Advertising and Selling Rules for Cannabis in Thailand: What You Can and Cannot Post on Asiannabis

GOOD_BUDS · September 2, 2026, 6:18am

Read this before you post anything about buying, selling, or promoting cannabis flower. It protects your licence, and it protects this forum.

Asiannabis Community | Safety and Regulation | Last verified: 1 August 2026

Summary in one minute

Since 26 June 2025, cannabis flower in Thailand is a controlled herb. Two things changed that affect everyone who posts here:

Selling cannabis flower online is illegal. Not restricted, not grey — illegal. No exceptions for messaging apps, forums, or private chats.
Advertising cannabis flower is illegal in every form, on every channel. Article 9 of the Ministry of Public Health Notification on Controlled Herbs (Cannabis) B.E. 2568 bans direct and indirect advertising without exception.

You can still talk about cannabis here. You can teach, argue, review, publish research, show your grow room, and tell people where your licensed premises are. What you cannot do is sell or advertise.

This post explains the line, and what happens to you if you cross it.

Part 1 — What the law actually says

The legal basis

Cannabis flower is not a narcotic in Thailand. It is a controlled herb under the Protection and Promotion of Thai Traditional Medicine Knowledge Act B.E. 2542 (1999).

The rules that matter day to day come from the Ministry of Public Health Notification on Controlled Herbs (Cannabis) B.E. 2568, signed 23 June 2025 by Public Health Minister Somsak Thepsuthin and published in the Royal Gazette on 26 June 2025.

Two further Ministerial Regulations were issued in 2026:

Extracts containing more than 0.2 percent tetrahydrocannabinol remain Category 5 narcotics — published 26 March 2026, in force 26 April 2026.
Licensing for cannabis flower as a controlled herb was tightened by Ministerial Regulation No. 2 B.E. 2569, published 30 April 2026.

The comprehensive Cannabis and Hemp Act that everyone keeps waiting for has been stalled in parliament since November 2024. Do not plan around it. The ministerial notifications are the law today.

What legal supply looks like now

A prescription form PT 33 (Thai: ภ.ท.33) from a licensed practitioner is required for every retail sale of flower.
A prescription is valid for a maximum of 30 days.
Flower must come from a cultivation site certified to Good Agricultural and Collection Practices, or an equivalent or higher standard.
Every transaction must happen face to face at licensed premises.

The effect has been brutal. Of roughly 18,433 cannabis shops operating before June 2025, about 7,297 had closed by February 2026 — a drop of around 40 percent. Most of them did not lose a court case. They simply could not operate under the new rules.

Part 2 — What you must not post on Asiannabis

These are not our preferences. Each one maps to a specific prohibition in Thai law, and posting it here creates exposure for you and for this community.

Selling and ordering

Any message that closes a sale of flower: price agreed, quantity agreed, payment method, delivery address.
“Send me a message to order”, “check my LINE”, “delivery available”, “we ship nationwide”.
Links to a shopping cart, checkout page, or payment link for flower.
Payment details — bank account, PromptPay number, crypto wallet — attached to a flower offer.
Inter-provincial delivery offers. All transactions must be in person on licensed premises.

Advertising flower

Retail price lists for flower.
Strain menus with potency figures presented as a product catalogue — for example a table of strain names with percentages next to an invitation to buy.
Discounts, promotions, happy hours, buy-one-get-one, loyalty points advertised publicly.
Close-up photography of buds used as product imagery.
Paid advertising of any kind pointing at flower products.
Celebrity or influencer endorsements of cannabis products.
Promotional hashtags used to sell, such as the common recreational tags.

Recreational and consumption content

Photos or video of people smoking, vaping flower, or exhaling smoke.
Content that presents cannabis as a way to get high, party, or relax recreationally.
Any content aimed at people under 20, or that would obviously appeal to minors.

Health claims

Claims that a specific product treats, cures, or prevents any disease.
Testimonials framed as proof of a medical outcome.
“Relaxing and refreshing effects” claims on cannabis food and drink — the Food and Drug Administration prohibits this wording specifically.

Content that targets prohibited jurisdictions

Asiannabis is governed by the law of the Kingdom of Thailand. Do not post content that solicits customers in countries where cannabis is prohibited, and do not post anything that reads as an offer to ship across a border.

Part 3 — What you are welcome to post

This is a forum for growers, patients, farms, laboratories, and licensed businesses. Almost everything you actually want to discuss is fine.

Your business, as information

Shop name, address, opening hours, phone number, map link.
Photographs of your premises, interior, and team.
Your licence, licence number, and the credentials of the practitioner who consults at your shop.
Directory-style listings and business profiles on mapping services.
An invitation phrased as information rather than a sale: “Visit our licensed premises at [address] to consult a practitioner in person.”

Technical and agricultural content

Cultivation technique, Good Agricultural and Collection Practices compliance, growroom design, climate control, lighting.
Nutrients, substrates, pest and disease management, integrated pest control.
Extraction technology, drying and curing, post-harvest handling.
Testing, analytics, certificates of analysis, contaminant remediation.
Genetics, breeding, tissue culture, seed biology.

Business-to-business discussion

Equipment, supplies, infrastructure, packaging, laboratory services.
Consulting, licensing, compliance, and regulatory questions.
Supply-chain and export process discussion between licensed operators.

Education and law

Explainers on Thai regulation, prescription access, patient rights.
Peer-reviewed research, clinical evidence, pharmacology.
Honest, non-promotional strain characteristics discussed as horticulture rather than as a menu.

The working test is simple. Are you informing, or are you selling? If a reader could act on your post by paying you, it is selling.

Part 4 — What it costs you if you get this wrong

There are two separate tracks of punishment, and they run at the same time. Losing your licence usually hurts far more than the fine.

Track one — criminal penalties

Conduct	Penalty
Advertising controlled herbs, selling online, or selling without a prescription	Up to 1 year imprisonment and/or a fine up to 20,000 baht
Advertising violations for cannabis food products	Up to 3 years imprisonment and/or a fine up to 30,000 baht
Advertising violations for herbal supplements or cosmetics containing cannabis	Up to 1 year imprisonment and/or a fine up to 100,000 baht
False reporting or document forgery	Up to 3 years imprisonment or a fine up to 60,000 baht

Track two — your licence

In June 2026 the Department of Thai Traditional and Alternative Medicine published a formal administrative guideline for suspending and revoking licences held by research, export, sales, and processing operators. It applies to every licensed operator, and it is applied by inspectors on the ground.

Suspension of 30 days

Failing to prepare reports PT 27 and PT 28 (ภ.ท.27, ภ.ท.28), keeping them incomplete, or failing to keep them at the premises for inspection.
Failing to submit those reports to the registrar.
Selling or exporting controlled herbs that are not certified to Good Agricultural and Collection Practices or an equivalent or higher standard.
Failing to display your licence openly at the premises, or being unable to produce it electronically for an inspector.
Advertising controlled herbs for commercial purposes.

Suspension of 90 days

Failing to notify the licensor of export details.
Selling cannabis without a PT 33 prescription issued by a licensed practitioner.

Suspensions are cumulative across all breaches found, capped at 90 days in a single order.

Immediate revocation of the licence

Filing false PT 27 or PT 28 reports.
Selling to anyone under 20, to school or university students, to pregnant women, or to breastfeeding women without a PT 33 prescription.
Allowing customers to smoke cannabis on the premises.
Selling through a vending machine or automated dispenser.
Selling through online channels, electronic media, or a computer network.
Selling at a temple, a dormitory, or a public park.

And the rule that ends businesses: a second breach of the same provision after a suspension leads to immediate revocation.

Track three — the parts nobody budgets for

Inspection risk. A public price post or a visible order link is free evidence. It is the cheapest way to put your shop on an inspection list.
Reapplication. Reporting indicates a waiting period of around two years before a revoked operator can reapply. Treat revocation as the end of the business, not a pause.
Platform risk for everyone else. One shop posting a price list creates a compliance problem for every other member reading this forum.

Part 5 — How Asiannabis enforces this

We run an automated compliance scan across the forum. It flags posts containing sale-closing language, retail pricing attached to flower, strain menus with potency figures, external checkout links, payment details, and recreational consumption content.

What happens when a post is flagged:

First flag, minor — the post is edited or the offending line is removed, and you get a message explaining why.
First flag, serious — anything that reads as an online sale is hidden immediately, then reviewed.
Repeat — posting rights are suspended.
Deliberate use of the forum as a sales channel — the account is removed and the shop’s sub-category is closed.

If your post gets edited, this is not censorship and it is not personal. Under the current framework the forum itself is an “online channel”, and a sale conducted here is exactly the conduct that triggers revocation. We would rather trim your post than watch you lose a licence.

If you think a flag was wrong, reply in the topic or email asiannabisthailand@gmail.com and we will look at it.

Quick checklist before you press reply

Am I naming a retail price for flower? → Remove it.
Am I inviting anyone to order, message, or pay me? → Remove it.
Am I posting a bud close-up as product imagery? → Replace it with a plant, a room, or a process shot.
Am I claiming this product treats a disease? → Remove it.
Am I showing someone smoking? → Remove it.
Am I giving my address, hours, licence, and practitioner details? → Fine. Post it.
Am I explaining technique, science, law, or standards? → Fine. Post it.

Part 6 — Platform-specific traps and how to avoid them

Line OA

Line Official Accounts have become a primary channel for cannabis dispensaries in Thailand. They present compliance risks that are distinct from public platforms because the perception of privacy is false: Line OA broadcasts are not private messages, and conversations in Line groups can be screenshotted and submitted to authorities. The advertising prohibition applies equally to Line OA as to any other channel.

Specific patterns that create legal exposure on Line OA: rich menu buttons labelled “Order Now,” automated responses that quote gram prices when a user sends a keyword, and “member-only” price lists distributed as images in broadcast messages. None of these become legal because they are behind a follower list. The offer to sell is the act; the channel is irrelevant.

What Line OA can legally do for a dispensary: share educational push notifications about the regulatory environment, announce opening hours changes, share links to published informational articles, and provide a contact channel for scheduling an in-store consultation under PT 33 procedures. This is a narrower set of functions than most operators currently use the channel for.

Facebook Groups and Private Communities

Facebook Groups with “private” status do not provide legal protection. The prohibition on advertising cannabis flower is not qualified by audience size or privacy settings—it mirrors the framework applied to prescription medications, where advertising to any audience, however targeted, is prohibited. A closed Facebook Group where members post “I’m looking for X strain” and a dispensary responds with availability and price is an active market, not a private conversation.

The practical implication for the Asiannabis forum: posts that say “I have stock of [strain], DM me” are the same violation whether they appear here or on Facebook. The forum rules exist not as an additional layer of censorship but as direct implementation of the legal requirements that apply to all participants.

Review Platforms and Google Business Profiles

Customer reviews on Google Maps, Wongnai, or any other platform do not trigger legal problems for the business owner provided the business does not solicit reviews that include price information or THC percentages as purchase incentives. The legal risk emerges when a dispensary responds to a review in a way that functions as advertising—for example, replying “Thanks! Our White Widow at 500 baht/5g is the best deal in town” constitutes advertising cannabis flower with a price claim.

Google Business Profiles can display opening hours, address, and a website link. The website cannot contain a price list, online order function, or THC percentage claims. This level of digital presence is legally permissible and represents the practical ceiling for a compliant dispensary’s online footprint.

Part 7 — Borderline cases and how to call them

“I’m just sharing photos of my plants”: Acceptable for cultivation and growing community content. Not acceptable if the plant is identified as “now available at [location]” or the photo includes branding or a price watermark.

“I’m posting about the effects of different terpenes”: Acceptable as scientific or educational content. Crosses into a prohibited health claim if it includes statements that a specific product you sell will produce a specific therapeutic effect in the reader.

“I’m asking whether anyone has tried [strain] for [condition]”: Patient-to-patient information sharing about personal experience with a prescription-dispensed product is currently in a legal grey area. It is not prohibited by the advertising rules (which target sellers, not patients), but posts that read as testimonials used to promote a specific shop or product create indirect advertising liability for the business connected to the post.

“My business partner is posting, not me”: Dispensaries are held responsible for advertising conducted on their behalf. A staff member, brand ambassador, or third-party marketing agency posting on behalf of the dispensary carries the dispensary’s legal liability.

“I’m posting from a personal account”: If the personal account is visibly connected to a licensed business—by name, location tag, or bio—it is treated as commercial communication. The legal test is whether a reasonable person would understand the post as representing the business.

Part 8 — What a compliant post looks like in practice

Most operators understand the prohibited categories in the abstract but struggle to apply them in real-time when writing a post. The following examples are not legal rulings; they are practical illustrations of the line as it currently sits under the B.E. 2568 Notification and the B.E. 2569 Ministerial Regulations.

Example A — Cultivation question: “I’m seeing yellowing on lower leaves in week 4 of veg, using coco at EC 1.4. Could this be a mag deficiency?” — Fully compliant. No product, no price, no health claim. Agronomic troubleshooting is the core use case this forum exists for.

Example B — Business announcement: “We’re now open seven days a week at our Lat Phrao branch. Come visit.” — Compliant. Location and hours are informational, not a solicitation to purchase a specific product.

Example C — Product mention without price or claim: “We carry several imported genetics that express a high-myrcene profile.” — Borderline. Mentions product characteristic (terpene profile) in a way that implies purchase availability. Add a price or a health effect and it crosses the line clearly.

Example D — Direct sell offer: “10g of our top-shelf Gelato for 3,500 baht, delivery available. Line: @yourdispensary” — Clear violation on three counts: price, delivery offer (online sale), and direct contact solicitation.

Example E — Patient sharing experience: “My doctor prescribed cannabis flower for my condition. I’ve been using it for two months and find that it helps me sleep. No negative side effects so far.” — Patient personal experience is not advertising. It becomes advertising if a business entity reposts or endorses it in a way that links the experience to their specific products.

The filter that applies to every post before publishing: does this post make someone more likely to purchase a specific cannabis product, and does it tell them where or how to do so? If yes to both, do not post it.

Part 9 — When rules change and how to stay current

The regulatory framework for cannabis in Thailand has changed in material ways three times since 2022. Operators who rely on secondhand summaries of what the rules say—including well-intentioned posts on this forum from earlier periods—risk acting on outdated information. The authoritative sources are the Royal Gazette texts in Thai; everything else, including this post, is an interpretation.

DTAM publishes administrative guidance in Thai on its official website. The Asiannabis forum Legal and Regulation category tracks material changes as they occur, with the date each change took effect noted explicitly. When you see a post in that category dated before April 2026, treat it as historical context, not current guidance.

Part 10 — Reporting violations and staying current

Members sometimes ask whether to report advertising violations seen on other platforms—Instagram posts from dispensaries with price lists, Line groups functioning as order channels, or Google Business responses containing THC claims. There is no legal obligation on private individuals to report violations they observe, and there is no legal jeopardy for doing so in good faith.

DTAM accepts complaints via its official portal at dtam.moph.go.th, by phone at 1165, or by written complaint addressed to the Director-General, Department of Thai Traditional and Alternative Medicine, Nonthaburi 11000. Complaints should include date observed, platform, description or screenshot, and business name or location if known. Complainant identities are not disclosed during administrative proceedings.

This forum does not facilitate competitor reporting. It maintains moderation standards that align with the legal framework, and posts that would constitute violations if made by a business are removed regardless of who posted them.

The regulatory framework has changed materially three times since 2022. Operators who rely on secondhand summaries risk acting on outdated information. The authoritative source is the Royal Gazette in Thai. When you see a post in the Legal and Regulation category dated before April 2026, treat it as historical context rather than current guidance—including well-intentioned older posts on this forum. The Asiannabis moderation team updates pinned threads when material changes take effect; watching those threads is the lowest-effort way to stay current without reading the Royal Gazette directly.

Sources

Ministry of Public Health Notification on Controlled Herbs (Cannabis) B.E. 2568 — Royal Gazette, 26 June 2025
Ministerial Regulation on Category 5 Narcotics (cannabis and hemp extracts) B.E. 2569 — in force 26 April 2026
Ministerial Regulation No. 2 B.E. 2569 on controlled herb licensing — published 30 April 2026
Thai Food and Drug Administration advertising rules for food and cosmetics containing cannabis
Drug Act B.E. 2510 (1967), provisions on advertising of drugs and controlled substances
Consumer Protection Act B.E. 2522 (1979), Section 22 on false or misleading advertising
Electronic Transactions Act B.E. 2544 (2001), applicable provisions on online commercial communications

This post is general information, not legal advice. Regulations in this area change quickly. For decisions that affect your licence, consult a Thai lawyer.