 10 bands. Loose tablets in a pill organiser are the common form of this problem, since they separate the medicine from the label that identifies it.

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