The NBA no longer tests players for cannabis, and the 2023 collective bargaining agreement made that official. What changed, why it changed, and what role Kevin Durant played in pushing the league to that point is a story worth understanding in full.
Yes, NBA players can consume cannabis outside of games and practices without facing league penalties. The short answer to “when did the NBA stop suspending players for cannabis use” is 2023, when the NBA collective bargaining agreement between the league and the National Basketball Players Association took effect on July 1 of that year. That agreement removed cannabis from the league’s list of banned substances entirely, treating it the way the league treats alcohol.
The policy shift did not appear from nowhere. The NBA had already suspended random drug testing for cannabis during the 2020 NBA bubble in Orlando, citing the unusual circumstances of the season. That temporary suspension opened a door that player advocacy groups and individual voices like Kevin Durant kept pushing on during subsequent CBA negotiations.
Before the 2023 agreement, the NBA’s marijuana suspension structure was tiered and financially significant.
The prior penalty schedule gave players little room for error and carried consequences that scaled quickly.
| Offense | Consequence |
| First offense | Entry into the substance abuse program, no suspension |
| Second offense | Five-game suspension without pay |
| Third offense | Ten-game suspension without pay |
| Fourth offense and beyond | Discretionary suspension of up to one year |
Under the current rules, none of those penalties apply to off-court cannabis use. The cannabis testing ban now mirrors how the league handles alcohol: impairment during games or practice remains a disciplinary issue, but what players do on their own time is no longer the league’s business.
Kevin Durant has been one of the most publicly consistent voices pushing the NBA to reconsider its approach to cannabis. His advocacy did not begin with a single speech or viral moment; it built over several years of public statements, media appearances, and direct conversations with league leadership. Durant met with commissioner Adam Silver to make the case that the league’s cannabis testing ban was out of step with how the substance was being treated legally across the country and inconsistent with how the league handled alcohol.
Durant was direct about cannabis use among NBA players, calling it prevalent. In various interviews, he suggested the figure was close to 80 percent of players using cannabis in some form, a number that framed the existing policy less as a deterrent and more as a selective enforcement mechanism. That argument, made publicly and repeatedly, shifted the terms of the conversation during collective bargaining.
The 2020 NBA bubble accelerated everything. With players confined to a controlled environment and random drug testing already suspended, the practical argument for resuming cannabis testing became harder to make. That period gave player advocacy a momentum it had not had before.
Kevin Durant was the most prominent voice, but he was not alone. Several current and former NBA players had been pushing for league policy reform on cannabis for years before the CBA changed.
The collective weight of those voices, combined with Durant’s direct engagement with Adam Silver and the NBA Players Association’s formal bargaining position, made the 2023 shift possible. It was player advocacy sustained over years, not a single moment.
The NBA’s current policy is the most permissive cannabis stance among major professional sports leagues in the United States. Understanding where the NBA sits relative to other leagues shows how significant the shift has been, and what still separates professional sports from full normalisation of athlete cannabis use.
Looking at drug use and professional sports across leagues, NHL’s testing for cannabis and how other organizations have handled the issue reveals a patchwork of policies.
| League | Current Cannabis Policy | Testing Status |
| NBA | Removed from banned substances list; off-court use permitted | No random testing for cannabis |
| NFL | Raised threshold to 150 ng/mL in 2020 CBA; reduced suspensions | Testing window narrowed to two weeks per year |
| MLB | Removed from banned substances list in 2019; treated as health issue | No suspensions; players directed to treatment if flagged |
| UFC / USADA | Removed from prohibited list for out-of-competition use in 2021 | In-competition use still prohibited; threshold applies during fight week |
The NBA’s policy goes furthest among the major leagues in removing cannabis from the prohibited substances framework entirely, rather than raising thresholds or narrowing testing windows. The weed decriminalization in sports has moved at different speeds across organizations, but the direction across all of them has been the same.
The 2023 CBA change is significant, but “removed from the banned substances list” does not mean cannabis is treated without any restrictions at all. Understanding what the rules actually permit, and where limits still exist, matters for anyone trying to understand the full scope of what changed.
The CBA’s framing of cannabis as equivalent to alcohol is the clearest way to understand the new boundaries. Players can use cannabis in their personal time without league discipline. But the substance abuse program still governs behavior at team functions, and impairment during games, practices, or official team activities remains a disciplinary matter. The NBA drug policy has not endorsed on-court intoxication; it has removed off-court use from its enforcement scope.
That distinction matters practically. A player who tests positive for cannabis during a standard screening will not be suspended for the result. A player who appears impaired at a game or practice can still face consequences, in the same way a player visibly intoxicated at a team event would face consequences. The NBA’s approach mirrors how most employers handle alcohol: legal off the clock, not acceptable when it affects professional performance.
One of the less-reported changes in the 2023 CBA is that NBA players can now invest in cannabis and cannabidiol (CBD) businesses. Under the previous NBA drug policy, association with the cannabis industry carried reputational and contractual risk. The new agreement removes that barrier, allowing players to participate in a legal market that several of them had been advocating for publicly.
The argument that drove much of the player advocacy for this change was not recreational; it was about player wellness programs and what athletes actually need to manage the physical and psychological demands of an NBA career. Cannabis is not classified as a performance-enhancing drug, and the players who pushed for reform consistently framed it as an alternative to opioids for pain management, not as a shortcut. A 2017 NIH review on cannabinoids and pain management in clinical populations has supported the case that cannabinoids can serve as pain management alternatives with a different risk profile than opioid-based medications.
The mental health and cannabis argument also carried weight during CBA negotiations. Players pointed to cannabis as a tool for managing anxiety, sleep disruption, and the psychological toll of a professional athletic career, framing it in the same terms as other league-supported wellness interventions.
The league’s decision to accept that framing, and remove cannabis from the performance-enhancing drugs distinction entirely, reflected a significant shift in how NBA leadership understood the substance.
The NBA collective bargaining agreement underwent a 2023 change that applies to NBA play. It does not apply everywhere. NBA players who compete internationally, including those on Olympic rosters under USA Basketball, remain subject to the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) Prohibited List, where cannabis has a urinary threshold of 150 ng/mL in-competition. The CBA exemption is domestically scoped, and the moment a player represents their national team, league rules no longer apply.
WADA classifies cannabis as a prohibited substance in-competition, meaning a player who uses cannabis during the period surrounding international competition, including the Olympics, could test positive regardless of what the NBA’s own collective bargaining agreement says. The threshold exists to account for residual detection, but the practical window for detection is longer than many athletes assume, and the consequences of a positive test at an international event fall under WADA’s jurisdiction, not the NBA’s substance abuse program.
For any NBA player considering international competition, the gap between NBA drug policy and WADA rules is the thing to understand. The NBA has moved to a normalised framework domestically. WADA has not moved to the same place, and that discrepancy has real consequences for players on Olympic rosters. Understanding what each governing body requires, and when each set of rules applies, is not straightforward, and no current ranking source explains this clearly.
If you are navigating cannabis use as a medical patient and want to understand how to do so legally and responsibly, speak with a Veriheal medical cannabis doctor who can help you understand what applies in your state.
Note: The content on this page is for informational purposes only and is not intended to be professional medical advice. Do not attempt to self-diagnose or prescribe treatment based on the information provided. Always consult a physician before making any decision on the treatment of a medical condition.
Note: Veriheal does not support illegally consuming therapeutic substances such as cannabis but acknowledges that it transpires because of the current illicit status, which we strive to change by advocating for research, legal access, and responsible consumption. Always consult a physician before attempting alternative therapies.
The NBA no longer conducts random drug testing for cannabis following the 2023 collective bargaining agreement between the league and the NBA Players Association. Off-court cannabis use carries no league penalty. Impairment during games or practices remains a separate disciplinary matter under the league’s existing conduct policies.
Yes, the 2023 NBA CBA removed previous restrictions on players investing in cannabis and CBD companies. This was a meaningful change from the prior NBA drug policy, which created reputational risk for players with business ties to the cannabis industry.
Kevin Durant met directly with commissioner Adam Silver and made a sustained public case for removing cannabis from the league’s banned substances list, citing the prevalence of cannabis use among players and framing it as a wellness and pain management issue rather than a conduct one. His advocacy, combined with the NBA Players Association’s formal bargaining position, contributed directly to the 2023 CBA change.
NBA players competing internationally under USA Basketball are subject to WADA’s Prohibited List, which classifies cannabis as a prohibited substance in-competition with a urinary threshold of 150 ng/mL. The NBA’s domestic CBA exemption does not apply to international competition, including the Olympics.
The NBA has gone furthest among major US leagues, removing cannabis from its banned substances list entirely. The NFL significantly relaxed its approach in its 2020 CBA, raising the detection threshold to 150 ng/mL and narrowing the testing window to two weeks per year, but it has not removed cannabis from its policy framework in the same way the NBA has.
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