Calories don’t equal sugar content

Calories are a unit of energy — they measure how much energy your body can get from eating or drinking something. Sugar, on the other hand, is just one type of ingredient that contains calories. All sugar has calories, but not all calories come from sugar.

Different nutrients give you calories:

Sugar and other carbohydrates: 4 calories per gram

Protein: 4 calories per gram

Fat: 9 calories per gram

Alcohol: 7 calories per gram

This means a food can have:

High calories and no sugar (like olive oil, which is pure fat)

Low calories but high sugar (like fruit, which has natural sugars)

Both high sugar and high calories (like candy or soda)

  • A tablespoon of olive oil has 120 calories and 0g of sugar — the calories come from fat.

    A cup of grapes has 62 calories and 15g of sugar — most calories come from natural sugars.

Calories tell you how much energy food gives you. Sugar is just one source of that energy. That’s why calories and sugar aren’t the same thing — and why a food’s sugar content doesn’t always match its total calories.