New Cosmetic Ingredient Rules Take Effect, High-Risk List Cut to 5, 124 Registered by Mid-2026

The revised Regulations on Registration and Dossier Management of New Cosmetic Ingredients officially took effect on July 15, 2026. As of that date, 124 new cosmetic ingredients had been registered nationwide, representing more than 70% of the 169 registrations in the full year of 2025. The new rules compress the high-risk efficacy list from 10 categories to 5, removing anti-hair loss, anti-acne, anti-wrinkle, anti-dandruff and deodorant ingredients from the high-risk category, and no longer uniformly requiring certain long-term toxicology tests. Plant-based ingredients remain the main category. Popular ingredients include Acer truncatum seed oil, which has an unsaturated fatty acid content of over 92%, along with Anoectochilus roxburghii, Camellia chrysantha, Dendrobium officinale, white-fleshed Ganoderma and Tremella aurantialba. The density of cyclic peptide ingredient registrations has increased: Botanee registered cyclooctapeptide-1, Shenzhen Tianqiming registered cyclohexapeptide-120, Paitai Biology registered cyclosh-pentapeptide-46SP and Proya registered bicyclohexadecapeptide-1. Animal-derived ingredients have doubled, from five cases in 2025 to 12 cases as of July 15, 2026, including bee oligopeptide, fingerless frog oligopeptide, blue crab dodecapeptide, swollen seahorse extract, giant salamander oil, horse oil ethyl ester, lard, donkey-hide gelatin peptide, glutamate-modified pearl powder and Antarctic krill oil. By enterprise registration location, Guangdong leads with 26 registered companies, followed by Shanghai with 14 and Zhejiang with 13. Yunnan is dominated by Botanee and Novotech. Since the registration system was implemented in 2021, cumulative registrations have exceeded 500 as of July 15, 2026. Botanee and Vichy Technology are tied for first with 23 registrations each. Huaxi Biotechnology, Intercos, Shanghai Keqin, Beijing Shangjie Youlan, Novotech, Wenzhou Gumu Biotechnology, Proya and Dow are among the top ten. Among newly registered enterprises in 2026, Novotech has six registrations, tied with Botanee for the annual lead, followed by Beijing Shangjie Youlan with four, and Wenzhou Gumu Biotechnology, Shanghai Zhizhen Zhichen and Guangdong Danlan International Biology with three each. The number of foreign companies participating has increased from 14 in 2025 to 16, adding Japan Cell Biotechnology Co. , Ltd. , Korea Aekyung Industrial Co. and US Ashland Inc. Among the 18 new ingredients registered by foreign companies, polymers, surfactants and functional oils account for 14, nearly 80%. Since 2021, some new ingredients have been deregistered or had their registrations cancelled. Of the 124 registrations in 2026, only 10 have entered the routine monitoring period.