Chewable CBD Tablets: Everything You Need to Know

For some people, CBD is (literally) a tough pill to swallow — and if you’re one of them, chewable CBD tablets could be the discreet, convenient, smoke-free way of using the cannabinoid you’ve been looking for. 

CBD capsules have long been a staple in the market, and CBD vitamins have recently burst onto the scene as well. But these products are typically designed to be swallowed whole, not chewed, and while this might seem like the smallest of distinctions, it’s also opened up an opportunity for brands to release yet another infused iteration of a familiar concept. 

One of the most recent examples comes from CBD brand Santeer, which just released a line of chewable CBD tablets. The Colorado-based company offers three types of tablets intended for specific purposes: Focus, Dream, and Renew (there’s also a variety available for pets). Focus and Renew come in bottles of 50 tablets, each of which contains 5 mg of CBD. Dream, on the other hand, has a higher CBD dosage per tablet (10 mg), though it comes in a smaller bottle (30 tablets). The products are available through the brand’s website, along with a number of online retailers. Each bottle costs $80.

If that price tag seems a bit steep, consumers do have other options. SA Botanicals, for example, offers a line of strawberry-flavored tablets that cost $65 for a bottle of 60 tablets, each of which contains 15 mg of CBD. There’s also Glo CBD, which claims to be the first company to have offered a chewable tablet. Their elderberry-flavored GloTabchewables, each with 10 mg of CBD, will set you back just $40 for a bottle of 30 tablets.

Are Chewable CBD Tablets Easier to Use than Other CBD Products?

One of the main benefits of chewable CBD tablets, like other products such as capsules or gummies, is the ability to precisely calculate your dosage. Since each tablet contains the same amount of CBD, there’s less guesswork involved than with vapes, topicals, and other methods.

But how much are you supposed to take? Here, it’s hard to say, as choosing the right CBD dose depends on the condition you want to treat, along with personal factors — especially your metabolism, since this determines how your body will process CBD. What we do know is that taking more CBD won’t necessarily yield better or faster results: a 2018 study from Brazilian researchers found that oral doses of 300 mg of CBD helped significantly reduce the anxiety from public speaking, while doses of 600 mg had no discernible effect. Chewable tablets won’t magically ensure that you’re getting the right amount of CBD for you, but at least they can make the process of trial-and-error a bit more precise and manageable. 

Another advantage of chewable CBD tablets is their bioavailabilty, especially compared to beverages like CBD wellness drinks. Bioavailability refers to the amount of CBD that your body is able to absorb and process, and while oral ingestion methods like chewable tablets don’t offer the same punch as smoking or vaping — which can offer up to 40 percent bioavailability compared to a maximum of 20 percent for oral CBD, according to hemp researcher Keith Butler — they compare favorably to beverages, topicals, and other products. 

Some brands, like Santeer, claim that their chewable tablets have “enhanced bioavailability” that make their products even more effective, but consumers would be wise to take this with a grain of salt. Although Santeer claims that you’ll get “5-9 times more CBD from these tablets than CBD oils or capsules,” this hasn’t been confirmed by any independent studies to date. 

In terms of safety, there’s always the risk of encountering a contaminated or mislabeled product, since the CBD industry is still unregulated (if this is a concern for you, you might want to avoid SA Botanicals’ products, since they don’t provide third-party lab reports on purity). Other than that, however, chewable CBD tablets give consumers little to worry about, though some products, like GloTabs, are made with inactive ingredients such as lactose that could potentially prove problematic for people with certain sensitivities.

All in all, if you’re looking for an easy, precise way to get your daily dose of CBD, chewable tablets might not be a bad option.