Whole Foods ashwagandha supplement recalled nationwide over salmonella risk

A dietary supplement sold under Whole Foods Market's house brand is being pulled from shelves nationwide after federal testing turned up possible salmonella contamination, the company and the Food and Drug Administration announced this week. The recall covers one lot of 365 Whole Foods Market Standardized + Full Spectrum Blend Ashwagandha Capsules, a 120-count bottle of the herbal supplement that has become one of the best-selling adaptogens in the United States.

Vitality Works Inc., an Albuquerque, New Mexico-based supplement manufacturer, issued the recall on October 30 in coordination with the FDA after the agency's routine sampling program flagged a single retail unit for potential salmonella. The company said no illnesses linked to the product had been reported as of the announcement.

What was recalled

The affected product is identified by lot number 2025-26227, printed on the bottom of the white plastic bottle alongside an expiration date of October 13, 2028. The bottles carry the UPC code 9948252099 and were sold exclusively under the 365 Whole Foods Market private label. According to the FDA notice, the capsules were distributed nationwide, sold both in physical Whole Foods Market stores and online through Amazon.com, from November 24, 2025 through October 20 of this year — an 11-month sales window that gives the recall unusually broad reach for a single-lot supplement action. The FDA's notice does not name specific states, describing distribution simply as nationwide.

The FDA's own enforcement database lists the action under the standard classification used for foodborne-contamination recalls. Supplements fall under FDA's food safety authority rather than its drug rules — dietary supplements are not reviewed or approved by the FDA before they go on sale, and the agency's main tool for catching problems after the fact is exactly this kind of routine retail sampling — which is why the agency, not Whole Foods' pharmacy division, is the lead regulator here.

How the contamination was found

The FDA notice states the possible contamination was discovered "through routine sampling," a standard surveillance method in which inspectors pull retail products off shelves for laboratory testing independent of any consumer complaint or reported illness. That detail matters because it means the recall was not triggered by sick customers or a traced outbreak — it was caught before any confirmed harm, which is the scenario food-safety regulators consider their system working as designed.

Salmonella is a bacterium that, according to the FDA's own public-health description included in the recall notice, can cause serious and sometimes fatal infections in young children, frail or elderly people, and anyone with a weakened immune system. In otherwise healthy people, it more commonly causes fever, diarrhea that is sometimes bloody, nausea, vomiting and abdominal pain. In rare cases, the bacteria can enter the bloodstream and cause more severe complications, including infected aneurysms, endocarditis and arthritis.

Who is affected

Because the product was sold nationwide and through Amazon in addition to physical stores, the pool of potentially affected customers is not confined to any single region. Anyone who purchased the 120-count ashwagandha capsules from Whole Foods or Amazon during the nearly year-long sales window is advised to check the lot number on the bottom of their bottle, as local news coverage of the recall has also urged. Ashwagandha, an herb used in traditional Ayurvedic medicine and marketed in the U.S. primarily for stress and sleep support, has seen a sharp rise in retail sales over the past several years as interest in adaptogenic supplements has grown, which widens the practical reach of any recall tied to a popular retailer's private-label version of the product.

The FDA and company notices stop short of providing a specific unit count for the recall, identifying the scope instead by lot number and distribution window rather than a total bottle tally — a common practice for single-lot dietary supplement recalls, where exact sell-through figures are not always disclosed publicly.

Company response and next steps

Consumers who have the recalled lot are instructed not to consume the capsules. The FDA notice directs customers to discard the product rather than return it to a store shelf, even though refunds are being made available separately at any Whole Foods Market location regardless of where the product was originally purchased. Vitality Works has set up a dedicated recall line, (505) 268-9950, staffed weekdays from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Mountain time, for questions about the recall.

This is not the first time Vitality Works has issued a federal recall, and the action has already been picked up by independent recall-tracking sites that monitor the week's federal consumer-safety notices. FDA enforcement records show the company recalled fenugreek capsules in 2023 after a customer found a foreign object — pieces of a pen — in a bottle, a separate and unrelated incident that was distributed to dozens of retail chains before being resolved. That earlier action does not bear on the current salmonella recall but indicates the company has been through the federal recall process before.

As of publication, the recall remains active and has not been marked as terminated on the FDA's public recalls tracking page. Whole Foods Market has not released a separate public statement beyond directing affected customers to its in-store refund process. The FDA typically updates recall status once a company completes corrective actions and the agency confirms the product has been fully removed from distribution; no timeline for that closure has been published for this case. Shoppers who are uncertain whether their bottle matches the recalled lot are advised to contact Vitality Works directly or bring the bottle to a Whole Foods Market customer service desk for verification.