On current U.S. nutrition labels, you don’t need to calculate added sugar from total sugar. The label lists both numbers separately. Total sugars appears first, and directly beneath it you’ll see “Includes X g Added Sugars” with its own line. To find naturally occurring sugar, subtract the added sugars from the total sugars. If a yogurt has 15 g total sugars and 7 g added sugars, it contains 8 g of naturally occurring sugar from the milk itself.
That said, the math gets trickier when you’re dealing with older labels, products from outside the U.S., or foods without clear added sugar lines. Here’s how to handle each situation.
How the Label Actually Works
The FDA requires all packaged foods to show both total sugars and added sugars on the Nutrition Facts panel. The word “Includes” before the added sugars number tells you that added sugars are a subset of total sugars, not a separate category stacked on top. So the basic formula is:
Naturally occurring sugar = Total Sugars − Added Sugars
Added sugars cover anything introduced during processing: table sugar, high fructose corn syrup, honey, syrups, and concentrated fruit or vegetable juices used as sweeteners. They do not include the sugars naturally found in whole fruit, vegetables, or milk. The daily value listed on the label is based on a limit of 50 grams of added sugar per day for a 2,000-calorie diet.
When the Label Doesn’t Show Added Sugars
Some products still carry older-format labels, and imported foods often skip the added sugars line entirely. In these cases, you have to estimate. The approach is to figure out how much sugar the food would contain naturally (with zero sweeteners added), then subtract that baseline from the total sugar number on the label.
For dairy products, research across multiple countries puts the average natural sugar content at about 5.4 g per 100 mL of plain milk and 6.7 g per 100 g of plain yogurt. A standard 250 mL glass of milk naturally contains roughly 13.5 g of sugar (all lactose), while a 150 g serving of plain yogurt contains about 10 g. If your flavored yogurt lists 22 g of total sugar per 150 g serving, you can estimate around 12 g of that is added sugar.
For fruit-based products, a medium apple has about 19 g of natural sugar and a medium banana about 14 g. Applesauce with no sugar added will hover near those natural levels per equivalent serving. If the label shows significantly more, the difference is likely added sugar. Fresh fruit juice is harder to parse because even 100% juice is naturally high in sugar, typically 20 to 26 g per cup.
Check the Ingredient List
When you can’t find an added sugars line, the ingredient list is your best backup tool. Ingredients are listed by weight, so if a form of sugar appears in the first three or four ingredients, the product contains a significant amount of added sugar. The challenge is that sugar goes by dozens of names. Common ones to watch for:
- Syrups: corn syrup, high fructose corn syrup, malt syrup, cane syrup
- “-ose” sugars: sucrose, dextrose, fructose, glucose, maltose
- Unrefined sweeteners: honey, molasses, agave, turbinado, raw sugar
- Juice-based: fruit juice concentrates (apple, grape, pear), fruit nectars
- Other names: evaporated cane juice, barley malt, invert sugar, corn sweetener
If multiple sugar aliases appear scattered throughout the ingredient list, the manufacturer may have split sweeteners across several types so that no single one lands near the top. That’s a sign the total added sugar content is higher than any one ingredient would suggest.
Single-Ingredient Sugars Are Labeled Differently
Products like a bag of table sugar, a bottle of maple syrup, or a jar of honey are essentially 100% sugar. The FDA handles these with a special rule: they list the percent daily value for added sugars, but may put the actual gram amount in a footnote rather than on the main label. For these products, you don’t need to calculate anything. The entire sugar content is added sugar when you use it in your food.
Converting Grams to Teaspoons
Grams can be hard to visualize. The standard conversion is 4 grams of sugar per teaspoon. So if a granola bar lists 12 g of added sugars, that’s 3 teaspoons of sugar added during manufacturing. A can of soda with 39 g of added sugar contains nearly 10 teaspoons.
This conversion makes daily limits easier to track. The American Heart Association recommends no more than 36 grams (9 teaspoons) of added sugar per day for men and 25 grams (6 teaspoons) for women. Those limits are stricter than the FDA’s 50-gram daily value printed on the label, so the percent daily value on your food may understate the issue relative to heart-health guidelines.
Putting It Into Practice
Here’s a real-world example using the FDA’s own yogurt illustration. A sweetened yogurt label reads: Total Sugars 15 g, Includes 7 g Added Sugars (14% DV). That tells you 7 g came from sweeteners and 8 g came from the lactose naturally present in milk. The 14% daily value is based on the FDA’s 50 g limit. Against the AHA’s 25 g limit for women, that same 7 g would represent 28% of the daily budget.
For a product without the added sugars line, say an imported flavored milk listing 20 g total sugars per 250 mL serving, you’d estimate about 13 to 14 g of natural lactose for that serving size. The remaining 6 to 7 g is likely added sugar. It’s an estimate, not an exact number, but it gets you close enough to make informed choices at the grocery store.
Each gram of sugar, whether natural or added, provides 4 calories. So 7 g of added sugar adds 28 calories to that yogurt. On its own that’s modest, but added sugars accumulate quickly across a full day of packaged foods, flavored drinks, sauces, and snacks.