Due to its ability to add a savory flavor to dishes, it has been embraced globally by chefs and home cooks.

[1]: 234 Sauces that included fermented fish parts with other ingredients such as meat and soy bean were recorded in China, 2300 years ago.

Fish sauce re-entered China in the 17th and 18th centuries, brought from Vietnam and Cambodia by Chinese traders up the coast of the southern provinces Guangdong and Fujian.

The earliest recorded production was between 4th–3rd century BC by the Ancient Greeks, who fermented scraps of fish called garos into one.

"[13] Garum was made in the Roman outposts of Spain almost exclusively from mackerel by salting the scrap fish innards, and then sun fermenting the flesh until it fell apart, usually for several months.

To improve the visual appearance and add taste, second-pass fish sauces often have added caramel, molasses, or roasted rice.

[17] An anonymous article, "Neuc-num", in Diderot and d'Alembert's 18th-century Encyclopédie, states: "It is said that Europeans become accustomed enough to this type of sauce".

[18] Southeast Asian fish sauce is often made from anchovies, salt, and water, and is intensely flavoured.

Anchovies and salt are arranged in wooden barrels to ferment and are slowly pressed, yielding the salty, fishy liquid.

Industrially fish sauce is produced by mixing trei aing keuy or anchovies with coarse salt and fermenting it in large wooden vats.

Food Production Company of Kampot produces a speciality fish sauce containing roe.

Unlike other fish sauce variants, the fermented solids are not discarded but are sold as separate products.

As such, patis usually takes longer to produce than other types of fish sauce as it is reliant on the readiness of bagoong.

In Thailand, fish sauce is used both in cooking and also served at the table as a condiment, for instance in noodle soups.

[28] In 2014, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) banned the import of Thai fish sauces due to a lack of information about tests for botulinum toxin.

The Thai Office of Food Safety and Quality then tested 48 brands of fish sauce to determine the content of botulinum toxin in the products.

[31] There are two areas in Vietnam that are most famous for producing fish sauce: Phú Quốc and Phan Thiết.

Fish sauce has a 300-year history dating back to the Champa kingdom of the Cham people.

The Vietnamese occupied the area in 1693 and commercialized the fish sauce by keeping it in barrels and selling throughout the country.

Popular brands in the US include Mega Chef, Red Boat, 3 Crabs, Golden Boy, and Hòn Phan Thiết.

In January 2016, the Institute of Food Technologists published a study asserting that using Vietnamese fish sauce as a substitute for sodium chloride (salt) in chicken broth, tomato sauce, and coconut curry reduced the amount of sodium chloride by 10 to 25 percent while still maintaining the perceived deliciousness, saltiness, and overall flavor intensity.

[42][43] The reason for this growth is due to the increasing domestic demand and the strong development of the fish sauce export industry.

In Chaoshan cuisine, fish sauce is made with Reeve's shad (Tenualosa reevesii), which is unsuitable for direct eating due to being fatty, bony, and odorous.

Shottsuru, the best-known type of Japanese fish sauce and often used as a synonym for all gyoshō, is from Akita Prefecture and is mainly made from sailfin sandfish.

Across the Korean Peninsula, aekjeot (액젓, literally "liquid jeotgal"), a type of fish sauce usually made from fermented anchovies or kkanari(pacific sand lances), is used as a crucial ingredient in many types of kimchi, both for taste and fermentation.

Colatura di alici is an Italian fish sauce originating in the village of Cetara, Campania.

Common commercial brands of fish sauce generally contain about 50% to 60% of the FDA's daily recommended amount of sodium per tablespoon serving.