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If you have never bought any of this, this page is enough. Three questions and a reading path in order.
What is it, exactly?
Cannabidiol is one of the compounds in the hemp plant. It is not the compound the law restricts — that is THC, and the limit across most of the EU sits at or below 0.3% of the total. A legal hemp product contains both; the difference is the ratio.
Which format should I choose?
It depends only on how you want to take it, not on quality. Oil is the easiest format to dose and the easiest to compare on price. Everything else — capsules, cream, tea, flower — changes the form, not the content.
How do I know the product is good?
From the lab report, and from nothing else. A product with a batch number on the packaging and an analysis of that batch is verifiable; a product without them is a description. There is no shortcut, and colour, brand and price do not replace the document.
The path, in order
A handful of reads that answer most of what comes next.
- The essentials The name on a certificate and the one on a label Documents use the full chemical name and marketing uses the abbreviation. The gap between the two vocabularies hides several distinctions worth knowing. 14 min
- The essentials Three words, none of them legally defined Full spectrum, broad spectrum and isolate are commercial terms with no legal definition. What each usually means, and what the certificate says instead. 14 min
- The formats Why a drop is not a unit of measurement Drop size varies with the dropper, the viscosity and the angle. Anything expressed in drops rests on a quantity nobody controls. 14 min
- Verifying and storing The document that decides everything, line by line A batch certificate is the only piece of paper that ties a product to a measurement. Here is what each line means, and which ones are usually missing. 17 min
- Choosing and buying The only division that makes two offers comparable Price per gram compares nothing across formats or concentrations. One division fixes that, and it is the single most useful arithmetic in this category. 14 min
- Choosing and buying Eight questions to ask before paying All eight have factual answers a competent seller supplies in one reply. How they respond tells you as much as what they say. 14 min
- Verifying and storing Five habits that cost more than they look The common storage errors are not exotic. They are the refrigerator, the windowsill, the original bag, the daily opening, and the oversized jar. 17 min
Or jump straight to what interests you
The guides are grouped by theme, from the essentials to the craft.
- The essentials What it is, what it is not, and the minimum vocabulary. 8 guides
- The questions everyone asks The recurring questions, answered with what is known. 10 guides
- Choosing and buying Comparing prices properly and knowing what to ask. 9 guides
- Verifying and storing The lab report, the batch, and what ruins a product at home. 11 guides
- The formats Oil, capsules, vape, cream, tea, flower and resin. 13 guides
- Animals What changes when the recipient is not a person. 1 guides
- Legal framework The perimeter, and the vocabulary it produced. 6 guides
- Chemistry and botany The molecules and the structures that hold them. 8 guides
- Craft and extraction Separating what matters from the rest of the plant. 25 guides
- From harvest to jar Drying, curing, and what happens along the way. 9 guides
- Cultivation Where and how it grows, and why that changes the product. 9 guides
- Varieties The genetics, the origins, and the names given to them. 10 guides
- Culture and history The people, the places and the episodes. 6 guides
- In practice What to do with it once you have bought it. 3 guides