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What are added sugars?

Added sugars are sugars added to a food during processing, such as sucrose or dextrose, plus sugar and sweeteners sold on their own, syrups and honey, and sugar from concentrated fruit or vegetable juice. The FDA Daily Value for added sugars is 50 grams a day, based on a 2,000 calorie diet.

Action level No action usually needed

Why you are seeing it
It is a line on the Nutrition Facts label under Total Sugars, with its own gram amount and %DV.
Why it matters
It separates sugar that was put into a food from sugar that the ingredients contain, so a reader can see what a serving adds.
What should I do?
  • Read the Added Sugars line, and the serving size above it.
  • Use the Sugar Grams to Teaspoons Converter to picture the amount.
  • Ask a doctor or dietitian about your own needs, because the Daily Value is a label reference.
A common misunderstanding
Total sugars and added sugars are different lines: the first includes sugar that was already in the food.

What counts as added

The FDA page on added sugars counts sugar put in while a food is made (sucrose and dextrose, for example), sugar and sweeteners sold on their own, syrups and honey, and sugar that comes from concentrated fruit or vegetable juice.

The label lists them on their own line under total sugars, so a reader can see how much of the sugar was added.

A simple example

Grams, teaspoons and percent

A drink with 27 grams of added sugar is 27 / 50 = 54% of the 50 gram Daily Value.

Using the common rounding of 4 grams to a teaspoon, 27 grams is about 6.75 teaspoons.

Two servings of it would be 54 grams and 108% DV.

The Daily Value

The Daily Value for added sugars is 50 grams a day based on a 2,000 calorie diet. It is a label reference. The %DV on a label tells you how much of that 50 grams one serving uses.

Try these tools

  • How Much Sugar Did I Drink?Enter the sugar per serving and how much you drank to see the grams and teaspoons of sugar, and what it adds up to over time.
  • Sugar Grams to TeaspoonsConvert grams of sugar to teaspoons. The grams per teaspoon is shown and can be changed.
  • Daily Value CalculatorTurn an amount of a nutrient into a percent of its FDA Daily Value, with the FDA rule for low and high.

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