Kids' Sugar Intake Calculator
How much sugar can a child have per day? Enter your child's age to see the NHS and AHA daily limits in grams and teaspoons — plus real snack examples that actually fit the budget.
0–17 — the guidelines change at ages 2, 4, 7, and 11.
Free sugars = added sugar plus juice, honey, and syrups. Sugar naturally in plain milk and whole fruit doesn't count.
What fits in a 24 g day?
Tap snacks to build a typical day and watch the budget — values are typical label figures.
1 g left for the rest of the day.
- Swap the juice box (200 ml) for water or plain milk — saves ~17 g.
- Swap the flavoured yogurt tube for plain yogurt with mashed berries — saves ~6 g.
Guideline-based estimates for generally healthy children — not medical advice. If your child has diabetes or any condition affected by sugar intake, follow your pediatrician's targets instead. Track your family's days against the limit →
How kids' sugar limits work
Two major bodies publish limits for children, and they draw the lines differently — so this calculator shows both and puts the stricter one first:
- NHS (free sugars): children under 4 should avoid added sugar entirely; ages 4–6 no more than 19 g/day; ages 7–10 no more than 24 g/day; from age 11, the adult limit of 30 g/day.
- American Heart Association (added sugar): under 25 g/day for all children aged 2–18, and none at all under age 2.
Note the crossover: for a 12-year-old the NHS allows 30 g but the AHA caps the whole of childhood at 25 g — so for tweens and teens the AHA number is the safer target, and that's the one the calculator headlines.
Why children's limits are lower than adults'
Sugar guidelines are really energy percentages — the WHO recommends free sugars stay under 10% of daily calories, ideally under 5%. A 5-year-old needs roughly 1,400 kcal a day versus an adult's 2,000, so the same percentage simply lands at fewer grams. Add two child-specific factors: developing teeth (tooth decay is still one of the most common childhood diseases, and it's driven by sugar frequency) and taste calibration — the sweetness level a child gets used to now becomes their "normal" for decades.
The school-lunch sugar trap
A completely ordinary packed lunch — a 200 ml juice box (≈17 g), a flavoured yogurt (a 125 g pot is ≈12 g), and two biscuits (≈8 g) — adds up to about 37 g of free sugars. That's over even a teenager's limit, before breakfast cereal (a bowl of frosted cereal is ≈11 g) or a squirt of ketchup at dinner (≈4 g per tablespoon) enters the picture. The fix usually isn't heroic: swapping the drink alone often halves the day. Our Sugar Swap Finder ranks swaps by exactly how many grams each one saves.
What doesn't count: milk and whole fruit
The lactose in plain milk and the sugars inside intact fruit and vegetables are not free sugars — they come packaged with fibre, water, and nutrients, and no guideline counts them. Juice and smoothies are the exception: pressing fruit frees the sugar, so even "no added sugar" orange juice carries 8–9 g per 100 ml and counts in full. The Fruit Sugar Chart shows how whole fruits compare.
This is not medical advice. These are published population guidelines for generally healthy children. If your child has diabetes or any condition affected by sugar intake, or you're concerned about their diet or weight, talk to your pediatrician or GP — their individual targets come first.
Once you know the number, the useful habit is seeing each day against it — the Sugar Intake Tracker apptakes about thirty seconds a day and works for the whole family.
Frequently asked questions
How much sugar can a child have per day?+
The NHS free-sugar limits are 19 g/day for ages 4–6, 24 g/day for ages 7–10, and 30 g/day from age 11, with under-4s advised to avoid added sugar entirely. The American Heart Association recommends under 25 g/day of added sugar for all children aged 2–18, and none at all under age 2. When the two disagree, the safer approach is to aim for the stricter number.
Do fruit and milk count towards a child's sugar limit?+
No — the sugars naturally present in whole fruit, vegetables, and plain milk don't count towards free- or added-sugar limits. Fruit juice, smoothies, honey, and syrups do count, because the sugar is freed from the fruit's structure and hits the body like added sugar. So a banana is effectively a 0 g snack, while a 200 ml juice box is about 17 g.
How much sugar is in a typical juice box?+
A 200 ml carton of juice contains roughly 17 g of free sugars — about 4 teaspoons. That's nearly the entire 19 g daily limit for a 4–6-year-old in a single lunchbox drink, which is why swapping juice for water or plain milk is usually the single biggest improvement you can make.
Why can't babies and toddlers have added sugar?+
The AHA recommends zero added sugar before age 2, and the NHS extends that advice to all children under 4. Very young children have small calorie needs, so sugary foods crowd out nutrients they actually need, feed early tooth decay, and set taste preferences that make sweet foods the default later. Honey is also unsafe under 12 months for a separate reason (infant botulism risk).
Why are children's sugar limits lower than adults'?+
Sugar guidelines are really percentages of energy intake — the WHO recommends free sugars stay under 10%, ideally 5%, of daily calories. A 5-year-old needs far fewer calories than an adult, so the same percentage lands at fewer grams. Children's teeth are also more vulnerable to decay, and eating habits formed in childhood tend to persist.
Is this calculator medical advice?+
No — it applies published population guidelines (NHS and AHA) for generally healthy children and presents them as estimates. If your child has diabetes, is under a dietitian's care, or has any condition affected by sugar intake, your pediatrician's or clinician's individual targets override anything a general calculator shows.
Now track it daily
Knowing the number is step one — seeing it every day is what changes it. Sugar Intake Tracker, our iOS app in development, logs added sugar from a photo of your food: snap it, confirm the AI estimate, done.
Meet the appAI estimate · You confirm · Your log stays on your device