Is it legal in Denmark? Drug law, penalties and sources

The list decides, and the lists are not organised by chemistry

Khat is on list A, the same list as heroin and LSD, and the entry covers every part of the plant. Its alkaloid cathinone is on list B and cathine is on list D. So one plant and its two actives sit on three different lists with three different consequences.

Diazepam and flunitrazepam are both benzodiazepines, and they are on list E and list D respectively. Zolpidem is not a benzodiazepine at all and shares list E with diazepam. Reading the list is not the same as reading the chemistry.

Only one list A substance has a medical route. Section 2(2) of the order allows the substance at A number 2, which is heroin, to be used medically in treating a person for drug dependence. LSD and khat are on the same list and get no such exception.

Denmark names substances one at a time

The order's only general clause is narrow. Section 1 extends the lists to possible salts and simple derivatives with euphoriant effect, giving esters and ethers as its examples, and to all preparations containing or made from a listed substance. That is much less reach than the structural definitions some countries use.

So the drafting names things individually instead. Psilocin and psilocybin are listed separately rather than one being reached from the other. The entry for 6-APB names its 4- and 5- isomers expressly. 1P-LSD has its own entry, which it needs, because it is an N-acyl derivative rather than an ester or an ether.

That matters for what is absent. Where a country catches by structure, absence from the printed list proves little. Where a country names one compound at a time, an absence is more informative, though it is still not a permanent answer: sections 1 and 2 of the Act let the minister add a substance at any time.

A warning cannot generally be given

This is the thing most accounts of Danish drug law get the wrong way round. Section 3 of the Act states that a warning cannot in general be given, and permits one only where social circumstances speak for it and the possession is an expression of strong dependence following prolonged and sustained misuse.

That is a discretion narrowed by the statute itself, not a policy of leniency. It sits alongside a sentencing direction in the same section requiring the court to weigh the harmful effects of the substance, and since 1 July 2025 its dangerousness as well.

Two bands, and the serious one is in the criminal code

The order contains no penalty. Section 30 of it sends any breach to sections 3 and 3 a of the Act, and says that where the circumstances in section 191 of the criminal code apply, that provision governs instead.

So the everyday band is a fine or up to 2 years, and the serious band is up to 10 years, rising to 16. The step between them is not a quantity written into the statute: section 191 turns on transfer to a larger number of people, or for significant payment, or other particularly aggravating circumstances.

Hemp and the poppy are licensed exceptions, not exemptions

Cannabis is on list B, and the entry covers all above ground parts of the plant. Section 4 of the order lets the Danish Medicines Agency permit commercial cultivation, one year at a time, on plots of at least 0.3 hectares, of plants whose tetrahydrocannabinol content is at most 0.2 per cent.

The opium poppy is at list A number 6, defined as all parts of the plant except the seeds, and section 2(4) allows it to be grown commercially for seed production without a permit. Both are permissions written into the instrument rather than substances left out of it.

What the Act and the criminal code provide

Every substance confirmed against a primary source

88 substances have a status for Denmark verified against a named statute. Each row links to the full entry, with the consequences, the prescription position and the source.

Sources

• Bekendtgoerelse om euforiserende stoffer, BEK nr 2446 af 12/12/2021 The five lists are at Bilag 1. In force 1 January 2022, repealing BEK nr 950 af 23/06/2020. Consulted 16 September 2026.
• Lov om euforiserende stoffer, LBK nr 1334 af 09/12/2019 The consolidated Act. Sections 1 and 2 are the powers, section 2 a covers convertible substances, section 3 is the penalty.
• LOV nr 724 af 20/06/2025 A strengthened effort against narcotics crime including opioids. In force 1 July 2025. Added dangerousness to the sentencing direction in section 3.

Statute text on this page is quoted from the copies linked above. Last verified October 4, 2026.