Sugars on Food Labels: Total Sugars vs Free Sugars
Why the "of which sugars" line includes milk and fruit sugars, what counts as free sugars, the 5 g and 22.5 g per 100 g bands, and how to spot added sugar.
"Sugars" on a UK nutrition label and "sugar" in health advice are not quite the same thing. The label shows total sugars, while UK dietary advice focuses on free sugars. Knowing the difference helps you make sense of products such as yoghurt, fruit snacks and breakfast cereals.
What the label means by "sugars"
The "of which sugars" line under carbohydrate is total sugars. In law it means all monosaccharides and disaccharides present in the food, excluding polyols (Regulation (EU) No 1169/2011, assimilated in Great Britain). That includes:
- sugars added during manufacture, such as table sugar, glucose syrup or honey;
- lactose, the sugar naturally present in milk;
- sugars naturally present in fruit and vegetables.
The NHS points out that this figure includes sugars from milk and fruit, so it does not show free sugars on its own. A pot of plain yoghurt can therefore show several grams of sugars per 100 g even though no sugar was added.
What counts as free sugars
Free sugars are the sugars UK advice suggests cutting down on. The NHS defines them as any sugars added to food or drinks, plus the sugars in honey, syrups, nectars and unsweetened fruit juices, vegetable juices and smoothies. Sugar found naturally in milk, fruit and vegetables does not count as free sugars.
The Scientific Advisory Committee on Nutrition (SACN) recommends that free sugars should not exceed 5% of total dietary energy. The NHS turns that into daily maximums:
| Age | Maximum free sugars a day (NHS) |
|---|---|
| Adults | 30 g (roughly 7 sugar cubes) |
| Children aged 7 to 10 | 24 g |
| Children aged 4 to 6 | 19 g |
| Children aged 2 to 3 | 14 g |
| Children aged 1 | 10 g |
The reference intake of 90 g of total sugars on labels is a different figure. According to the NHS, it includes no more than 30 g of free sugars; the rest allows for sugars in milk, fruit and vegetables.
The 5 g and 22.5 g bands
UK guidance uses total sugars per 100 g to judge whether a food is low or high in sugars. The same cut-offs drive the sugars colour on front-of-pack traffic-light labels:
| Sugars | Low (green) | Medium (amber) | High (red) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Food, per 100 g | 5 g or less | more than 5 g up to 22.5 g | more than 22.5 g |
| Drinks, per 100 ml | 2.5 g or less | more than 2.5 g up to 11.25 g | more than 11.25 g |
For foods sold in portions of more than 100 g, sugars are also red when a portion contains more than 27 g; for drinks in portions of more than 150 ml, more than 13.5 g.
Because these bands use total sugars, a dairy or fruit-based product can land in amber without any added sugar. The colour tells you how much sugar there is, not where it came from.
How to spot added sugar in the ingredient list
The nutrition table cannot separate free sugars from naturally present ones, but the ingredient list can help. Ingredients are listed in descending order of weight, so the higher a sugar appears, the more of it there is. Sugars appear under many names, including:
- sugar (the name that may be used for any type of sucrose), cane sugar, brown sugar
- glucose syrup, dextrose, glucose, fructose, glucose-fructose syrup
- invert sugar syrup, golden syrup, maple syrup, molasses, treacle
- honey, agave syrup, fruit juice concentrate
Several small amounts of different sugars can add up even when none of them is at the top of the list.
Sweeteners such as sucralose or steviol glycosides are not sugars and are not counted in the sugars figure; neither are polyols such as sorbitol. You can read more about them in our sweeteners hub.
Sugar claims on packs
Sugar claims are regulated (Regulation (EC) No 1924/2006, assimilated in Great Britain):
- Low sugar: no more than 5 g of sugars per 100 g for solids, or 2.5 g per 100 ml for liquids.
- Sugar-free: no more than 0.5 g of sugars per 100 g or 100 ml.
- No added sugars: no added monosaccharides or disaccharides and no other food used for its sweetening properties. Where sugars are naturally present, the label should also say "contains naturally occurring sugars".
"No added sugars" is not the same as low in sugar: a smoothie, a nectar with no added sugar or a dried-fruit snack can carry it and still be high in total sugars. Fruit juice is a special case: sugar may not be added to it at all, so it cannot carry the claim.
Common questions
Does fruit juice count as free sugars?
Yes. Under the NHS definition, the sugars in unsweetened fruit juices, vegetable juices and smoothies count as free sugars, even though nothing was added. The sugars inside whole fruit and vegetables do not.
Why does plain yoghurt show sugars?
Milk naturally contains lactose, which counts in the total sugars figure. If the ingredient list shows only milk and cultures, those sugars are not free sugars.
Is brown sugar or honey a better choice?
Not in terms of sugar: honey, syrups and all types of sugar count as free sugars in the same way.
Using FoodFact to compare sugars
FoodFact shows the total sugars declared on each product and calculates the traffic-light colour from it. Our lower-sugar list uses its own cut-off of under 10 g of sugars per 100 g, which is not the "low sugar" claim; you can also see products with the most sugar. For the full label, see our guide to reading a UK nutrition label. Values come from what manufacturers declare, so check the pack.