Norvasc
A common oral medicine for high blood pressure.
Where Amlodipine is approved
All regulators →Of the three regulators tracked here, the first to approve Amlodipine was the US, on 31 Jul 1992. It is approved in 2 of the 3 regulators tracked here.
From the regulators' own registers: FDA Drugs@FDA, the EMA medicines list and Health Canada's Notice of Compliance database. Dates are the first listed approval of a product containing only this substance; combination products and nationally authorised EU medicines are not counted.
Amlodipine patents and exclusivity
Expiry tracker →Protections still running for marketed products containing Amlodipine, as listed by the regulators. Expired patents and exclusivities, and discontinued products, are not shown.
- 6 listed patents; the last listed expires 24 Feb 2041 (US 12226528).
Reproduced from the FDA Orange Book and Purple Book (checked 5 Oct 2026) and the European Commission's Union Register of medicinal products (CC BY 4.0; the EU expiry date is calculated exactly as the Commission's register displays it). Listed patents and dates are as submitted to or published by the regulator and may not reflect litigation, invalidation, settlements, lapsed fees or later extensions. This is not legal advice or a freedom-to-operate opinion, and it does not say when a generic or biosimilar will launch.
What health systems spend on Amlodipine
All medicines →From NHSBSA Prescription Cost Analysis (Open Government Licence v3.0) and CMS State Drug Utilization Data. Both are gross amounts: neither system publishes its discounts or rebates per drug. Products combining several substances are not counted here.
How Amlodipine works
All drug targets →- Voltage-gated L-type calcium channel blocker BlockerTarget: Voltage-gated L-type calcium channel✓ In ChEMBL and the Guide to Pharmacology
- CADASILPhase 3
- HypercholesterolemiaPhase 3
- Hypertension resistant to conventional therapyPhase 3
- Blood pressure traitPhase 3
- Chronic kidney diseasePhase 3
- Coronary artery disorderPhase 3
- Depressive disorderPhase 3
- Essential hypertensionPhase 3
- HyperlipidemiaPhase 3
- Impaired renal function diseasePhase 3
Mechanisms and diseases from ChEMBL via the Open Targets Platform (release 26.09), ChEMBL record CHEMBL1491, CC BY-SA 3.0. Targets checked against the IUPHAR/BPS Guide to PHARMACOLOGY (2026.3), ligand 6981, CC BY-SA 4.0. Trial phases are not approvals: approved uses are shown from the regulators' own records where we hold them.
Patient leaflets for Amlodipine
The package leaflet is the official guide for patients that comes with every medicine. These links go to the regulators that publish it.
- IEIreland: 36 products on the HPRA listEach product record links to the HPRA, which publishes the leaflet and SmPC.
- UKUnited Kingdom: Search MHRA ProductsPatient information leaflets and SmPCs for UK-licensed products.
- USUnited States: Search DailyMedFDA-approved labels, including patient and medication guides.
Leaflets differ between brands and countries; always read the one that comes with your own medicine. This is regulatory information, not medical advice.
Reference identifiers for Amlodipine
- ATC code
- C08CA01
- ChEMBL
- CHEMBL1491
- DrugBank
- DB00381
- PubChem CID
- 2162
- CAS number
- 88150-42-9
- FDA UNII
- 1J444QC288
- Wikidata
- Q411347
- Wikipedia
- Amlodipine
Codes that identify this medicine in other databases, from Wikidata (CC0), matched by its ChEMBL ID. The ATC code is the WHO classification of what the medicine is used for.
What Norvasc is used for
NORVASC is a calcium channel blocker and may be used alone or in combination with other antihypertensive and antianginal agents for the treatment of: • Hypertension ( 1.1 ) o NORVASC is indicated for the treatment of hypertension, to lower blood pressure. Lowering blood pressure reduces the risk of fatal and nonfatal cardiovascular events, primarily strokes and myocardial infarctions. • Coronary Artery Disease ( 1.2 ) o Chronic Stable Angina o Vasospastic Angina (Prinzmetal’s or Variant Angina) o Angiographically Documented Coronary Artery Disease in patients without heart failure or an ejection fraction < 40% 1.1 Hypertension NORVASC ® is indicated for the treatment of hypertension, to lower blood pressure. Lowering blood pressure reduces the risk of fatal and nonfatal cardiovascular events, primarily strokes and myocardial infarctions. These benefits have been seen in controlled trial…
How it works
12.1 Mechanism of Action Amlodipine is a dihydropyridine calcium antagonist (calcium ion antagonist or slow‑channel blocker) that inhibits the transmembrane influx of calcium ions into vascular smooth muscle and cardiac muscle. Experimental data suggest that amlodipine binds to both dihydropyridine and nondihydropyridine binding sites. The contractile processes of cardiac muscle and vascular smooth muscle are dependent upon the movement of extracellular calcium ions into these cells through specific ion channels. Amlodipine inhibits calcium ion influx across cell membranes selectively, with a greater effect on vascular smooth muscle cells than on cardiac muscle cells. Negative inotropic eff…
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How this page is built
The facts on this page are pulled directly from official U.S. FDA datasets — they are not written from memory. Each field below names the dataset it came from, so you can check it yourself.
- FDA Drug Label (openFDA) ↗ Indications, mechanism of action and pharmacologic class
- Drugs@FDA ↗ First FDA approval date and the company holding the application
- FDA Drug Shortage Database ↗ Current US supply / shortage status
Plain-English summaries and drug-class explainers are written and reviewed by Sreepriya Prasannan (MSc Digital Transformation of Life Sciences (Innopharma Education / Griffith College); MSc & BSc Botany). Data is retrieved automatically from the sources above and cross-checked with AI-assisted verification (Anthropic's Claude) — brand and generic names are matched against the exact FDA product record so that a combination product or a different formulation cannot be mistaken for the drug on this page. An editor reviews the result before publication. We describe this in full in our editorial standards and corrections policy. The FDA data on this page was last retrieved on 4 Oct 2026. How every register is built: methodology · fixes we have made: corrections log.