At a glance
Where the market is heading
Retail value is what the Department of Revenue estimates was sold at licensed cannabis retailers, derived from excise tax returns rather than measured at the till. Collective sales is the older medical channel, reported by the collective gardens themselves until they were required to close. The two are drawn separately because they are different measures from different kinds of business, and the total DOR publishes beside them is simply the two added together.
Quarterly retail value
The collective line goes to zero, and that zero is real. DOR prints it, and the reason is in DOR's own footnote: collective gardens had to close. A channel that no longer exists sells nothing, so the zero is true — what would be false is drawing it as a market collapse. The close date on this page comes from the footnote, not from where the line falls.
This is an estimate and the header says so. DOR's column is titled an estimated retail value derived from excise tax returns. It is not a seed-to-sale total and is labelled as an estimate wherever it appears, including on cross-state charts.
What is collected on it
These are sales taxes, not the cannabis excise. Washington's cannabis excise is larger than its sales tax on cannabis, and is published by the licensing regulator once a fiscal year, so it appears on the county section below rather than here. The base for both lines is DOR's own total retail value - licensed retailers plus the medical collectives - less the sales exempted for medical purposes, and DOR publishes the local rate it applied in its own column.
Estimated sales tax, by quarter
Neither rate is typed in. Both are divided out of DOR's own columns and checked against them every run; the state rate reproduces its column exactly, and a rate written into this page's prose by hand would fail the build.
Medically exempt sales are a tax status, not a channel. A store may hold a medical endorsement that exempts qualifying sales from sales tax. DOR subtracts that exempt column from its own total retail value to reach the taxed base, and the exemption is not a medical/adult-use split.
The medical endorsement
This is the only medical figure Washington publishes for the current market, and it is a tax exemption measured in dollars. It is shown on its own axis rather than as a share, because presenting it as a channel share would claim a split the data does not carry.
Sales exempt from sales tax for medical purposes
The early zeros are DOR's. The column reads zero in the opening quarters of the series, and those are published zeros rather than gaps this site invented. Neither source read here dates the endorsement, so this page does not date it either: the quarter the column first carries a value is measured from the file and stated in the state data, as a measurement rather than a start date.
The other agency's booksannual
This section is a different agency, a different base and a different clock. The Liquor and Cannabis Board reports what retailers filed, county by county, over a July-to-June fiscal year, and it is where Washington's cannabis excise appears. It is drawn on its own axis and its own grain because it is a cross-check on the quarterly figures above, not a continuation of them. Nothing here is summed with them or averaged against them.
Retailer sales and cannabis excise, by state fiscal year
Retail tier only. The older workbooks also ship cultivation and processing sheets and a combined total that adds all three together. That combined figure counts the same product several times on its way to the shelf and is never read here; the state data records the tier each sheet declares.
The excise rate is divided out, not looked up. Both columns come from the same file, so the ratio between them is the rate the regulator actually applied — including the year it changed. The measured bands are published with the state data.
Counties with no retailer have no row. They are absent rather than zero, and the count of reporting counties is recorded for each fiscal year in the state data. A map built from this file must draw an absence, never a zero.
Dispensaries and licences in Washington — 464 active, of 1,219 licence records, from Washington State Liquor and Cannabis Board.
Where these figures come from
Sourcing, basis and comparabilityAdult-use retail has operated under Initiative 502 since the series here begins. Medical collective gardens were a separate channel until they were required to close: 3 Starting July 1, 2016 collective gardens (dispensaries) had to close down. Prior to July 1, 2016 we considered all their cannabis sales to be for medical purposes, since all sales were to patients that had approval (or a prescription) from a doctor. Since medical cannabis was subject to sales tax we assumed that most of their taxable retail sales were for cannabis. Unfortunately, if a business was conducting other retail transactions, such as selling t-shirts or paraphernalia, we were not able to distinguish what sales were for cannabis and what sales were for other retail transactions. Some businesses likely had significant other non-medical cannabis retail transactions if they were using their business registration number for other business purposes. Since then there is one retail channel, and stores may hold a medical endorsement that exempts qualifying sales from sales tax. That exemption is a tax status, not a second channel.
Basis — DOR estimated retail value, before tax
- Measurement
- estimated
- Money
- unstated
- Tax
- excl
- Period
- calendar_quarter
- Scope
- retail_only
- Geography
- statewide
- Channels
- adult_use
- Rounding
- Every dollar column is rounded to the nearest $1,000; the sheet name says so.
The regulator's own words: The column header is the basis statement: 'Estimated retail value of cannabis and cannabis products sold at a licensed cannabis retailer (before tax)4'. 4 Retail values were estimated from Department of Revenue (DOR) excise tax returns. DOR writes 'before tax' without naming which taxes, which is recorded as an open question rather than resolved from general knowledge of Washington tax law.
Why an axis above reads unstated: The gross/net axis is unstated. Searched all six footnotes and every header cell of the one sheet for 'discount', 'net', 'gross' and 'refund': no hit. DOR says the values are estimated from excise tax returns and says nothing about discounts. An undocumented basis is a gap to be labelled, never filled in with the most likely answer.
Basis — Collective taxable retail sales, before tax
- Measurement
- measured
- Money
- unstated
- Tax
- excl
- Period
- calendar_quarter
- Scope
- unstated
- Geography
- statewide
- Channels
- medical
The regulator's own words: Scope is unstated because DOR says the column may carry non-cannabis retail: 3 Starting July 1, 2016 collective gardens (dispensaries) had to close down. Prior to July 1, 2016 we considered all their cannabis sales to be for medical purposes, since all sales were to patients that had approval (or a prescription) from a doctor. Since medical cannabis was subject to sales tax we assumed that most of their taxable retail sales were for cannabis. Unfortunately, if a business was conducting other retail transactions, such as selling t-shirts or paraphernalia, we were not able to distinguish what sales were for cannabis and what sales were for other retail transactions. Some businesses likely had significant other non-medical cannabis retail transactions if they were using their business registration number for other business purposes.
Why an axis above reads unstated: Footnote 3 is the search result, not a silence: it states DOR could not separate cannabis from other retail transactions in this column. Nothing in the sheet narrows the scope further. An undocumented basis is a gap to be labelled, never filled in with the most likely answer.
Basis — Total retail value, both channels, before tax
- Measurement
- estimated
- Money
- unstated
- Tax
- excl
- Period
- calendar_quarter
- Scope
- unstated
- Geography
- statewide
- Channels
- medical, adult_use
The regulator's own words: The sum of the two columns above, so it covers both of the channels they cover. It is published as a cross-check on them, never as the headline.
Why an axis above reads unstated: Inherited: one of its two addends has an unstated scope by DOR's own footnote, so the sum cannot be narrower. An undocumented basis is a gap to be labelled, never filled in with the most likely answer.
Basis — Sales exempt from sales tax for medical purposes
- Measurement
- measured
- Money
- unstated
- Tax
- not_applicable
- Period
- calendar_quarter
- Scope
- retail_only
- Geography
- statewide
- Channels
- adult_use
The regulator's own words: A tax status inside the single retail channel, not a channel: 5 Data on exempt sales were from DOR excise tax returns. Exempt sales include transactions by cannabis retailers with a medical cannabis endorsement. This includes: - Sales and donations of cannabis products determined by the Department of Health (DOH) to be beneficial for medical use to qualifying patients and designated providers who have been issued recognition cards. - Sales and donations of low-THC products to qualifying patients and designated providers who have been issued recognition cards. - Sales of high-CBD compliant cannabis products to all consumers.
Why an axis above reads unstated: The gross/net axis is unstated for the same reason as the headline column and by the same search: no footnote or header cell mentions discounts, net or gross. An undocumented basis is a gap to be labelled, never filled in with the most likely answer.
Basis — Estimated sales tax collections
- Measurement
- estimated
- Money
- not_applicable
- Tax
- not_applicable
- Period
- calendar_quarter
- Scope
- retail_only
- Geography
- statewide
- Channels
- adult_use
The regulator's own words: Neither rate on this page is typed in: the state sales-tax rate of 6.50% is divided out of DOR's own collections column, and the cannabis excise rate is divided out of WSLCB's - 25.00% from FY2015; 37.00% from FY2016 to FY2025. 6 The weighted average local sales tax rate is updated in October of each year.
Basis — WSLCB retailer sales and excise, by fiscal year
- Measurement
- measured
- Money
- unstated
- Tax
- unstated
- Period
- fiscal_year
- Scope
- retail_only
- Geography
- statewide
- Channels
- adult_use, medical
The regulator's own words: Retailer tier only. The workbooks also carry Producer, Processor and an all-tier sheet, and none of those is read here.
Why an axis above reads unstated: Neither the money axis nor the tax axis is stated anywhere in these workbooks. Each sheet carries exactly four labelled columns - County, Reporting Period, Total Sales, Excise Tax - one privilege cell and no footnotes, so there is no text in which a basis could be stated. An undocumented basis is a gap to be labelled, never filled in with the most likely answer.
Basis — Medically endorsed retailers, point in time
- Measurement
- measured
- Money
- not_applicable
- Tax
- not_applicable
- Period
- point_in_time
- Scope
- retail_only
- Geography
- statewide
- Channels
- adult_use
The regulator's own words: A snapshot with no history: WSLCB replaces the file rather than versioning it.
Sources 2
| Role | Source | Format | From | Last verified | Note |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Canonical | Cannabis Sales Tax Table Washington State Department of Revenue | xlsx | 2014-Q3 | 2026-08-23 | One sheet, 48 quarter rows and six footnotes. The workbook's own name says the figures are rounded and the footnotes say the quarters are final: 1 The newest quarter in this report reflects data as of this date. All quarters are static and will not be revised in the future. |
| Cross-check | Sales and Excise Tax by County, by fiscal year Washington State Liquor and Cannabis Board | xlsx | 2015 | 2026-08-23 | Never averaged with the canonical figure. The WSLCB total sits above the DOR figure in 6 of the 11 fiscal years and sits below it in 5, within a ratio of 0.9959 to 1.0237. The comparison covers FY2015 to FY2025, the fiscal years the two series jointly cover in full. The two are different agencies on different bases and are never averaged. |
Why each marker above says what it says
| Metric | Marker | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Retail sales | Partly comparable | Washington publishes quarterly and nothing finer, so it is absent from every monthly view with the grain as the reason rather than spread across months no regulator reported. The quarters run 2014-Q3 to 2026-Q2. On basis, the figure is an ESTIMATE: DOR derives it from excise tax returns rather than measuring sales, and it must not sit unlabelled beside a state's seed-to-sale actuals. On scope, it is LICENSED RETAIL ONLY and excludes the medical collective channel that was still trading in the opening quarters of the series: DOR reports the collectives in a column of its own, this file carries that column and draws it separately, and it is never summed into this figure. DOR writes 'before tax' without naming which taxes. The WSLCB total sits above the DOR figure in 6 of the 11 fiscal years and sits below it in 5, within a ratio of 0.9959 to 1.0237. The comparison covers FY2015 to FY2025, the fiscal years the two series jointly cover in full. The two are different agencies on different bases and are never averaged. |
| Medical / adult-use split | Single-channel market | Washington has one retail channel. Medical collectives were a separate channel until they were required to close, and since then a store may hold a medical endorsement that exempts qualifying sales from sales tax. The exempt-dollar column is that tax status, not a channel split, and it is labelled as a proxy wherever it appears. |
| Price per gram | Not like-for-like | Neither source pairs dollars with a weight. The DOR workbook carries money and tax only, and the WSLCB county workbooks carry two dollar columns. A per-gram figure would need a quantity nobody publishes, so this file ships no price block at all rather than one whose method field would have to name a method it does not use. |
| Per capita | Partly comparable | Per resident, on the Census July-1 estimate for each quarter's own year. It inherits every flag on its numerator, which is DOR's estimate rather than a measured total, and it is quarterly. Washington publishes quarterly and nothing finer, so it is absent from every monthly view with the grain as the reason rather than spread across months no regulator reported. The quarters run 2014-Q3 to 2026-Q2. |
| Patient counts | Not like-for-like | Neither source read here publishes a patient count. The only patient-adjacent figure either agency exposes in these artifacts is the exempt-dollar column, which is money. |
| Licence counts | Not like-for-like | The only licence figure read here is a point-in-time count of MEDICALLY ENDORSED retailers, which is a subset of licensed retail and has no history: WSLCB replaces the file rather than versioning it. Counting its rows would count contacts. The mapping layer that looks like a clean licence feed disagrees with that list and is used for geometry only. |
| Tax revenue | Partly comparable | The quarterly figure offered here is SALES tax on cannabis retail, not the cannabis excise. The cannabis excise is the larger of Washington's two cannabis taxes: over the 11 fiscal years the two agencies jointly cover in full, the excise is larger than the state and local sales tax in 11 of them, running from 1.68 to 4.14 times it. The excise is published by the licensing regulator at fiscal-year grain, so it sits on this page's own annual series and not on a quarterly cross-state axis. Local sales tax is carried separately and withheld from this metric. Neither rate on this page is typed in: the state sales-tax rate of 6.50% is divided out of DOR's own collections column, and the cannabis excise rate is divided out of WSLCB's - 25.00% from FY2015; 37.00% from FY2016 to FY2025. Washington publishes quarterly and nothing finer, so it is absent from every monthly view with the grain as the reason rather than spread across months no regulator reported. The quarters run 2014-Q3 to 2026-Q2. |
What is checked on every run 7
| Check | Kind | Last result |
|---|---|---|
| DOR's total column equals its two component columns added together. | identity | 48 quarters checked, worst residual $0.00, 0 beyond tolerance. |
| The taxable base equals the total less the medically exempt figure. | identity | 48 quarters checked, worst residual $1,000.00, 0 beyond tolerance. |
| State sales tax equals the taxable base at the rate divided out of the same two columns. | identity | 48 quarters checked, worst residual $0.00, 0 beyond tolerance. |
| Local sales tax equals the taxable base at the weighted average local rate DOR publishes in its own column. | identity | 48 quarters checked, worst residual $1,000.00, 0 beyond tolerance. |
| Each fiscal year's county rows sum to that sheet's own Total row. | identity | 11 fiscal years checked, 11 reconciling; worst sales residual $0.00, worst excise residual $0.00. |
| DOR's quarters, summed onto WSLCB's fiscal years, against WSLCB's own totals. Reported, never reconciled and never averaged. | cross source reconciliation | 11 fiscal years compared, 0 skipped for incomplete DOR coverage; ratio 0.9959 to 1.0237, mean 1.0051; partition {'above': 6, 'below': 5, 'equal': 0}. |
| Whether DOR's estimate matches what was actually sold. | unchecked | Not cross-checked. No independent measurement of Washington retail dollars is published. The WSLCB figure is a second administrative total on a different base, not a measurement, so it bounds the estimate without verifying it. This page says the headline is an estimate rather than implying the rigour of a seed-to-sale total. |
The regulator's own notes, and what is still open
The regulator's own notes
Washington publishes quarterly and this page is quarterly. The regulator's open-data portal that once carried a monthly series no longer exists, and spreading a quarter across three months would publish figures nobody reported. — dccannabisdata.com, from the sources below
4 Retail values were estimated from Department of Revenue (DOR) excise tax returns. 2 Represents the quarter sales occurred.
— Washington State Department of Revenue, Cannabis Sales Tax Table footnotes 4 and 2
The WSLCB total sits above the DOR figure in 6 of the 11 fiscal years and sits below it in 5, within a ratio of 0.9959 to 1.0237. The comparison covers FY2015 to FY2025, the fiscal years the two series jointly cover in full. The two are different agencies on different bases and are never averaged. — Measured this run from both agencies' own totals
Neither rate on this page is typed in: the state sales-tax rate of 6.50% is divided out of DOR's own collections column, and the cannabis excise rate is divided out of WSLCB's - 25.00% from FY2015; 37.00% from FY2016 to FY2025. — Measured this run by dividing each agency's tax column by its own base
Open questions on this data
Unresolved definitional questions that gate something. Listed because a question nobody can see is a question nobody closes.
- DOR labels its dollar columns 'before tax' without naming which taxes. Washington levies a cannabis excise and a state and local sales tax; the header does not say whether the excise sits inside the figure. Closing it needs: A data request to DOR's Research and Fiscal Analysis division asking which taxes the 'before tax' columns exclude.
- The Cannabis Central Reporting System, CCRS, is scheduled to move to a WA.gov host, which has relocated WSLCB publishing paths before. Closing it needs: Re-run the landing-page scrape after the move and confirm the anchor texts this pipeline keys on still resolve. Both landing pages are fetched every run precisely so a relocation presents as a scrape failure rather than as a quietly stale file.