How to Make a Nutrition Label for Food You Sell (UK Guide)

Posted by

04/11/2026

On 02/11/2026

If you make food at home, run a small food business, or sell at markets, one of the first labelling questions you hit is how to work out the nutrition table. The good news is that you do not need a laboratory to start. For many recipes you can calculate it yourself from your ingredients, as long as you follow the same rules the big brands do. Here is how, step by step, for the UK.

First, do you actually need a nutrition label?

In the UK, nutrition information is mandatory on most pre-packed food. But there are exemptions. Under the Food Standards Agency’s technical guidance, food supplied directly by a manufacturer of small quantities to the final consumer, or to local shops that supply the final consumer directly, is exempt (Annex V, point 19 of the retained regulation). The guidance interprets a manufacturer of small quantities as a micro business, meaning fewer than 10 employees and a turnover or balance sheet under 2 million euros (around 1.4 million pounds), and it describes how local is measured by county and distance.

Two catches. First, that guidance dates from 2017 and has been carried into UK law since, so check the current version before relying on it. Second, if you make a nutrition or health claim on the product, such as “high in protein”, you must provide a nutrition declaration even if you would otherwise be exempt. Many small producers choose to add a label anyway because customers and shops expect one.

What a UK nutrition declaration must contain

The mandatory declaration gives energy in both kilojoules (kJ) and kilocalories (kcal), plus the amounts in grams of:

Fat
of which saturates
Carbohydrate
of which sugars
Protein
Salt

Values are given per 100g (or per 100ml for drinks). You can add per portion values alongside, and you can voluntarily add fibre, mono-unsaturates, polyunsaturates, polyols, starch, and certain vitamins and minerals. You cannot add other nutrients to the table, and the guidance specifically says trans fats and cholesterol cannot be declared in it.

Step 1: Write down your exact recipe in grams

Weigh every ingredient and note the grams for one full batch. Cups and spoons are not precise enough. Include oils, sugar and salt, because they change the numbers more than most people expect. Note the total weight of the batch before cooking, and the weight afterwards if you cook it.

Step 2: Find reliable values for each ingredient

The rules allow declared values to be average values worked out from your own analysis, from a calculation using the known or actual average values of the ingredients you used, or from generally established and accepted data. In the UK, the guidance names McCance and Widdowson’s Composition of Foods as the example of generally established data. For branded ingredients, use the figures printed on that product’s own label.

You can search ingredients directly in our UK food database with the Nutrition Label Generator, which pulls the per 100g values for you.

Step 3: Add up the batch, then divide by the weight

For each ingredient, multiply its per 100g value by the grams you used, divided by 100. Add those up for every nutrient to get the whole batch. Then divide by the batch’s total weight in grams and multiply by 100 to get per 100g.

Here is a simple example using our database values: 200g of cheddar cheese (412 kcal per 100g) and 300g of plain flour (367 kcal per 100g) give 824 + 1,101 = 1,925 kcal in the batch. The batch weighs 500g, so that is 385 kcal per 100g. If the batch makes 4 servings of 125g, each serving is about 481 kcal. Do the same sum for fat, saturates, carbohydrate, sugars, protein and salt.

Step 4: Use the cooked weight if the food changes weight

Baking, roasting and boiling change a food’s weight, usually by losing water. The total calories in the batch stay roughly the same, but they are now spread over a lighter food, so the per 100g figure goes up. Use the weight of the finished product for the per 100g values on a cooked food. Our tool has a weight after cooking field for exactly this.

Step 5: Work out per portion and Reference Intake

Per portion is the batch total divided by the number of portions. To show % Reference Intake, divide each value by the reference figure and multiply by 100. The UK and EU reference intakes for an average adult are energy 8,400 kJ / 2,000 kcal, fat 70g, saturates 20g, carbohydrate 260g, sugars 90g, protein 50g and salt 6g. If you show them, the label should say they are the reference intake of an average adult (8,400 kJ / 2,000 kcal).

Step 6: Salt, not sodium

UK labels use salt, not sodium. Salt is calculated as sodium multiplied by 2.5. If an ingredient’s data only gives sodium, convert it before adding it up.

Common mistakes

Using per portion figures only. Per 100g is the required basis.
Forgetting that oil, butter and sugar add up fast across a whole batch.
Using raw weight figures for a cooked product.
Leaving out an ingredient because it is a small amount.
Adding trans fat or cholesterol rows copied from a US label. These are not allowed in the UK table.

Accuracy: it is an average, not an exact reading

The guidance says declared values must be average values, and that the actual content of the food should not deviate substantially from what is labelled, as the consumer could otherwise be misled. Natural variation in ingredients is expected, which is why calculated values are acceptable, but it is also why products sold at scale are often checked by laboratory analysis.

The nutrition table is only one part of a legal label

Pre-packed food also needs the name of the food, an ingredients list in weight order (for foods with two or more ingredients), the 14 allergens emphasised in the ingredients list, net quantity, a best before or use by date, storage conditions where needed, and the business name and address. A nutrition table does not replace any of these. Our Ingredient List & Allergen Generator puts your ingredients in weight order and emphasises the 14 allergens for you.

Colour-coded front-of-pack labels are optional. If you want them, our guide to how the UK’s traffic light labels work lists the exact thresholds, and our generator colours your values using the same ones.

Skip the spreadsheet

If you would rather not do the sums by hand, the Nutrition Label Generator does all of the above: add each ingredient and its grams, set the number of servings and the cooked weight, and it builds a UK label with per 100g, per serving, % Reference Intake and traffic lights, which you can download or print. If a nutrient is missing for one of your ingredients, it shows n/a rather than quietly leaving it out. For a more detailed breakdown of how to read the finished table, see our guide to the UK nutrition label.

*This article is general information, not legal advice. Food labelling law and guidance change over time, so check an official source directly if you need this for your own business’s compliance.