Is Heroin legal in Austria?

Also known as: diacetylmorphine, smack

Legal status

Designated a Suchtgift in Austria, and therefore on the narcotics rather than the psychotrope side of the split. In the Suchtgiftverordnung, Annex I.1.b prints the pharmacological name Diacetylmorphin beside the street name Heroin. Listing both removes the argument that the substance in a wrap and the substance in the schedule are different things. That entry is a bare name. It establishes placement and nothing else, and the conduct rules live in SMG §5(1) and in the §27 offence rather than in the schedule line. The statute does not carry the list. SMG §2(1) sets a two part test of convention restriction plus ministerial designation, SMG §2(3) allows a national addition where a substance has a comparable danger potential by reason of its effect and spread, and the Suchtgiftverordnung annexes supply the designation. SV §1(5) extends a listing to every stereoisomer and to those positional isomers whose structural similarity gives a comparable pharmacological effect, and it is not an open analogue clause; the annexes I.1.c, I.2, II, IV.1, V.1 and V.2 carry their own salts, esters, ethers and preparations extensions, which are read where they sit and not transplanted.

Consequences if caught

Capital exposure: none. The maximum is life, and SMG §28a(5) is the single route to it, for a leading role in a larger connection of persons carrying out §28a(1) conduct. Austria executes nobody, for this or for anything else. Heroin is an Annex I.1.b narcotic, and its street purity is irrelevant to the tier because SMG §28b calculates on the pure active substance. Above simple possession, §28(1) reaches three years for holding more than the threshold with intent to put it into circulation, §28(2) five years above fifteen times that amount, and §28(3) one to ten years for membership of a criminal association. SMG §35(1) lets the prosecution step back provisionally for a probation period of one to two years where the act was exclusively for personal use and brought the accused no advantage, which is conditional diversion and not permission. 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. They describe the offences that this row's placement in the Austrian Suchtgift and psychotrope lists brings into play.

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 a Suchtgift, the psychotrope non punishment route in SMG §30(3) is not available to it: that provision reaches medicines containing a psychotropic substance, and a narcotic is not one. The travel certificate fields that close Annexes 2 and 3 of the Psychotropenverordnung belong to the psychotrope system in the same way. Diamorphine has authorized medical uses in some systems, but the entry read here supplies no Austrian traveller route, and nothing outside a dispensed authorized medicine sits inside SMG §5(1).

Documentation

Carry the original dispensing packaging together with the prescription and a signed prescriber's statement of the patient, the substance, the daily dose and the length of treatment, since a narcotic designation puts the burden of showing an authorized purpose on the person holding it. The Austrian entry names diacetylmorphine, which is the name a medical document would use. The narcotics list was read at its 18 September 2026 consolidation, whose last listed amendment is BGBl II 180/2026 published 10 July 2026, which is a dated source horizon rather than a guarantee that no later instrument exists.

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.