Daily Sugar Intake Calculator
How much added sugar per day is too much?
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Daily Sugar Intake Calculator
The World Health Organization recommends keeping free sugars below 10% of your daily energy, and ideally under 5% for extra health benefits. This calculator turns your daily calorie intake into a maximum free-sugar amount in both grams and teaspoons, at the 10% limit and the stricter 5% target. Free sugars include sugar added to foods and drinks plus the sugars in honey, syrups and fruit juice — not the natural sugars in whole fruit, vegetables and milk.
Free sugars = sugars added to food plus those in honey, syrups and fruit juice. Naturally occurring sugars in whole fruit, vegetables and milk are not counted.
How to use this sugar calculator
Enter your total daily calories — the number you aim to eat in a day, such as 2,000 — and press calculate. Your free-sugar cap appears instantly in grams and teaspoons, with no sign-up. The tool splits the number two ways: the WHO 10%-of-energy limit and the stricter 5% ideal, using four calories per gram of sugar and about four grams per teaspoon, so you can see both a sensible ceiling and a tighter target.
How to read your result
The figure is a daily cap for free or added sugars, not the natural sugar in whole fruit, vegetables or plain milk — those are not counted. Since roughly four grams of sugar equals one teaspoon, a 25 g cap is about six teaspoons, and 50 g is about twelve. Use the 10% number as your everyday limit and the 5% number as a goal to aim for. A single can of cola can already reach the 5% line.
The science behind the numbers
The World Health Organization advises keeping free sugars under 10% of daily energy, and ideally under 5%, to lower the risk of weight gain and tooth decay. The American Heart Association is stricter still, suggesting about 25 g a day for women and 36 g for men. Most added sugar is not sprinkled on at the table — it hides in soft drinks, juices, sauces, breakfast cereals, flavoured yoghurt and snacks, which is why totals add up faster than people expect.
Limits and practical tips
Treat the result as a guide, not a strict rule, and read labels: look for the “added sugars” line and the many aliases — syrups, fruit-juice concentrate and the -ose words such as glucose, fructose, dextrose and maltose. Sugary drinks are the single biggest source for most people, so swapping them for water or unsweetened options usually has the largest effect. Pair this with CaloNote’s Sodium Intake, Fiber Intake and Net Carbs calculators, and log your meals in the CaloNote app to see sugar add up over a day.
Frequently Asked Questions
- What does the daily sugar intake calculator show?
- It shows your recommended maximum free sugar per day in grams and teaspoons, based on your calorie intake. Using the WHO guidelines, it translates a percentage of your energy into an easy-to-track sugar limit for daily eating.
- How do I calculate my daily sugar limit?
- Enter your daily calorie intake, and the calculator applies the WHO guidelines to cap free sugars at 10% of calories, with an ideal target of 5%. It then converts those calories into grams and teaspoons of sugar.
- How much sugar per day is recommended?
- The WHO recommends keeping free sugars under 10% of total calories, and ideally below 5%. For a 2,000-calorie diet, the 10% limit is about 50 grams, roughly 12 teaspoons, while the 5% target is around 25 grams.