A 10-month-old typically needs about 24 to 28 ounces of formula per day, spread across three to four bottles of 6 to 7 ounces each. That total is lower than what your baby was drinking a few months ago, and that’s normal. As solid foods take up a bigger share of your baby’s diet, formula gradually steps into more of a supporting role.
Daily Volume and Feeding Schedule
At 10 months, most babies settle into a pattern of three to four formula feedings spaced about four to six hours apart, with each bottle holding roughly 6 to 7 ounces. That puts total daily intake somewhere in the range of 18 to 28 ounces, depending on how much solid food your baby is eating. Some days your baby will drink more, some days less. Both are fine as long as growth stays on track.
Nighttime feedings are no longer necessary at this age for most babies. Your baby can get all the calories and nutrients they need during daytime hours. If your 10-month-old is still waking for a bottle overnight, it’s usually out of habit or comfort rather than hunger.
Balancing Formula With Solid Foods
By 10 months, your baby should be eating solid foods two to three times a day alongside formula. The CDC recommends offering something to eat or drink about five to six times over 24 hours, which works out to roughly three meals and two to three snacks or bottles. Formula still provides important calories, fat, and nutrients that solid foods alone can’t fully cover at this age, so it shouldn’t be dropped entirely.
The key shift happening right now is that solids are gradually replacing formula volume. If your baby is enthusiastically eating table foods and drinking less formula than they used to, that’s a sign of healthy development, not a problem. On the other hand, if your baby barely touches solids and still wants 32-plus ounces of formula a day, it’s worth focusing on offering more food variety before bottles so they’re hungry enough to explore new textures.
You can also start offering small amounts of water in a cup with meals. For babies between 6 and 12 months, 4 to 8 ounces of water per day is the recommended range. More than that can fill your baby up and displace the formula and food they actually need.
Reading Your Baby’s Hunger Cues
Rigid ounce targets matter less than paying attention to what your baby is telling you. At 10 months, hunger and fullness signals are fairly clear. A hungry baby will reach for food, open their mouth when offered a spoon, or get visibly excited when they see a bottle. A full baby pushes food away, turns their head, closes their mouth, or uses hand motions to signal they’re done.
Letting your baby decide when they’ve had enough, rather than pushing them to finish a set number of ounces, helps them develop healthy self-regulation around eating. If your baby consistently stops at 5 ounces per bottle instead of 7 but is gaining weight normally, that’s their normal.
When Formula Intake Seems Too High
Babies who consistently drink more than 32 ounces of formula per day at this age may be getting more calories than they need. Research from the American Society for Nutrition has found that added sugars in formula are linked to rapid weight gain as early as 9 months, and that primarily formula-fed babies consume nearly double the added sugars of primarily breastfed babies. This doesn’t mean formula is harmful, but it does mean that letting formula dominate the diet well past the point where solids should be increasing can contribute to excessive weight gain.
If your baby seems to want formula constantly and shows little interest in food, try offering solids first when they’re hungriest, then following up with a smaller bottle. This approach naturally shifts the balance without cutting formula abruptly.
Preparing for the Switch to Milk
Your baby is about two months away from the transition to cow’s milk, which happens at 12 months. Formula remains the recommended primary liquid until then. However, starting around 11 months, you can introduce about an ounce of whole milk in a sippy cup once a day to test how your baby tolerates the taste and to practice cup drinking.
If your baby doesn’t take to cow’s milk right away, mixing equal parts whole milk and prepared formula can help bridge the gap. You then gradually shift the ratio toward more milk and less formula over a couple of weeks. The goal is to be fully off bottles and onto sippy or straw cups as soon after the first birthday as possible, since prolonged bottle use can affect dental health and feeding habits.
Now is a great time to start offering formula in a cup at one or two feedings per day. This gets your baby comfortable with the cup before the bigger transition to milk, making that switch easier when the time comes.