The Code of Federal Regulations, usually called the CFR, is the official compilation of every general and permanent rule issued by federal agencies in the United States. It gathers thousands of individual regulations into 50 subject-area titles covering areas as varied as food safety, workplace protections, energy, and banking. Federal law at 44 U.S.C. § 1510 requires the government to maintain this codification so that the public can actually find and read the rules that apply to them.1Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 44 USC 1510 – Code of Federal Regulations When you see a reference like “21 CFR 101.9” on a food label or in a government notice, that citation points into the CFR.
Where the Rules in the CFR Come From
Congress passes laws, but most of those laws are deliberately broad. A statute might direct the government to keep food safe without specifying how many parts per million of a contaminant are acceptable. Congress delegates that technical work to federal agencies such as the FDA, EPA, or OSHA, authorizing them to write detailed rules that carry the full force of law. Those rules, once finalized, are what fill the CFR.
The process agencies follow to create those rules is governed by the Administrative Procedure Act, codified at 5 U.S.C. § 553.2Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 5 US Code 553 – Rule Making In most cases it works like this:
- The agency publishes a notice of proposed rulemaking in the Federal Register, along with its legal authority and an explanation of the problem the rule addresses.
- The public gets a chance to submit written comments, typically through regulations.gov. Comment periods usually run 30 to 60 days, though agencies can set longer windows.3Federal Register. The Public Commenting Process
- After reviewing the comments, the agency publishes a final rule in the Federal Register with a statement explaining its reasoning. The rule then gets incorporated into the CFR.
Not every rule goes through this process. The APA exempts interpretive rules, general policy statements, and situations where an agency finds that public comment would be impractical or against the public interest.2Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 5 US Code 553 – Rule Making Those exceptions come up more often than most people expect, and they are a frequent source of legal challenges.
How the CFR Is Organized
The CFR uses a hierarchical structure that moves from broad subject areas down to individual regulatory requirements. At the top sit 50 titles, each covering a general subject like agriculture (Title 7), energy (Title 10), or labor (Title 29).4eCFR. Titles Within each title, the breakdown works this way:
- Chapters are identified by the issuing agency. Title 21 (Food and Drugs), for instance, has Chapter I for the Food and Drug Administration.5eCFR. 21 CFR Chapter I – Food and Drug Administration
- Parts sit inside chapters and focus on a specific regulatory program or topic, like food labeling requirements or a particular type of environmental permit.
- Sections are the most granular level, where the actual text of the regulation lives. Each section has a unique number, and most citations point to this level.
Every CFR part also carries an “Authority” note identifying the specific federal statute that gives the agency power to issue those regulations.6eCFR. 1 CFR Subpart B – Citations of Authority If you want to trace a regulation back to the law Congress actually passed, that authority note is where you start. It typically appears right after the table of contents for each part and includes the United States Code citation.
How to Read a CFR Citation
CFR citations follow a consistent pattern that is simpler than it looks. Take 21 CFR 101.9, which covers nutrition labeling requirements for food.7eCFR. 21 CFR 101.9 – Nutrition Labeling of Food The first number (21) is the title. “CFR” tells you the source is the Code of Federal Regulations. The number before the decimal (101) is the part, and the number after (9) is the section.
Citations sometimes go deeper. A reference like 21 CFR 101.9(c) points to a specific paragraph within that section, identified by a letter in parentheses. Longer sections may use nested numbering, such as (c)(1)(ii), to pinpoint a particular clause. Each layer just narrows your focus from a broad subject area down to a single sentence of regulatory text.
Sometimes you already know the statute and want to find every regulation based on it. For that, the government publishes a Parallel Table of Authorities and Rules, which lists United States Code sections alongside the CFR parts derived from them.8GovInfo. Parallel Table of Authorities and Rules It is especially useful when the implementing regulations are spread across multiple agencies.
Reading the Current Version Online
The Electronic Code of Federal Regulations (eCFR), at ecfr.gov, is a free, continuously updated version of the CFR maintained by the National Archives and the Government Publishing Office. Unlike the print edition, which reflects a single annual snapshot, the eCFR incorporates changes from the Federal Register on a near-daily basis. One important caveat: the eCFR is not the official legal edition of the CFR.9eCFR. eCFR Home The print CFR retains that status. In practice, most researchers and compliance professionals still use the eCFR because it is far more current.
The eCFR also includes a point-in-time feature that lets you view regulations as they existed on any specific date going back to 2017.10eCFR. Using the eCFR Point-in-Time System Enter a date, and the system reconstructs the regulatory text as it read on that day. A comparison view highlights added text in green and removed text in red with strikethrough formatting, which helps when you need to see how a regulation evolved.
The Print Revision Cycle
The print edition of the CFR follows a quarterly revision cycle that staggers updates across the year. The 50 titles are split into four groups, each updated on a fixed date:
- January 1: Titles 1 through 16
- April 1: Titles 17 through 27
- July 1: Titles 28 through 41
- October 1: Titles 42 through 50
Each new edition incorporates all changes published in the Federal Register over the prior twelve months. Between annual updates, the List of CFR Sections Affected (LSA) tracks which sections have been amended, added, or removed since the last revision. Published monthly, the LSA lists each affected CFR part and section alongside the Federal Register page where the change appears.11GovInfo. List of CFR Sections Affected If you are relying on the print CFR for compliance purposes, checking the LSA is essential, because the regulation you are reading could have been rewritten shortly after publication.
Do CFR Regulations Have the Force of Law?
Yes. Regulations published in the CFR carry the force of law when they were properly issued under a valid delegation of authority from Congress. Violating them triggers the same kinds of legal consequences as violating a statute.
The penalty for any given violation depends on the agency and subject matter. Some violations carry civil fines per incident, with maximums that scale into the millions for a related series of violations. Others carry criminal penalties, including imprisonment. The specific penalty structure for any regulation is usually spelled out either within the CFR part itself or in the underlying statute that authorized the regulation. Because many penalty amounts are adjusted annually for inflation, the dollar figures shift from year to year, so it is worth checking the most current version of the relevant CFR part rather than relying on older print editions or secondary summaries.