Being outside the jurisdiction of the USA, we have no obligation to report sales of distilling equipment to the USA authorities.

We have curated links to opinions about distillation on a small still for own use by country and state, this is not our legal advice but purely the opinion of other people who we cannot vouch for; We can ship worldwide, but we cannot check if you are allowed to own a small still.

If you are not allowed to own a small still ( or even ) you should not buy myVodkaMaker.

Legend:

Some places have conflicting or changing information, we include both so you can decide.

Worldwide 

Australia Austria Brazil Bulgaria Canada Croatia Czech Republic France France Germany Greece Hungery Ireland Italy Macedonia Netherlands New Zealand Norway Peru Romania Russia Slovenia South Africa Ukraine United Kingdom Venezuela

USA By State

Federal"Federal laws allow citizens the right to own a still for non-alcohol use. Legally you can own and be in posession of a still as long as you do not use it in the production of spirits. This means legally you can: Own or be in posession of a still."

Alabama-Wet counties Alabama-Dry counties Alaska-Wet counties Alaska-Dry counties Arizona Arkansas
California Colorado Connecticut Delaware DC Florida Georgia Hawaii
Idaho Illinois Indiana Iowa Kansas Kentucky Louisiana
Maine Maryland Massachusetts Michigan Minnesota Mississippi Missouri Montana Nebraska Nevada New Hampshire New Hampshire-Pending Law
New Jersey New Mexico New York
North Carolina North Dakota
Ohio Oklahoma Oregon Pennsylvania Rhode Island South Carolina South Dakota
Tennessee Texas Utah Vermont Virginia Washington West Virginia-Pending Law West Virginia
Wisconsin Wyoming

General information

Places that have recognized hobby distillation as a legal category and have passed laws also have simplified permits with requirements that are not as strict as for craft distilleries. However, other places treat hobby distillation the same as craft distillation, which makes getting permits to distil alcohol prohibitive for hobbyists, even when they are allowed to own a small still without a permit.

Authorities mainly want to prevent illegal sale of untaxed alcohol. The size of the still, and how much it can produce matters a lot when it comes to the consequences for failure to obtain permits. Your main requirement should be to not get caught owning an illegal still that can be used to make commercially viable quantities of untaxed alcohol. myVodkaMaker meets this requirement.

Some authorities say you can legally own a still without registering it if it is under a certain size. The size varies from Germany with 0.5Litre, some European countries with 2 Litre, some US States with 1 gallon and Australia with 5 Litre. myVodkaMaker falls well within the size requirement for all regions.

Irrespective of the legality of owning the still, New Zealand is the only western country where you can legally hobby distil without requiring some form of permit. All other places you need a permit, but the cost of prosecuting a hobby distiller with a tiny still means those laws are seldom enforced. So again we emphasize, you do not want to get caught owning a illegal still that can be used to make commercially viable quantities of untaxed alcohol. myVodkaMaker cannot make commercially viable quantities of alcohol.

We ship myVodkaMaker set in a "restricted" mode, so it will not have the capability to distil any alcohol and it is very small, so you can legally buy and own myVodkaMaker in many places where owning a small still for water distillation is allowed without a permit. If allowed and/or you have obtained a permit you can legally enable the "Permit" mode... then only will the still be able to make alcohol. If you ignore your legal obligations you bear the responsibility. If you live in a place where any kind of still is prohibited you bear the responsibility or you should not buy myVodkaMaker.

myVodkaMaker is a new startup I created to bring to life the patent I filed after I was inspirited to reduce the height of my thin reflux distilling column by winding it into a spiral to make it the size of a small coffee machine. My home distillation journey started in South Africa during the hard lockdown of 2020 when there was a complete alcohol ban(to save hospital beds they said). There were no supplies available at all so I build a small still with what I had at hand. As a boiler I used a 10L plastic bucket and old kettle element ... it was awful. Actually, the spirit was quite drinkable. It was an awful pain to fill, heat, watch and dump 6 liters of wash at a time. I had some plumbing laying around, so I built a 22mm continuous still. Running such a small still is like balancing a unicycle so it was essential to use some electronics and firmware from another project I had made before to drive the still. At that stage, I knew very little about distilling and could only build an inefficient still making it very very very slow and as soon as I could I upgraded to 50mm stainless steel still and I could produce some reasonable neutral. Over the 2 years, I learned a lot and got inspiration from https://homedistiller.org/ , r/firewater , still-it and many more. I created and tested many 22mm still designs, I learned how to improve the efficiency and quality. The 22mm is such an ideal hobby size that I even stopped using my 50mm still. After I posted to the homedistiller forum about my small still, I was doing a write up on how I built it when inspiration struck like lightning - Wind the thin refux column into a spiral so it would fit in a coffee machine sized enclosure. Since then I have been working frantically to commercialize it as a product and the result is amazing - I still cannot believe what I have made and I hope if you do buy one you will find it just as amazing. - Lafras myvodkamaker