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Classification of Laminated Aluminum Foil for Flexible Packaging

2025-06-17

Shanghai Nosinda Metal Co., Ltd is a high-tech enterprise focusing on the research, development, production and sales of high-performance laminated aluminum foil for flexible packaging. We are committed to providing high-barrier, high-temperature resistant, environmentally friendly laminated aluminum foil packaging solutions for the food, medicine, daily chemical and other industries, helping customers improve product freshness, safety and brand value. If you have any questions or quotation needs, please contact us. Our engineering design team will immediately adopt professional processes to ensure that each customer makes the right choice in metal and manufacturing.

There are many ways to classify laminated aluminum foil for flexible packaging. This article classifies it according to the material structure and end use. The following is a detailed classification.

1. General Structure:

■ PET/AL/PE

• PET (polyethylene terephthalate): provides high mechanical strength, printability, and abrasion resistance.

• AL (aluminum foil): provides core barrier properties (light barrier, oxygen barrier, and moisture barrier).

• PE (): provides heat sealability, chemical resistance, and softness.

• Application: Food (coffee, tea, snacks), general medicines, and general industrial products.

■ PET/AL/CPP

• CPP (cast polypropylene): replaces PE, providing heat sealability, better transparency, high temperature resistance (can be steamed for a short time), and stiffer.

• Application: Food that requires lightweight high temperature sterilization (such as sauces, pet wet food), dry food, and medicine.

■ NY/AL/PE (or NY/AL/CPP)

• NY (nylon): replaces PET, providing excellent puncture resistance, impact resistance, rubbing resistance, and low temperature resistance.

• Application: Frozen foods containing spurs/hard objects (such as seafood, meat), heavy packaging, electronic components that need to be resistant to falling, and products that require high rubbing resistance (to prevent pinholes in the aluminum foil layer due to folding).

2. Enhanced Barrier/Functional Structure:

■ PET/VMPET/AL/PE (or CPP)

• VMPET (vacuum metallized polyester film): adds an additional metallized barrier layer in front of the AL layer, significantly improving the overall barrier performance (especially for oxygen), and acts as a protective layer for the AL layer to reduce the risk of pinholes due to bending.

• Application: High-value products that are extremely sensitive to oxygen (high-end health products, precision electronics, specialty chemicals).

■ KPET/AL/CPP

• KPET: coats special materials (such as PVDC) on the surface of PET to further improve oxygen and moisture barrier properties.

• Application: Food and medicine that require ultra-long shelf life or extremely high barrier properties.

■ Aluminum-plastic Composite

• Structure: PET (or BOPP)/woven fabric/AL/PE (or CPP) or PET/AL/woven fabric/PE.

• Features: Adding woven fabric (such as BOPA woven fabric, PP woven fabric) greatly enhances the tensile strength, tear resistance and puncture resistance of the bag.

• Application: Large-capacity, heavy-duty packaging (such as animal feed, chemical raw materials, rice, cat litter).

3. Aluminum-plated Alternative structure:

■ PET/VMPET/PE or CPP

• VMPET (aluminum-plated polyester): replaces pure aluminum foil layer, providing good light barrier, a certain degree of oxygen and moisture barrier, low cost, better flexibility (not easy to produce pinholes), but the barrier property (especially oxygen barrier) is far inferior to pure aluminum foil.

• Application: Products that do not require extreme barrier properties, are cost-sensitive, or require transparent/translucent effects (some snacks, dry foods, labels).

■ Other aluminized structures: such as BOPP/VMCPP.

The main uses of laminated aluminum foil can be divided into three core industries: food, medicine and daily chemicals, meeting the requirements of food preservation and quality, drug safety and stability, and daily chemical product quality maintenance and image display.

1. Food Industry

• Liquid food: Aseptic brick packs (Tetra Pak), pillow packs, roof packs, and yogurt lids for milk, juice, yogurt, soy milk, plant protein drinks, etc.

• Solid/semi-solid food: cheese, chocolate, coffee, milk powder, tea, seasonings (sauces, powders), pet food, snacks, instant porridge/soup, baby food, etc.

• Steamed food: Steaming bags for foods that require high-temperature steaming and sterilization.

• Function: Extend shelf life, keep fresh, keep fragrance, prevent moisture, prevent oxidation, avoid light, and facilitate transportation and storage.

2.Pharmaceutical Industry

• Solid preparations: PTP blister aluminum foil packaging and strip packaging cold forming aluminum foil for tablets, capsules, pills, etc. Aluminum foil is the key layer covering the drug blister in blister packaging.

• Liquid preparations: Composite film bags for oral liquids, eye drops, injections (some special packaging).

• Diagnostic reagents: Reagent strips and test paper packaging that require strict moisture and light protection.

• Medical devices: Sterile barrier packaging for some medical devices.

• Function: Provide extremely high moisture, oxidation and light protection to ensure the stability, effectiveness and safety of drugs/reagents; prevent bacteria; extend the shelf life; facilitate dosage distribution.

3.Daily Chemical Industry

• Skin care products/cosmetics: facial mask bag, essence/ampoule bags, lotion/cream tube bags, sunscreen, travel samples, etc.

• Personal care products: refill bags (stand-up bags, flat bags) for shampoo, conditioner, shower gel, toothpaste tubes (composite hoses).

• Household cleaning products: refill bags for laundry detergent, softener, dishwashing liquid, etc.

• Function: protect the contents from deterioration due to light, oxygen, and moisture (such as oil oxidation, inactivation of active ingredients, and volatilization of fragrance); prevent the fragrance of the contents from leaking out or external odors from invading; provide good printing effects to display brand and product information; light, easy to transport and store; convenient for consumers to use (such as stand-up bags, easy-tear mouths).

Aluminum foil laundry detergent powder bag

4. Other Industries

Although food, medicine, and daily chemicals are the absolute mainstays, composite soft-package aluminum foil is occasionally used in some special fields, such as:

• Industrial field: Packaging of certain industrial chemicals and electronic components (moisture-proof and anti-static) that require high barrier protection.

• Special packaging: Packaging of products that require extremely long shelf life, such as military rations and emergency food.

• Pet food/supplies: Packaging of high-end pet food and pet care products.

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Email: sales@nosindametal.com

Tel: +86 176 0133 0366

Add: Zone A, Floor 1, Building 104, No. 1-30, Lane 88, Minbei Road, Minhang District, Shanghai, China