Did you know? Sixty percent of Americans use or have experimented with CBD products.

With numbers like this, CBD must be equal to or even more popular than essential oils and wellness therapies like acupuncture and homeopathy. If you ask us, that’s a significant leap. Factor in that hemp-derived CBD became legal at the federal level in the US as little as four years ago.

But we have a good guess as to why CBD is so popular. First off, it offers relief to people with stress and anxiety. Second, it helps people enjoy quality sleep, improving their overall health.

That said, if you want to try CBD for the first time, this question might cross your mind; how long does it stay in my system?

Well, it depends on multiple factors and may range from some hours to several days, or even a month.

Here, we shall discuss how long CBD stays in your system and what factors affect its duration in your body. So, let’s rush in and jump into it immediately.

How Long Does CBD Stay in Your System?

Before we can answer this question, you need to understand “CBD half-life”.

CBD half-life is how long your body takes to reduce CBD traces in your system to one-half of its original strength and effectiveness. Usually, it takes the body four to five half-lives to eliminate a drug.

For CBD, the half-life will vary with the method of consumption. For example:

• Oral sprays – half-life of 1.4 to 10.9 hours
• Oral consumption–half-life of 2 to 5 days
• Intravenous administration – half-life of 24 hours
• Smoking – half-life of 31 hours

Based on this information, the cannabinoid can linger around your body anywhere from 1 hour to 5 days. But sometimes, it can stay in your system for several days–around 10 to 25 days, especially after chronic oral consumption.

What Factors Affect How Long CBD Stays in Your System?

As noted above, how long the CBD remains present in your body relies on several considerations. Therefore, in this segment of our article, we shall discuss each factor to help you understand CBD and how it works in your system.

1. How Much Do You Use

Believe it or not, how much CBD you use determines how long the cannabidiol will stay in your system. Like other drugs, the more CBD you take (at once), the longer it lingers around in your system.

Studies show that 1.35 mg of CBD can stay in the blood for over 6 hours after ingestion as per a publication in the journal Therapeutic Monitoring. Nonetheless, traces of a more substantial dose may remain in the body for up to 25 hours.

2. Frequency of Consumption

Besides dosage, how often you use CBD products also matters.  With frequent CBD users, the concentration of CBD metabolites can build up in their system and stay for a while.

Why?

Well, CBD is highly absorbed by fat hence it can accumulate in fatty tissues and leave residual traces in the body system for a longer period.

If you are an occasional user, expect the CBD to clear from your system much faster.

3. Method of Use

Our bodies usually process CBD differently based on the method of intake. Here are several common CBD consumption methods:

Oral Consumption

As the name implies, oral consumption refers to eating CBD products like edibles and gummies or drinking water-soluble CBD. Either way, the CBD only enters your bloodstream after being digested in the stomach and passing through the liver.

Keep in mind that if you consume CBD products orally, you might not enjoy its effects immediately. It may take up to one hour before it kicks in. Nevertheless, if you eat or drink the products on an empty stomach, the CBD can get metabolized and eliminated from the body much faster.

Inhalation

If you prefer vaping or smoking CBD, the cannabinoid can enter your body faster because it’s directly absorbed via the lungs. The CBD can reach your bloodstream quickly and circulate through various systems in your body.

Inhaled CBD products tend to last in your system for 40 minutes to 2 hours.

Sublingual Intake

Some people prefer taking CBD sublingually so they can get the best results from the compound. When you squeeze oil drops straight under your tongue and hold them for 90 seconds, the CBD will be absorbed directly into your bloodstream.

Since the CBD product bypasses the stomach and enters your bloodstream, it means more CBD is absorbed instead of getting lost in digestion. Therefore, the CBD will kick in faster and produce a more potent effect.

Once CBD gets into your swirling bloodstream, it’ll pass through your liver where some molecules will get filtered. Eventually, the body will eliminate these filtered materials through urine and feces.

But even though the liver will remove the CBD, it can stay in your system for as long as 6 to 8 hours.

Topical Use

Unlike oral drops and tinctures, topical CBD serum and creams cannot enter your bloodstream. Instead, they slowly interact with cannabinoid receptors on the skin’s surface to deliver the best effects.

4. Your Body

We all have different bodies, so don’t expect CBD to work on you the same way it works on your friend.

Factors like your age can influence how long CBD stays in your body. For example, some cells within your body might fail to perform their duties efficiently or their function might change as you age. Thus, they can affect how CBD gets metabolized and removed from your body.

Other aspects that can affect the duration of CBDin your body include:

• Body mass index
• Metabolism
• Water content

5. Diet

If you take digestible CBD products on an empty stomach, the body will metabolize and eliminate the compounds rapidly.

But if you take the products after eating, the compounds will take longer to break down as the body will be processing the food in your stomach. That means the CBD will take longer to reach a higher concentration in your bloodstream and may also linger around for an extended period.

Will CBD Show Up on Drug Tests?

Many individuals desire to try out CBD products but are fearful of testing positive for drugs during compulsory drug screening at their workplace.

While this is a genuine fear, CBD rarely shows up in drug tests. But there’s a catch: If your CBD product has any traces of THC in it, it will probably show up during screening.

Tetrahydrocannabinol or THC is the active component in marijuana that generates the feeling of being “high”.

You need to understand that the FDA does not regulate most of the available CBD products. Because of this, it’s hard to ascertain for sure what ingredients are in these products.

So, it’s no surprise that many CBD products contain some THC traces. Most times, the THC amount in a CBD product will depend on the kind of CBD extract.

• Full-spectrum CBD: Full-spectrum CBD comprises all compounds occurring in marijuana naturally and often extracted, like flavonoids, terpenes, and THC. The law, however, dictates that full-spectrum hemp-derived CBD should contain only less than 0.3% of THC.
• Broad-spectrum CBD: Broad-spectrum CBD is simply full-spectrum CBD with THC stripped out during the extraction process.
• CDB isolate: CBD isolate is a pure form of CBD extract. It comes from hemp plants and contains no additional compounds.

Now, let’s see how long CBD is detectable based on various tests.

How Long Does CBD Stay in Your System Urine Test?

Urine testing is perhaps the most popular screening method for cannabis. Nonetheless, the window for detecting traces of THC and CBD varies significantly based on your CBD dosage and frequency of consumption.

Typically, THC metabolites remain in your urine anywhere from 3 days to two weeks following use. For heavy CBD users, the metabolites can be detectable for up to 30 days.

How Long Does CBD Stay in Your System Blood Test?

Blood tests are rare in workplace settings, but the court can subject people on probation to mandatory drug testing, including blood tests.

However, this testing method does not prove convenient because the body eliminates CBD and THC from the bloodstream quickly.

If you use CBD products with traces of THC, expect the THC to remain detectable in blood plasma up to 5 hours after use. But THC metabolites can linger around for up to a week.

How Long Does CBD Stay in Your System Hair Follicle Test?

The presence of THC in your CBD drops, gummies, or vape means that THC metabolites will remain detectable in your hair follicles for as long as three months following consumption.

How Long Does CBD Stay in Your System Saliva Test?

The saliva test is hardly used as a screening tool for CBD and THC. However, if you use CBD products that contain THC, your saliva could test positive for THC for 38 -48 hours.

Closing Thoughts

There is no definitive response to the question: How long does CBD stay in your system?

The duration varies depending on your body, dose amounts, as well as how you consume the CBD products.

That sums up our post for today. We hope you have found it helpful. Let us know if you have any concerns or lingering questions.

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