Wyoming

Overview

Wyoming has no medical-cannabis program and prohibits adult-use cannabis statewide. Cannabis remains a Schedule I controlled substance under the Wyoming Controlled Substances Act (Wyoming Statutes Title 35 Chapter 7 Article 10). Wyoming permits hemp and CBD products containing 0.3% THC or less consistent with the federal 2018 Farm Bill.

Multiple medical-cannabis bills have been introduced in recent legislative sessions without enactment. Ballot-initiative efforts to authorize medical or adult-use cannabis have failed to qualify due to Wyoming's high signature-gathering requirements distributed across a majority of the state's counties.

Medical status

Wyoming operates no medical-cannabis program. There is no patient registry, no qualifying-condition list, no licensed-dispensary system, and no statutory protection from criminal-possession liability for patients certified under another state's medical program.

Recreational status

Recreational cannabis is illegal statewide. Penalties under Wyoming Statutes §35-7-1031:

• Possession ≤3 oz plant or ≤3/10 oz hashish: misdemeanor. Up to 12 months jail and $1,000 fine.
• Possession over those thresholds: felony. Up to 5 years and $10,000.
• Manufacture or delivery: felony with penalties scaling by quantity.
• Edibles: Wyoming has prosecuted edibles and concentrates aggressively under "possession of THC" felony provisions where the quantity of THC by weight is treated as the controlled-substance threshold; this has produced felony exposure for relatively small quantities of edibles brought from neighboring legalized states.

Wyoming highway-patrol enforcement at state borders with Colorado, Montana, Utah, Idaho, Nebraska, and South Dakota is active.

CBD and hemp

Wyoming permits possession of CBD products containing 0.3% THC or less derived from compliant hemp. The state has limited authorization for low-THC oil (with a physician's recommendation) for narrow seizure conditions, but operational access is constrained and there is no in-state dispensing infrastructure.

Patients and caregivers

Wyoming recognizes no patient or caregiver category. The state has no qualifying-condition list, no patient ID card, no licensed dispensaries, and no caregiver designation. Families seeking access for pediatric epilepsy or other refractory conditions have no in-state pathway and historically rely on out-of-state purchase, which carries federal interstate-transport exposure.

Reciprocity and visiting patients

Wyoming does not extend reciprocity to any out-of-state medical-cannabis program. Visiting patients carrying medical cards from Colorado, Montana, New Mexico, or any other state receive no protection. Possession remains a misdemeanor or felony depending on quantity and product type. The state's "possession of THC" felony provision is particularly harsh for visitors carrying edibles or concentrates: the gross product weight rather than active-THC weight has been used as the felony threshold in some cases.

Employment and workplace

Wyoming is an at-will employment state with no statutory cannabis protection. Employers may discipline or terminate workers for positive THC tests. Workers' compensation claims may be denied when post-incident testing returns positive. Public-employee positions, federal-contractor roles, and CDL holders face additional federal-rule exposure. Wyoming has no statutory "lawful off-duty activity" defense for cannabis or CBD.

Hemp-derived intoxicants

Wyoming aligns with the federal Farm Bill on industrial hemp (cannabis with 0.3% THC or less by dry weight). Retail availability of intoxicating hemp-derived cannabinoids has been more constrained than in many states. Wyoming has historically treated delta-8 THC and related compounds as controlled substances under state law where the source-extract THC content exceeds the hemp threshold. Enforcement varies but the legal posture is more restrictive than Colorado, Montana, or Nevada.

Recent legislative history

Medical-cannabis legislation has been introduced in Wyoming sessions repeatedly:

• 2025 session: HB 0072 and SF 0033 (medical cannabis) died in committee.
• 2026 session: SF 0029 (medical cannabis) and HB 0106 (decriminalization) followed the same trajectory.

Ballot-initiative organizing through the Wyoming NORML chapter and the Wyoming Patients Coalition has been blocked by signature-distribution requirements: a Wyoming initiative requires signatures equal to 15% of the prior gubernatorial vote, distributed across two-thirds of the state's counties. Wyoming's small and geographically dispersed population makes this threshold the highest effective barrier in the country.

The April 2026 federal Schedule III rescheduling order produced no Wyoming legislative response. State officials publicly reaffirmed that federal scheduling does not affect Wyoming criminal law.

Federal context

Out-of-state medical-cannabis cards confer no legal protection in Wyoming. Federal jurisdiction layers additional exposure on federal land (which includes a substantial fraction of Wyoming's land area: Yellowstone National Park, Grand Teton National Park, Bureau of Land Management land, and Bridger-Teton National Forest). I-25, I-80, and I-90 corridors see concentrated highway-patrol enforcement attention, particularly at borders with Colorado, Montana, Utah, and Nebraska.