Wednesday February 18, 2026

An Analysis of Consumer Product Recalls in 2025

By Don Mays, Product Safety Insights LLP

In 2025, the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) announced a record-setting total of 422 recalls. However, if every company listed in the CPSC's "Product Safety Warnings" had cooperated with the agency's recall requests, the number of recalls would have reached 541, averaging more than ten recalls per week.

This is an independently written opinion piece, unedited by PSL.

PSL welcomes such articles – and responses to them.

Inclusion is not an indication of agreement or disagreement – simply that the contents likely are of interest to readers.

Don Mays is a consultant and founder of Product Safety Insights LLC. He is Chairman of ASTM F15 Committee on Consumer Products and President of the Society of Product Safety Professionals.

www.ProductSafetyInsights.com

The number of CPSC recalls in 2025 increased by 28 percent compared to the previous year. Despite that rise, the total number of individual units involved in recalls dropped by 50 percent. This trend may suggest that the CPSC is moving more swiftly to remove unsafe and violative products from consumers’ homes and from the marketplace before they are widely distributed.

A notable aspect of last year’s recalls was that nearly half involved products that violated federal rules and regulations, a proportion that has grown yearly. Between 2016 and 2020, only about 14 percent of recalled products violated federal requirements. The increasing percentage of violative products indicates that the CPSC has become more aggressive in enforcing its rules. This strategy proved effective: among the 208 recalls citing regulatory violations, only two minor injuries and no deaths were reported. However, this trend may also reflect that some companies—especially those operating in third-party marketplaces—are flouting our product safety laws.

Approximately one-third of last year’s recalls were for children’s products. Many of those products violated newer regulations such as the STURDY Act, Reese’s Law, the Infant Sleep Products Rule, and the Safe Sleep for Babies Act. Additionally, frequent violations of the longstanding toy safety standard and the Flammable Fabrics Act governing children’s sleepwear resulted in those product categories having some of the highest numbers of recalls.

Compliance with regulations and standards does not necessarily ensure product safety. Too many recalls involved products that caused injuries and, in some cases, deaths. The number of injuries and fatalities has generally remained steady in recent years. This underscores the need for manufacturers and retailers to take greater responsibility in preventing unsafe products from reaching the market, rather than relying on recalls after harm has occurred.

To read the complete recall analysis, please click here.