International travelers receive good news as the FDA prolongs the expiration date for at-home COVID-19 tests

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has extended the shelf life of one of the most widely used at-home COVID-19 testing kits. The agency has approved the Abbott BinaxNow COVID-19 Ag Card Home Test for a 15-month expiration period. This decision comes after Abbott submitted stability studies demonstrating that the tests remain accurate and reliable over an extended timeframe. You can view the FDA's letter to Abbott confirming this extended expiration period.

This update should offer considerable relief to travelers abroad who are preparing to return to the United States. Depending on the original expiration date of their tests, this adjustment could extend their shelf life by up to six months.

This development was initially reported by Kyle Potter at Thrifty Traveler.

The BinaxNow Home Test is favored among international travelers. Along with Abbott's test, the Ellume COVID-19 Home Test and Qured's video-supervised rapid antigen test are the only three at-home tests currently authorized by the CDC for use by travelers heading to the U.S. CDC regulations mandate that all passengers, regardless of their vaccination status, must present a negative COVID-19 test result before boarding a flight to the U.S.

(TPG reported last summer that long wait times for BinaxNow supervised tests via Zoom were common due to high demand, but those wait times have since improved.)

A challenge with these tests was that many customers received them only to find their expiration dates were too soon for their travel plans. Many tests arrived with expiration dates set just six to nine months after production, which was inconvenient for travelers planning trips months in advance.

The FDA's extension now offers a 15-month expiration period from the production date, up from the previous 12 months. You can check the expiration date on the front of your BinaxNow home test.

We've previously discussed issues like inaccurate expiration dates with these at-home tests, but ultimately, they are extremely beneficial for anyone planning international travel. They simplify the process of securing the necessary negative COVID test result, and now you have more time to utilize the test.