The maximum penalties
| Offence | Crown Court maximum | Source |
|---|
| Possession | 7 years, an unlimited fine, or both | Misuse of Drugs Act 1971, Schedule 4 |
| Possession with intent to supply | Life, an unlimited fine, or both | Schedule 4 |
| Supply or offer to supply | Life, an unlimited fine, or both | GOV.UK |
| Production, which includes growing | Life, an unlimited fine, or both | GOV.UK |
| Importing into the UK | Life, an unlimited fine, or both | Customs and Excise Management Act 1979, Schedule 1 |
Magic mushrooms are sentenced as a Class A drug. In a 2004 appeal the Court of Appeal refused to sentence them more leniently than other Class A drugs, repeating an earlier ruling that courts should draw no distinction between them (R v Thomas, 2004).
Possession for personal use in England and Wales
Courts in England and Wales must follow the Sentencing Council's possession guideline, in force since 1 April 2021. It puts every Class A case in category 1 and gives one starting point for all adult offenders, whatever their plea or record.
| Category | Starting point | Range |
|---|
| 1, Class A | Band C fine | Band A fine to 51 weeks' custody |
A Band C fine starts at 150% of the offender's relevant weekly income, within a range of 125 to 175%. The court then moves up or down. Factors that increase the sentence include possession in prison, in a school or in licensed premises, the presence of children or others who do not use drugs, a large quantity, and relevant previous convictions. Factors that reduce it include having no previous convictions, a small quantity, and steps taken to address drug use.
Sharing is supply
Handing mushrooms to a friend, splitting a bag or bringing some to a festival for others is supply under section 4. GOV.UK lists sharing explicitly, and FRANK puts it plainly: supplying someone else, even friends, can mean life in prison.
The Sentencing Council's supply guideline sets out indicative quantities for drugs such as heroin, cocaine, ecstasy and LSD. Magic mushrooms are not on that list, so courts rely on expert evidence about strength. The guideline places supply directly to users in at least category 3 harm, whatever the quantity.
| Class A, lesser role | Starting point | Range |
|---|
| Category 3 | 3 years' custody | 2 years to 4 years 6 months' custody |
| Category 4 | 18 months' custody | High level community order to 3 years' custody |
A "lesser role" covers people who expect little or no financial gain, including those meeting their own use, or who acted under pressure or through naivety. Larger roles and quantities start much higher.
A case from 2003
In R v Thomas a man was stopped at the entrance to Glastonbury Festival in June 2003 and later found with 73 small bags holding about 140 grams of dried mushrooms. He had picked them in Wales the year before and dried them himself. He said they were for personal use; the pre-sentence report recorded that some would have gone to friends and some been sold to cover his £100 ticket. He was convicted of possession with intent to supply and sentenced to 2 years. In November 2004 the Court of Appeal dismissed his appeal and called the sentence a proper one.
The case predates the 2005 change. His defence argued that mushrooms dried naturally were not a "preparation" and so not controlled; the jury rejected that. Fresh mushrooms would not have been controlled at the time. Today the drying step no longer matters.
Will the police prosecute?
In England and Wales the CPS guidance on drug offences says that "a prosecution is usual when a case involves the possession of a Class A drug", and that supply of a Class A drug "will almost always justify a prosecution". The same guidance points prosecutors to cautions and other out of court resolutions, which police can use where the public interest allows.
In Scotland the Lord Advocate extended recorded police warnings to possession of Class A drugs in September 2021. The statement to the Scottish Parliament makes four points: the scheme covers possession only and never supply; a warning is not decriminalisation; officers can still report a case to the procurator fiscal; and the person can refuse the warning.
How often magic mushrooms come up
The Crime Survey for England and Wales measures use. In the year to March 2024, 1.1% of adults aged 16 to 59 said they had used magic mushrooms in the past year, up from 0.8%. In the year to March 2025, use among 16 to 24 year olds fell from 2.3% to 0.9% (ONS).
Enforcement figures do not separate mushrooms. The Home Office counted 40,652 seizures of Class A drugs in England and Wales in the year to March 2025, most of them cocaine, and publishes no separate count for magic mushrooms (Home Office seizure statistics). Low numbers in the statistics do not mean a lower penalty for the person in front of a court.
Where the risk can be avoided
The only setting where UK residents can use psilocybin truffles without breaking a law is a stay in a country that allows them, such as the Netherlands. The Netherlands page covers what is allowed there and the import offence on the way home, and the truffle guide orders the range from mild to strong.
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