Free food maths tool
Sugar Intake Calculator
Enter the calories you eat in a day and the grams of free (added) sugars in them. The calculator shows the sugars as a share of your energy and the grams that 10% and 5% of it would be.
Worked example
40 g of free sugars in a 2,000 kcal day is 160 kcal, or 8% of the energy. 10% of 2,000 kcal is 50 g and 5% is 25 g.
Work out your share of energy from sugars
The result below starts from the example's numbers. Change any field and it updates as you type.
Track this target every day
Use the number above as your daily goal in CalorTracker, then log meals by photo, voice or text and see where your day stands against it. Free to start, no card needed to explore.
Results are estimates from published formulas, not medical advice. Your own body can sit above or below them.
Where the formulas come from, and how we check them: how we calculate.
How the share is worked out
Sugars give 4 kilocalories per gram, like any carbohydrate. The share of energy is the grams of sugars × 4 ÷ the day's calories × 100. The two reference lines are the same formula run backwards: 10% of your calories ÷ 4 is the grams at 10%, and 5% ÷ 4 the grams at 5%.
What the WHO guideline says
The World Health Organization's 2015 guideline on sugars intake for adults and children makes a strong recommendation to keep the intake of free sugars below 10% of total energy, and a conditional recommendation to reduce it further to below 5%. The calculator places your figure against those two lines and says which side it falls on. It is a guideline for populations, and it is not a personal target, a diagnosis or medical advice.
Free sugars are not the same as total sugars
The WHO's free sugars are the sugars added to food or drink by the maker, the cook or you, plus the sugars naturally present in honey, syrups, fruit juices and fruit juice concentrates. They leave out the sugars inside whole fruit and vegetables, and in milk. A nutrition label that shows "added sugars" is the closest number to use. The "sugars" in the food data on this site, from USDA, are total sugars, so they include the natural ones and overstate free sugars for a food like fruit or plain yogurt. The FDA's Daily Value for added sugars, 50 g, is the same 10% line for a 2,000 kcal day.
What this does not cover
The calculator is for adult intakes and does not set a target for a child. It says nothing about sugar and any condition, such as diabetes, and anyone managing one should follow the advice of their own doctor or dietitian.
10% and 5% of energy in grams, by daily calories
The WHO's lines expressed in grams of free sugars at common calorie levels, at 4 kcal per gram. Find your own calorie level in the calorie calculator.
| Calories a day | 10% of energy (g) | 5% of energy (g) |
|---|---|---|
| 1,500 | 37.5 | 18.75 |
| 1,800 | 45 | 22.5 |
| 2,000 | 50 | 25 |
| 2,200 | 55 | 27.5 |
| 2,500 | 62.5 | 31.25 |
| 3,000 | 75 | 37.5 |