3-MMC, 4-MMC, 4-CMC: which cathinones are labs finding?
This article has been translated to English.
Mostly not 3-MMC, which is the one almost everybody asks about. In the samples European drug checking services published over the first eight months of 2026, the cathinones turning up are 4-CMC, 2-MMC and 4-MMC, with 3-MMC appearing just four times in that whole dataset.
The share of samples containing any cathinone has roughly tripled in the German and Swiss data, held steady in Slovenia, and not moved at all in Spain. Anecdotally, we were surprised to hear from many Spanish partygoers that cathinones there are for so-called chemsex situations, usually among men who have sex with men. Statistically, particularly in countries where cocaine is hard to get, cathinones are the modern-day king of stimulants.
The table below sets each service's cathinone share for January to August 2025 against the same months in 2026.
Cathinones as a share of tested samples, by service, 2025 against 2026
Service
Where
Jan to Aug 2025
Jan to Aug 2026
drugchecking
Switzerland, Germany
14.3%
42.6%
druglab
France
14.8%
26.5%
DrogArt
Slovenia
19.8%
24.3%
Energy Control
Spain
2.0%
1.7%
Energy Control is the most useful to compare here. Their sample count barely moved between the two years, 540 against 526, and their composition barely moved either, so the Spanish market, or at least what was tested there, genuinely has not taken this up.
Cathinone detections across those services, January to August 2026:
The table below counts cathinone detections by compound across those services.
Cathinone detections by compound, January to August 2026
Compound
Samples
4-CMC
376
2-MMC
320
4-MMC
268
NEP
146
3-CMC
78
4-BEC
35
4-BMC
25
3-MMC
4
Read the top and the bottom of that table together. 3-MMC is the cathinone people ask about, by a wide margin, and it is the one the labs are not finding. 4-CMC and 2-MMC have taken its place, NEP has arrived from almost nothing, and 4-BEC and 4-BMC are new enough that most people reading this will not have heard of them.
Expected reagent colours for the cathinone family
No reagent separates these from each other. Morris and Zimmermann tell you that you have a cathinone at all, which already rules out the amphetamine and MDMA families, but 4-CMC, 2-MMC and 3-MMC give you the same colours. Confirming which one you actually bought is a lab result.
Any trend read from this kind of data is easy to get wrong, so here we describe our method. We compared each service against itself, January to August in both years, and used only services with real volume in both. We excluded WEDINOS entirely: it contributed one record in 2025 and 2,153 in 2026, because that is when it was added to the database rather than when anything changed on the street. We also treat the DIZ and Saferparty records as one service, since the source label changed between the two years.
Counts are of samples containing a compound, so a sample holding both 4-CMC and caffeine appears in both rows.
Testing for cathinones
Zimmermann is the primary reagent for the cathinone family, while Mecke and Marquis narrow it further, and Morris separates them from cocaine and ketamine. Froehde and Liebermann can help tell the pentedrone class apart from the MMC and PVP kinds. Together these reagent tests answer the question that matters first: is the sample a cathinone at all, and if it is, which type, or is it another stimulant being sold as one. Naming the specific isomer, 4-CMC against 3-CMC for instance, is a laboratory job, but a mephedrone test kit is what gives you everything you can learn at home.
4-MMC with ZimmermannCMC and MMC side by side with Morris, Zimmermann and Simon's
The compounds described here are not freely interchangeable, and the dishonest dealers substituting them for each other without telling anyone are putting a particularly vulnerable public at risk. We recommend always using a test kit before taking any of them, if that choice is made in the first place. Reagents help identify, while a TLC testing card separates a sample into its components and estimates how much of each. Together they are the only way at home to find out that what you bought as one cathinone is another one, or maybe two of them together.
From the published lab data, largely yes, at least in the services we compared. Four samples across eight months against 376 of 4-CMC. That is a statement about what labs received, not proof that nobody has any.
What is the difference between MMC and CMC?
A methyl group against a chlorine on the ring. Effects are reported as broadly similar, quantity is not identical, and no reagent separates them. We wrote that up separately.
Is NEP new?
New in this data. It went from a single sample to 146 across the same services and months.
Can a reagent tell 4-CMC from 4-MMC?
No. It can indicate that a cathinone is present. Separating them needs chromatography or a laboratory.
Why does Spain look so different?
We do not know. Energy Control sees mostly MDMA and 2C-B in both years, so it may be who walks into that service rather than what is on sale.
No test result can tell you a substance is safe. No substance is 100% safe.This article is published for harm reduction purposes. It does not encourage the use of psychoactive substances and does not replace medical advice.
