Are magic mushrooms legal in Seattle?

What Seattle's 2021 resolution says

On October 4, 2021, the Seattle City Council voted 9–0 to adopt Resolution 32021, sponsored by Councilmember Andrew Lewis after a push from the advocacy group Decriminalize Nature Seattle. It made Seattle the largest city in the country at the time to take that step on psychedelic plants and fungi.

The resolution uses the word entheogens: plant or fungal material that may contain psychoactive compounds, with psilocybin mushrooms, ayahuasca, mescaline and iboga given as examples. Peyote is deliberately left out, because of its religious significance to Indigenous communities and the collapse of wild peyote populations.

It does four things:

1. Declares that investigating, arresting and prosecuting people for entheogen activity should be among the city's lowest enforcement priorities, naming two activities in particular: growing entheogens for religious, spiritual, healing or personal growth practices, and sharing them with fellow practitioners "without financial or other consideration."
2. Affirms the Seattle Police Department's existing practice of not detaining or arresting anyone, or confiscating their entheogens, solely for simple possession.
3. Asks SPD to write that practice into formal department policy, extend the same protection to growing and free sharing, and report back to the council.
4. Asks the city's lobbying office to support decriminalization at the state level.

That's the whole of it. It's a resolution, which states the council's position and asks departments to act. It isn't an ordinance, so it didn't change the Seattle Municipal Code, and a city can't change state criminal law at all.

What the resolution doesn't do

Most of the confusion about Seattle comes from reading "decriminalized" in a headline and assuming it means legal. Here's what the resolution leaves untouched:

• It doesn't cover selling. Sharing is protected only when no money or anything else of value changes hands. A sale, a "donation" for mushrooms, or a membership fee that comes with them is outside it.
• It doesn't change state law. Psilocybin and psilocin are listed in Washington's Schedule I (RCW 69.50.204). Possession is still a crime everywhere in the state, including inside Seattle.
• It only speaks to the City of Seattle. The King County Sheriff's Office, Washington State Patrol, University of Washington police, the Port of Seattle's police and every federal agency set their own priorities. Sea-Tac Airport isn't even in Seattle; it's in the city of SeaTac.
• It doesn't cover public use or driving. Using a controlled substance in public is its own offense, and driving while affected by any drug is DUI under RCW 46.61.502.
• It doesn't bind prosecutors or judges. A charge filed by the King County Prosecuting Attorney under state law isn't affected by a city resolution.

The 2023 public drug use law, and how it fits

Two years after the resolution, Seattle passed a law that pulls in the other direction. In February 2021 the Washington Supreme Court had struck down the state's drug possession statute in State v. Blake. The Legislature's permanent replacement, passed in May 2023 and in force since July 1, 2023, made knowing possession of a controlled substance, and using one in public, a gross misdemeanor.

Seattle then adopted the same offenses into its own code. Ordinance 126896 passed the council 6–3 on September 19, 2023, and Mayor Bruce Harrell signed it the next day. It lets the Seattle City Attorney prosecute possession and public use in municipal court, rather than leaving those cases to the county. The ordinance covers every controlled substance. It doesn't carve out psilocybin.

The mayor's Executive Order 2023-06, which tells police how to apply it, focuses enforcement on people who threaten harm to others and makes diversion to services the preferred response. It doesn't mention entheogens or the 2021 resolution.

Put together: a quiet, private, personal-use situation is exactly what the 2021 resolution was written for, and it's where Seattle police are least likely to act. Public use is a different matter, because the city now has its own law aimed squarely at it.

What's legal and what isn't, at a glance

Washington's penalty for possession or public use is up to 180 days in jail and a $1,000 fine, rising to 364 days after two or more convictions dated after July 1, 2023 (RCW 69.50.4013). The statute encourages prosecutors to divert these cases and police to refer people to services instead of booking them. Manufacturing or delivering psilocybin is a class C felony under RCW 69.50.401, which carries up to five years and a $10,000 fine.

What about mushroom shops in Seattle?

There's no license in Washington that allows anyone to sell psilocybin, so there's no legal mushroom dispensary in Seattle. That's true of storefronts, pop-up "churches," delivery services and online shops alike. A business that tells you it's licensed to sell psilocybin in Washington is telling you something that can't be true.

What exists instead is a mix of underground sellers and online shops that ship. Mailing a controlled substance is a federal offense, and the 2021 resolution doesn't touch sales at all, so every one of those routes sits outside the law. Some are far more careful and transparent than others. You can see how one Seattle-based online shop explains the law to its own customers; that shop, My Mushroom Dispensary, is our sister shop (here's how that works). Our guide to where people in Seattle get mushrooms walks through every route, the legal one in Oregon included, with the risks of each.

Five years on: what's changed since 2021

October 4, 2026 marked five years since the vote. Less has changed on paper than the 2021 headlines suggested:

• SPD policy: the resolution asked SPD to codify its hands-off practice as formal policy. As of October 2026 we haven't found a published SPD policy that does that.
• The state hasn't moved. Washington funded a University of Washington psilocybin study in 2023, but bills to create a legal psilocybin program stalled in the 2025 and 2026 sessions. Our Washington law guide tracks each one.
• More of the region followed. Port Townsend (December 2021), Jefferson County (May 2023), Olympia (August 2024) and Tacoma (January 2025) passed similar low-priority resolutions, and the King County Council passed a supportive motion in March 2026.
• Enforcement on public use tightened with the 2023 ordinance described above.

Federal law still applies in Seattle

Psilocybin is a Schedule I drug under the federal Controlled Substances Act. Simple possession is a federal misdemeanor for a first offense, carrying up to a year in prison and a minimum $1,000 fine (21 U.S.C. § 844); manufacturing and distribution are felonies. Federal agents almost never pursue personal-use cases, but federal law is the one that governs the mail and airports. TSA screeners who find suspected drugs refer them to local police, and the city's resolution means nothing to the agencies at a checkpoint in SeaTac.

Where psilocybin is legal nearby

Oregon is the closest place where adults can take psilocybin legally. Since 2023 it has licensed service centers where adults 21 and older take psilocybin under a trained facilitator's supervision, with no prescription and no Oregon residency required. You can't take any product home. Colorado runs a similar licensed program. Our guide to psilocybin therapy near Seattle covers costs, how a session works, and clinical trials recruiting in the Seattle area.

Last checked against the sources above on Oct 20, 2026. Spotted something out of date? Tell us.