If you start to feel unwell, COVID might come to mind - especially with a rise in cases this summer.
For those experiencing symptoms or who have been exposed to the virus, at-home tests are an easy way to figure out if you're positive. However, such tests are only good to use through a certain date.
Typically, the Food and Drug Administration authorizes an at-home COVID shelf-life of about four to six months from the time the test was made, the agency previously said.
"The shelf-life is how long the test should perform as expected and is measured from the date the test was manufactured," the FDA stated. "The expiration date listed on the box label for at-home COVID-19 tests is set at the end of the shelf-life, and is the date through which the test is expected to perform as accurately as when manufactured.
If you happen to have some tests lying around, and you think they're expired -- they might not be.
"When manufacturers first released these tests, they had conservative expiration dates," Cleveland Clinic Microbiologist and pathologist Dr. Daniel Rhoads said in a March 2023 article. "As they do additional studies and demonstrate that the expiration date can be pushed back, then they can extend it. But the boxes have already been distributed, with the original expiration date already listed on it.”
As Rhoads explained, once the test manufacturer has more "stability testing results," the test manufacturer can contact the FDA to request that the agency authorize a longer shelf-life.
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According to the FDA, stability testing is "where the manufacturer stores the tests for the time period of the proposed shelf-life (plus a little extra time to ensure the expiration date can be relied upon) and then evaluates its ability to perform accurately."
Some tests have had expiration dates extended anywhere from 15 to 22 months, according to the Cleveland Clinic.
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An extensive list of at-home COVID tests with extended expiration dates is available on the agency's website.
