Jackie Alyse Wigder

Cannabis laws · Verified July 2026

Is cannabis legal in South Carolina?

Low-THC / CBD only

Mostly no. South Carolina allows only low-THC or CBD products under narrow conditions; full-strength medical and recreational cannabis remain illegal. Possession outside these narrow allowances remains a criminal offense.

Julian's Law (2014, §44-53-1810) is a possession exemption, not a supply program: low-THC CBD oil (>15% CBD/<0.9% THC) for severe-epilepsy patients, no dispensaries or in-state supply. Medical bill S.53 stalled in committee; no 2026 vote.

What this status means: Low-THC or CBD-only status means the state allows just limited cannabis products, capped at low THC content, usually for a narrow set of medical conditions. Full-strength cannabis remains illegal, and some of these programs have no in-state way to buy the product they allow.

The facts, with sources

Possession
≤1 oz (28 g) cannabis or ≤10 g hashish: misdemeanor, ≤30 days jail + $100–200 fine (1st offense)
Decriminalized
No
Home cultivation
No Cultivating any amount is a felony statewide (under 100 plants: up to 5 yrs / $5,000). Julian's Law grants no home-grow right, only possession protection for qualifying-patient CBD oil.
Medical reciprocity
No No comprehensive medical program exists to reciprocate. Julian's Law protection is limited to SC-qualifying epilepsy patients possessing low-THC CBD oil; it does not recognize out-of-state medical cards.

Sources

Verified July 4, 2026

How federal law applies

Cannabis (termed "marijuana" in federal law) generally remains a Schedule I controlled substance. Only FDA-approved products and cannabis held under a qualifying state medical license have been moved to Schedule III (rule effective April 28, 2026); the broader Schedule I-to-III transfer is not finalized and remains pending in DEA's expedited rescheduling rulemaking.

Under the December 18, 2025 Executive Order on "Increasing Medical Marijuana and Cannabidiol Research," DOJ/DEA announced on April 23, 2026 that it was placing FDA-approved cannabis products and state-licensed medical cannabis into Schedule III (rule effective April 28, 2026) but left all other cannabis (unlicensed adult-use, bulk material, and synthetic THC) in Schedule I, and opened an expedited rulemaking (Federal Register, April 28, 2026) to consider rescheduling more broadly. A DEA administrative law judge began hearing evidence in that rulemaking on June 29, 2026; as of this site's last verification of this section, no final rule rescheduling cannabis generally had been issued. State-legal cannabis programs are unchanged by these developments and continue to operate under their own state laws.

A note on terminology: federal statute uses "marijuana" (spelled "marihuana" in the Controlled Substances Act) for what scientific and healthcare literature calls cannabis. This site uses "cannabis" except when quoting official sources.

Federal section verified July 30, 2026 · sources on the map page

Bordering states

See South Carolina on the interactive map, or compare all 50 states and DC.

This information is for educational purposes only and is not legal advice. Cannabis laws change frequently and details (limits, licensing, local rules) vary within states. Always confirm against the linked primary sources or a licensed attorney in your state.

Methodology, sources & AI use

Each jurisdiction was researched against at least two sources: the controlling state statute or state agency page, cross-checked against an aggregate policy tracker. Every state was then independently re-derived in a second, blind research pass, and every disagreement and every nuanced case (low-THC programs, varies flags, recent law changes, DC) was resolved by a third review against primary sources. Access dates are recorded per source and a verification date is shown per state. US territories are not yet covered.

The underlying dataset is available as JSON under a CC BY 4.0 license (opens in new tab); reuse it with attribution and a link back.

How AI was used: This dataset and page were built with substantial help from AI (Anthropic's Claude), directed and reviewed by a human editor. AI research agents gathered the statutes and agency pages cited for each state; a second, independent AI pass re-derived every state's facts without seeing the first pass; and a third pass resolved all disagreements against primary sources. Every cited link was then opened and checked in a real web browser, and dead or outdated citations were corrected by hand before publication. AI can still make mistakes, and laws change quickly.

Spotted an error? Reach out via the contact page and it will be checked against the primary sources and corrected.

Dataset updated July 2026.