Workplace safety training for workers and supervisors

Every course in this topic is awareness training. It explains what a standard requires, shows how it plays out on a real shift and gives you checklists and logs to use at work.

These courses are not part of OSHA’s Outreach Training Program, and they do not issue 10-hour or 30-hour cards. They also do not replace the site-specific training an employer must give on its own hazards, equipment and written programs. Each course ends with a certificate of completion for its contact hours.

Many OSHA standards include their own training rule. Two that apply in almost every workplace:

The PPE standard also requires a written certification of the workplace hazard assessment that names the workplace evaluated, the person certifying it and the date (29 CFR 1910.132(d)(2)).

OSHA revised the Hazard Communication Standard in 2024 to align it mainly with Revision 7 of the Globally Harmonized System (GHS). The revised rule took effect on July 19, 2024. In January 2026 OSHA extended the compliance dates by four months.

• November 20, 2026: for substances, employers update any alternative workplace labeling, their hazard communication program and employee training as needed.
• May 19, 2028: the same deadline for mixtures.

During the transition, employers may comply with the 2024 rule, with the version revised as of July 1, 2023, or with both. Hazard Communication was the second most-cited general industry standard in OSHA’s fiscal year 2026 list (inspections through August 31, 2026).

Recording and reporting injuries is not a training rule, but supervisors and HR staff are usually the people who make those calls. Under 29 CFR Part 1904:

• Employers with 10 or fewer employees at all times during the last calendar year do not have to keep the OSHA injury and illness log, and certain industries are partially exempt. Every covered employer must still report severe injuries.
• A work-related fatality must be reported to OSHA within 8 hours. An in-patient hospitalization, an amputation or the loss of an eye must be reported within 24 hours (29 CFR 1904.39).
• The annual summary (Form 300A) is posted from February 1 to April 30 of the year after the records cover, and a company executive certifies it (29 CFR 1904.32).

Our OSHA Recordability Checker walks through the general recording criteria step by step.

States can run their own occupational safety and health programs, called State Plans, which OSHA approves and monitors. A State Plan must be at least as effective as federal OSHA, and some adopt standards that go further.

There are 29 State Plans: 22 cover both private-sector and state and local government workers, and 7 cover state and local government workers only. If you work in a State Plan state, check your state agency’s version of a standard before you rely on the federal text.

Most courses here use the hierarchy of controls from NIOSH (the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health): elimination, substitution, engineering controls, administrative controls and PPE. NIOSH notes that the first three are more effective because they control exposures without relying on what each person does. Training is an administrative control, so the courses always ask what can be removed or engineered out first.