Packaging

Packaging Testing Services

Every product you buy has packaging that quietly did a lot of work before it reached you — surviving warehouse stacks, long-haul vibration, altitude changes in cargo holds, and that final drop from the delivery driver’s hands. When packaging fails, products get damaged, brands take a hit, and customers don’t come back. When packaging works, nobody even notices. That’s actually the goal.

Infinita Lab provides a comprehensive testing package to ensure product protection, ruggedness, and regulatory compliance. Our testing helps solve problems such as leak detection, biodegradability, and endurance under extreme conditions. Key tests involve Microbial Challenge of porous items, Dye Penetration for leakage, Vacuum/altitude simulation of air transport, Drop and Impact testing of shipping stresses, Sieve Analysis of particle size, and Cytotoxic testing of biological safety.

Infinita Lab supports packaging engineers and manufacturers by adhering to the strictest quality and compliance guidelines, including relevant international standards such as ASTM and ISO 17025.

Our Packaging Testing Services

Moisture Barrier Testing — Water Vapor Transmission Rate (WVTR)

Moisture is one of the biggest threats to packaged products. Whether you’re packaging crackers, pharmaceuticals, or electronic components, moisture getting in through the packaging film is a slow, invisible disaster. WVTR testing tells you exactly how fast water vapor is moving through your material — so you can make an informed decision about barrier design before your product hits the shelf.

Relevant ASTM Standards:

ASTM F1249 – Standard test method for measuring Water Vapor Transmission Rate (WVTR) of flexible barrier materials such as plastic films, laminates, and packaging structures using an infrared detection system. It determines how much moisture passes through a material under controlled temperature and humidity conditions. It is critical for evaluating moisture-barrier performance in packaging where product stability is sensitive to humidity. It helps in material selection, shelf-life prediction, and quality assurance by quantifying moisture permeability and ensuring consistent barrier integrity.

ASTM E96 – Gravimetric test methods for Water Vapor Transmission Rate of flat materials, including packaging films, membranes, and barrier laminates under defined temperature and humidity conditions — providing WVTR data for food, pharmaceutical, and medical device packaging qualification.

Oxygen Transmission Rate (OTR) Testing

Oxygen is the enemy of freshness. It spoils food, degrades pharmaceuticals, and accelerates the aging of anything organic. If your packaging film allows too much oxygen through, your product’s shelf life shortens — and your customers’ experience suffers. OTR testing provides a precise, quantitative measure of your film’s oxygen-barrier performance before you commit to production.

Relevant ASTM Standards:

ASTM D3985 – Standard test method for measuring the oxygen transmission rate (OTR) of plastic films, sheeting, and laminates using a coulometric sensor detection system. OTR is one of the most critical barrier properties of packaging materials used in food, pharmaceutical, and medical applications, where oxygen ingress can cause oxidation, spoilage, or degradation of the packaged contents. The test uses a diffusion cell in which the test film separates two chambers — one side purged with nitrogen while the other is exposed to oxygen — and the OTR is calculated as the volume of oxygen permeating through a unit area per unit time under specified temperature and relative humidity conditions.

Peel Adhesion & Seal Strength Testing

A packaging seal that opens too easily lets contamination in. A seal that’s too strong frustrates consumers and creates accessibility problems. Getting peel adhesion right — for laminates, pouches, lidding films, tapes, and labels — is a balancing act that requires precise, standardized measurement.

Relevant ASTM Standards:

ASTM D903 – Standard test method for peel or stripping strength of adhesive bonds, measuring the force per unit width required to peel a flexible adherend from a rigid substrate at a defined angle (typically 180°) at a constant rate of 152 mm/min. ASTM D903 is one of the fundamental adhesive testing standards used across the packaging, automotive, electronics, and construction industries, wherever adhesive bonds between flexible and rigid materials must be characterized and qualified. Key applications include packaging laminate bond strength between film layers for flexible food packaging, pressure-sensitive adhesive characterization, and peel force of protective cover films.

Drop & Impact Testing

Your packaging will be dropped. It’s not a question of if — it’s a question of how many times, from what height, and onto which surface. Drop testing takes the guesswork out of packaging design by simulating the real-world handling events your package will face from the warehouse floor to the doorstep.

Relevant ASTM Standards:

ASTM D5276 – Standard test method for drop testing of loaded containers by free fall, evaluating the effects of random drops and repeated impacts brought on by shipping, handling, and other field service circumstances. Packaged items are divided into three categories — standard, small, and flat — depending on their volume, weight, and longest dimension. The test identifies mechanical and structural flaws that are not always detected in shock and vibration tests and helps manufacturers identify potential warranty issues resulting from subpar packaging or mishandling.

Distribution Performance Testing

Real-world distribution is not a single event — it’s a sequence of stresses that accumulate over the entire journey. Compression in the warehouse, vibration on the truck, a drop at the delivery hub, and altitude changes in the cargo hold. Distribution performance testing replicates this entire sequence in a controlled lab environment, so you know your packaging can handle the full gauntlet before it faces it for real.

Relevant ASTM Standards:

ASTM D4169 – The primary ASTM standard for comprehensive package distribution performance testing. It defines distribution cycles composed of sequential test elements that represent real distribution hazards, organized by assurance level (I, II, III) based on acceptable risk. Elements include atmospheric conditioning, vibration, concentrated impact, and inclined impact, drop testing at defined heights in all orientations, compression, and low-pressure/altitude simulation. It is the most widely referenced packaging test standard in North America.

ASTM D642 – Standard test method for compressive resistance of shipping containers, measuring the load at which a package crushes, and the sustained load it can withstand over time without significant deformation. This test addresses the compressive loads packages experience when stored in warehouses or stacked in truck trailers.

Altitude & Vacuum Simulation Testing

When packages travel by air, they experience low atmospheric pressure in cargo holds. For sealed flexible packaging, this means the package inflates against its seals. Pressure-sensitive adhesive closures can cause ballooning and leakage. Testing packaging under simulated altitude conditions before air shipment is how you avoid expensive, embarrassing failures mid-flight.

Relevant ASTM Standards:

ASTM D6653 – Standard test method for determining the effects of high altitude and pressure differential on unitized loads of packages and other shipping units, simulating the low-pressure conditions encountered during air transport to evaluate packaging integrity and seal performance under vacuum/altitude conditions.

Microbial Barrier Testing for Porous Packaging

For packaging protecting sterile medical devices, surgical instruments, or pharmaceutical products, the question isn’t just “does it look intact?” — it’s “does it actually keep microorganisms out?” Microbial barrier testing is how you answer that question with data instead of assumptions.

Relevant ASTM Standards:

ASTM F1608 – Standard test method for evaluating the microbial barrier performance of porous packaging materials by measuring their resistance to airborne bacterial penetration under controlled aerosol exposure. It provides a comparative ranking of materials based on their ability to prevent microbial ingress, supporting sterility assurance for medical device and pharmaceutical packaging applications throughout storage and handling.

Dye Penetration Leak Testing

Sometimes the most straightforward test is the most revealing one. Dye penetration testing detects pinholes, channel leaks, and seal defects in nonporous packaging by simply seeing where the colored dye solution seeps through. It’s fast, visual, and remarkably effective at catching the kinds of defects that could let contamination reach your product.

The Dye Penetration Test verifies the presence of any leak or crack in nonporous packaging by using dye solutions to locate potential points of product contamination. It ensures that sensitive products, powders, or liquids remain safely contained during transport and storage.

Chemical Resistance Testing for Packaging Materials

Packaging that comes into contact with solvents, cleaning agents, or chemically active products needs to withstand such exposures without degrading, discoloring, or leaching harmful substances. Chemical resistance testing gives you the data to confidently claim your packaging is compatible with whatever it will hold or encounter.

Relevant ASTM Standards:

ASTM D543 – Standard practices for evaluating the resistance of plastics to chemical reagents, assessing dimensional change, mass change, and mechanical property retention of packaging polymer materials after controlled immersion in specified chemicals — essential for qualifying packaging used with aggressive contents or in chemically demanding environments.

Why Packaging Testing Matters

Packaging serves the significant purpose of safeguarding products, ensuring quality, and upholding brand reputation. Ensuring that packaging withstands diverse conditions is a crucial requirement for both manufacturers and merchants. Whether testing the integrity of transport packaging, defining particle size in plastic products, or assessing cytotoxicity to determine safety, every detail counts in protecting products and achieving compliance.

Packaging failures are rarely just a materials problem — they’re a testing gap. Getting the right tests done early, with the right standards, means your packaging team can make informed design decisions rather than learning from field failures.