What Does a Gram of Sugar Mean on a Nutrition Label?

All carbohydrates -- except fiber -- have 4 calories in a gram. Fiber has no calories. So when the food label states that the product has 1 gram of sugar, which is a type of carb, you know that the food has 4 calories that come specifically from sugar. Remember that 1 gram of sugar is just for one serving. Thus, if you eat an entire container that has several servings in it, you could significantly increase your calorie intake. Look at the very top of the label to determine the single portion size and how many of those servings are in a container.

The majority of nutrients on the label have a percent daily value on the right hand side. This tells you how much of the daily value one serving provides for a nutrient, based on a daily diet of 2,000 calories. Because sugar doesn’t really nourish your body and only provides calories, it does not have an established daily value. The American Heart Association recommends women and men respectively have no more than 100 and 150 additional calories from sugar each day. This amounts to 25 and 37.5 grams of sugar per day, respectively.

It might be tricky to figure out exactly what type of sugar is in the food, because manufacturers use all kinds of ingredients to sweeten products. Watch for sucrose, honey, maltose, fructose, glucose, syrup, brown sugar, corn sweetener and high fructose corn syrup, just to name a few. Foods may contain one or more of these sugary substances, all of which contribute to the overall sugar content. Ingredients are listed in descending order by weight. So, if you see some kind of sugar listed as one the first few ingredients in the label, the food is probably not the healthiest option for you.

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This is one gram of sugar