Menthol cigarettes are banned from retail sale statewide in Massachusetts, California, and New Jersey, and in the District of Columbia. No other state has a full statewide ban, and there is no federal ban. More than 400 cities and counties layer their own restrictions on top, so the states where menthol cigarettes are banned tell only part of the story.
The Four Statewide Bans
Each statewide ban treats menthol as one flavor within a broader prohibition on flavored tobacco. None of them targets menthol alone.
Massachusetts was first. A law signed in November 2019 pulled menthol cigarettes from store shelves on June 1, 2020. The ban reaches menthol, mint, and wintergreen cigarettes, cigars, chewing tobacco, and e-cigarettes. Licensed smoking bars may still sell flavored products, but only for on-site consumption.1Department of Public Health. 2019 Tobacco Control Law
California took a longer road. The legislature passed SB 793 in August 2020, the tobacco industry forced a referendum, and voters upheld the law through Proposition 31 in November 2022. The ban took effect in late December 2022 and covers menthol cigarettes along with flavored e-cigarettes, chewing tobacco, snuff, and roll-your-own tobacco sold at any retail location or vending machine.2California Department of Public Health. California Prohibits Retailers from Selling Flavored Tobacco Products
The District of Columbia prohibits menthol cigarette sales under local law and sits alongside the two states in federal health data tracking jurisdictions with statewide-level bans.3CDC. State Menthol Fact Sheets
New Jersey is the newest. In January 2026, the state passed S1947, extending its existing ban on flavored cigarettes to include menthol and clove. The law takes effect 60 days after enactment.
States That Have Considered a Ban
New York has a bill in its Senate Health Committee that would prohibit flavored tobacco sales statewide, but it has not advanced to a vote. Minnesota moved the other direction and passed legislation preventing local governments from banning flavored tobacco within their borders. Other states see proposals come and go. If you are checking the status in your state, the picture changes regularly, and the state health department is usually the clearest source.
Hundreds of Local Bans
More than 400 local jurisdictions and three Native American tribes have placed some restriction on flavored tobacco sales as of late 2025. Roughly 170 of those are comprehensive, prohibiting all flavors, including menthol, across all product types and all retailers. Most sit in California, where dozens of cities adopted bans before the statewide law took effect, but comprehensive local bans also exist in Colorado, Illinois, Minnesota, New York, and elsewhere.
San Francisco and Oakland are the best-known examples, with wall-to-wall bans at every retailer. Where a local ban is stricter than state law, the local rule usually controls.
Chicago is sometimes lumped in with those cities, but its rule is far narrower. Chicago prohibits flavored tobacco sales, including menthol, only within 500 feet of a secondary school. A 2016 amendment relaxed the original ordinance, which had also covered elementary and middle schools. Stores elsewhere in the city can sell menthol legally. Whether you can buy a pack in Chicago depends on where the store sits.
If you live near a city or county line, the law can change from one block to the next. The store across the street may follow a different rule than the one on your corner.
No Federal Ban
The FDA proposed a nationwide ban on menthol as a characterizing flavor in cigarettes in April 2022, with a companion rule for flavored cigars.4U.S. Food and Drug Administration. FDA Proposes Rules Prohibiting Menthol Cigarettes and Flavored Cigars to Prevent Youth Initiation, Significantly Reduce Tobacco-Related Disease and Death On January 21, 2025, the incoming administration withdrew both proposed rules. The withdrawal ended the rulemaking entirely, so any future federal ban would have to start over with a fresh proposal and public comment period. For now, authority to restrict menthol sits with state and local governments.
What the Bans Mean If You Smoke
Every existing ban targets the sellers, not the smokers. The laws prohibit selling, offering for sale, or possessing with intent to sell flavored tobacco. No state ban makes it a crime for a consumer to possess menthol cigarettes for personal use, and the FDA stated in its withdrawn proposal that it “cannot and will not enforce against individual consumers for possession or use.”4U.S. Food and Drug Administration. FDA Proposes Rules Prohibiting Menthol Cigarettes and Flavored Cigars to Prevent Youth Initiation, Significantly Reduce Tobacco-Related Disease and Death
Ordering online to a banned state is not a workaround. Federal law makes all cigarettes nonmailable through the U.S. Postal Service, regardless of flavor. The Prevent All Cigarette Trafficking Act of 2009 prohibits depositing cigarettes in the mail or causing them to be delivered through it, with penalties that include up to a year in prison and a civil penalty of ten times the retail value of the shipped cigarettes, including all taxes. Any cigarettes found in the mail are subject to seizure and forfeiture.5Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 18 U.S. Code 1716E – Tobacco Products as Nonmailable FedEx and UPS have adopted policies against shipping cigarettes to consumers.
Carrying a personal supply across state lines is a different question. The TSA allows cigarettes in carry-on and checked luggage.6Transportation Security Administration. Cigarettes A traveler bringing a pack or two into a ban state for personal use is not what enforcement targets. The calculus flips at commercial quantities: federal law treats more than 10,000 cigarettes (50 cartons) without the proper state tax stamps as contraband, and knowingly transporting or selling contraband cigarettes is a federal felony punishable by up to five years in prison.7Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 18 USC Ch 114 – Trafficking in Contraband Cigarettes and Smokeless Tobacco Some states set their own tax-free import limits as well. Personal use ends where resale begins.