"Sugar free", "no added sugar", "low sugar": three labels that sound alike but mean very different things

Three labels, three different promises

Every country has its own labeling rules. In Vietnam, the Ministry of Health is in charge. To keep things easy to picture, we'll use the European Union (EU) thresholds, a set of rules many places look to:

The table makes it clear: "sugar free" is about the total amount of sugar in the product. "No added sugar" is about what the manufacturer did. They didn't add any, but the sugar already in the ingredients is still all there.

"No added sugar" but still has sugar: nobody's lying

Back to that carton of nut milk. Oats, rice, lotus seeds and fruit all contain natural sugars, or starch that turns into sugar during processing.

Some more familiar examples:

• Unsweetened fresh milk still has about 4 to 5g of sugars per 100ml. That's milk sugar (lactose).
• 100% fruit juice, no added sugar still has the fruit's own sugar. One glass can match a glass of soda.
• Unsweetened oat milk still has carbs from the oats.

EU rules also require these products to add the line "contains naturally occurring sugars". A small detail, but an honest one.

Even more interesting: under EU rules, if a manufacturer adds concentrated fruit juice to sweeten a product, they are not allowed to say "no added sugars". Because in that case the juice concentrate is doing sugar's job.

Sugar goes by a dozen names

The ingredients list doesn't always say "sugar" outright. Here are other names worth recognizing:

1. Glucose syrup, corn syrup, fructose syrup
2. Malt syrup, maltose
3. Dextrose
4. Invert sugar
5. Honey, molasses, coconut nectar
6. Concentrated fruit juice
7. Maltodextrin. Technically this is chopped-up starch, not sugar. But it makes blood sugar rise very quickly.

Tip: ingredients are listed by weight, largest first. If one of the names above is in first or second place, the product gets most of its sweetness from sugar.

One more tip: some products split sugar into several smaller names. Each one sits in the middle of the list, but together they add up to quite a lot.

The "sugars" line and the "carbs" line on the nutrition panel

Many people only look at the "Sugars" line. But the Carbohydrate (carb) line tells a fuller story.

Carbs include starch, sugar and fiber. A pack of biscuits labeled "sugar free" can still be high in carbs from wheat flour. And your body still breaks starch down into glucose, just a bit more slowly.

There's one more group: sugar alcohols, such as sorbitol, maltitol, xylitol and erythritol. They usually aren't counted in the "Sugars" line. In Europe, they get their own line called polyols.

So when you see "sugar free", look at two more places: the carb line and the ingredients list.

Read a label in 15 seconds

Next time you're at the supermarket, try these three steps:

1. Look at sugars per 100g. Under 5g is low, over 15g is fairly high. Divide by 4 to convert to teaspoons.
2. Read the first 3 ingredients. Any names from the "other names for sugar" list?
3. Compare with the original. "Low sugar" or "reduced sugar" only means something next to the regular version from the same brand.

Frequently asked questions