Sugar Teaspoon Visualiser

How to Use the Sugar Teaspoon Visualiser

1. Choose who the limit is for: adults and children aged 11 and over (30g), 7 to 10 (24g) or 4 to 6 (19g).
2. Search for a drink or food and tap it. It is added at its usual serving, or tap one of the quick examples.
3. Or type the sugars from a label. Enter the grams of sugars on the pack, and an optional name, then tap Add.
4. Change the amount of a food in grams or millilitres, or tap one of its serving sizes.
5. Read the result. Each item shows its sugars in grams and teaspoons, and the total shows at the bottom as a row of teaspoons and a percentage of the daily limit.

How Many Teaspoons Are in a Gram of Sugar?

A level teaspoon of sugar weighs roughly 4g, so the sugars in grams divided by 4 gives the number of teaspoons. 35g of sugar is about 8.7 teaspoons. Some sources put a level teaspoon of granulated sugar at about 4.2g, and a heaped teaspoon holds more, so 4g is a rounded, easy figure. The tool uses it for every food and drink, so the pictures are a guide, not an exact measure. For the daily limit, the NHS says adults should have no more than 30g of free sugars a day, which it describes as roughly 7 sugar cubes (NHS, Sugar: the facts). That works out at a little over 4g a cube.

Example: Sugar in Everyday Drinks

These examples come straight from the visualiser, using the sugars values in our food database and the usual serving size. Open one in the visualiser to change the amount or add more drinks.

We treat 1ml of a drink as 1g, which is close for most drinks. A drink's sugars on the pack may differ from our general value, so check the label for the exact product.

What Is the Daily Sugar Limit in the UK?

The NHS gives these daily limits for free sugars: no more than 30g for adults, 24g for children aged 7 to 10 and 19g for children aged 4 to 6 (NHS, Sugar: the facts). The limits come from advice that free sugars should not make up more than 5% of the energy you get from food and drink each day. A single can of a sugary drink can use up all or more than the whole day's limit, which is why seeing it as teaspoons can help.

Free Sugars and Total Sugars: What Counts?

The NHS limit is for free sugars. These are any sugars added to food or drinks, plus the sugars in honey, syrups, nectars and unsweetened fruit juices, vegetable juices and smoothies. The NHS says sugar found naturally in milk, fruit and vegetables does not count as free sugars, but it is included in the total sugars on a label (NHS, Sugar: the facts).

The sugars figure in our database and on most labels is total sugars. For a fizzy drink or squash, nearly all of it is free sugars, so the teaspoons and the percentage are a close match. For milk, yoghurt or whole fruit, part of the sugars is natural, so the percentage of the limit will look higher than the free sugars you are actually eating. The tool says this on the page and does not try to split the two.

Cutting Down on Sugary Drinks

If a drink uses a big share of your limit, you can look for a lower sugar option. Our Healthier Food Swaps Finder finds similar foods with less sugar, and our Food Nutrition Comparison Tool puts two drinks side by side. The Traffic Light Label Checker shows whether a drink is red, amber or green for sugars under the UK front-of-pack criteria, and our guide to low sugar swaps covers drinks, cereals and sauces.

What This Tool Does Not Do

It shows sugars as teaspoons and compares them with the NHS limit. It does not say how much sugar you should eat, it does not count the sugar you add yourself at home, and it is not medical or dietary advice. If you have diabetes or another health condition, speak to your doctor, your diabetes team or a registered dietitian about sugar.

Sources

• NHS, Sugar: the facts

Food values come from our own food database, per 100g. Read how the data is sourced on our Methodology page. The 4g teaspoon is a rounded figure used for the pictures.