Is Caraway Cookware Non-Toxic? What Its Own Filings Show

What is Caraway cookware made of?

Caraway’s best-known pans are ceramic nonstick. In its own words, the Fry Pan is “crafted with an aluminum body, non-toxic ceramic coated interior cooking surface, and stainless steel handles and base plate”, and is oven-safe to 550 °F. It describes the coating as “a mineral-based coating made without PTFE, PFOA, or PFAS”, made “from inorganic minerals rather than synthetic chemical compounds”, and says the pan is “made without PTFE, PFOA, PFAS, lead, and cadmium”, adding that the list “is not exhaustive”.

Caraway doesn’t say what holds the minerals together. When Slovenian researchers analysed commercial ceramic nonstick coatings in 2017, they found titanium dioxide and quartz particles “embedded in a silicone polymer matrix”. Those weren’t Caraway’s coatings, but they are the same type. Silicone isn’t PTFE and isn’t a PFAS, so the PFAS-free claim stands. “Inorganic minerals” is the marketing half of the story. See is ceramic cookware safe? for the four different things “ceramic” can mean.

Retrieved 23 September 2026 from carawayhome.com. Prices change often.

What did the NAD decide about Caraway’s “non-toxic” claim?

In 2025 the Cookware Sustainability Alliance, a coalition of cookware manufacturers whose members make PTFE-coated pans, challenged Caraway’s advertising at the National Advertising Division, the industry’s self-regulatory body. On 14 August 2025 the NAD found that Caraway “has a reasonable basis to claim its cookware is free of PFAS and non-toxic”.

It went the other way on Caraway’s claims about other pans. It recommended Caraway stop saying that “most traditional cookware is made with forever chemicals and when they are overheated, they can release those same toxins into your food and home”, and drop a claim that “Teflon flu cases are rising”, for which Caraway “provided no source data”. The NAD said most of the studies Caraway offered “were not a good fit for the challenged claims”. Caraway said it “respectfully disagrees” but “will comply”.

So both things are true: Caraway’s own pans are PFAS-free, and PTFE pans used at normal temperatures aren’t the poison Caraway’s old ads implied. For the PTFE side, see is HexClad non-toxic?

Has Caraway cookware been tested?

Caraway publishes results from Light Labs, a testing company, on its site. For the ceramic coating, PTFE and PFOA were “not detected” and a wider PFAS panel found none (January 2026). Total organic fluorine, which catches PFAS a targeted panel might miss, was also not detected. Heavy metals were very low: lead under 0.002 mg/kg and cadmium under 0.001 mg/kg. Bisphenols and phthalates were not detected.

Two caveats. The reports don’t state the test method, or whether they measured what’s in the coating or what migrates out of it. Aluminium came in under 1 mg/kg on a coating that sits on an aluminium pan, which suggests a migration or extraction test, but that is our inference. And Caraway commissioned the tests, and Light Labs notes that “results do not guarantee future performance”. They’re good evidence about new pans, not about a worn one.

Does Caraway cookware contain cadmium?

The ceramic pans don’t; Caraway says they’re made without lead and cadmium, and its tests agree. But California’s cookware law (AB 1200) makes makers list certain chemicals in each product, and Caraway’s own filing lists cadmium, intentionally added, for its enameled cast iron in “RUST COLOR ONLY”, as part of the exterior enamel. Cadmium pigments are a traditional way to colour enamel red and orange. The same filing lists boron and titanium dioxide for the cast iron’s handles and interior coating.

Exterior enamel doesn’t touch food, and Caraway’s published cast iron results show cadmium not detected, though they don’t say which surface or colour was tested. It isn’t a reason to panic about a Rust skillet. It is a reason to read the filing rather than assume “non-toxic” on one line covers every product and colour. If it matters to you, choose another colour.

How long does a Caraway pan last?

Caraway doesn’t give a number. Its support page says the coating “will wear gradually” and is “designed to perform well for years”, and that it’s time to replace a pan with “scratches or chips on the ceramic coating”. The warranty is more telling: one year, excluding “non-stick deterioration”, scratches, “normal wear and tear” and damage from heat or metal utensils. (The stainless set carries a “limited lifetime warranty”.) Our standing estimate for sol-gel ceramic pans, from Caraway, GreenPan and Our Place alike, is two to three years of regular use.

What comes off as it wears is mineral and silicone, not PTFE. Lab studies of ceramic coatings found titanium-containing particles migrating into acidic simulants at up to 861 µg per litre after two hours at 100 °C, and nanoparticles released only under severe abrasion with a tungsten-carbide tool. Health effects at those doses are unknown. Once the coating is gone, food touches the aluminium body.

How do you make a Caraway pan last?

These are Caraway’s own care rules, and they’re the ones that decide coating life:

• Low to medium heat only. “Avoid high heat, which can damage the non-stick coating over time.” Preheat for “up to 90 seconds”, and never leave an empty pan on a hot burner.
• No cooking sprays. “Avoid using oil sprays or cooking aerosols”; they leave a residue that builds up.
• No dishwasher. Caraway says it “will damage the ceramic coating.”
• No metal utensils with rough edges. Caraway suggests “wooden, silicone, plastic, or nylon” tools and calls wooden ones “the best option”. We’d stick to wood: pans sold as “made without microplastics” shouldn’t be stirred with nylon. See are nylon cooking utensils plastic?
• Let it cool before running cold water over it.

Caraway vs Our Place, GreenPan and HexClad

All four are now PTFE-free ceramic on an aluminium core, and all four coatings wear. The differences are heat rating and how the coating is protected, not a chemistry that makes one safe and another toxic. Caraway’s coating warranty is one year, so check each maker’s terms before you pay for a name.

Disclosure: MicroPlastics has an affiliate relationship with Our Place, a Caraway competitor. There are no affiliate links on this page, and it did not affect this assessment. See our affiliate disclosure and our Our Place review.

Is Caraway worth it if you want no coating at all?

Then skip the ceramic line. Caraway’s own 5-ply fully clad stainless set has no coating to wear off and carries its longest warranty. Cast iron and carbon steel from any brand do the same job for less. Stainless takes more fat and proper preheating to stop sticking, and that is the whole trade-off. See the best non-toxic cookware, ranked.

Caraway also announced a $495 drip coffee maker on September 22, 2026, which it says has no plastic in the water path. We compare it with the other plastic-free-path brewers in the best plastic-free coffee makers.

One more Caraway habit worth copying: its cutting boards are birch wood, and its own copy says plastic boards shed microplastics. See plastic cutting boards and microplastics.