How Much Sugar is in YOUR Bottled Iced Tea?

What drink could be simpler or healthier than iced tea – except maybe water? Tea can keep you mentally alert and known for its crisp, refreshing taste. The antioxidants in tea may boost your immune system, improve digestion, and help manage heart disease and diabetes and many other chronic conditions.

But all ready-to-drink teas are not created equal. Added sugar – even in the form of fruit juice or honey – can turn simple bottled tea into a high-sugar, high-calorie beverage equal to those sugary sodas many tea drinkers wish to avoid.

However, sweet teas can be irresistible. They liven up black teas and satisfy our craving for sweetness and a crisp, refreshing thirst-quencher.

What’s considered a healthy level of sugar? The American Heart Association recommends no more than 36 grams of added sugars for men daily and 25 grams for women.

What’s in YOUR Tea?

On closer inspection, tea comparisons can be tricky. Bottle sizes vary, for one thing. So if you want to compare sugar content of two different brands, look at the line, “Serving size” on the nutrition panel first.  If they are the same, great. Then look at which has higher grams of sugar. However, if the serving sizes are different, that’s where a bit of mental math comes in. About how much bigger is the serving size compared to the other? For example, if the serving size is 18 ounces for one brand, and 8 ounces for the other, then you know 18 ounces is about double that of 8 ounces. So then take the grams of sugar from the 8-oz. brand and double it. Is it more or less than the grams of sugar of the 18-oz brand?

Another tea variation that has become popular over the years is adding fruit juices to tea, a clever way to make tea taste sweet and fruity without adding sugar. Some teas contain the juice of lemons, peaches, apples, berries, and so on. The idea is probably in part to help cut down on cane sugar, the most common sugar added to bottled teas. Nevertheless, check the nutrition panel because sugar is sugar, no matter the source.

We’re going to limit our comparisons of black teas to those sweetened with natural cane sugar, fruit juices, herbs, and spices. To help you make more informed tea selections, we compared the amount of sugar in five of the leading brands of bottled teas, using the classic black tea variety as our comparison model. So let’s get on with the brand comparisons! 

Pure Leaf

Pure Leaf’s product description says their sweet teas are sweetened with “real sugar.” To accommodate those with a “sweet tooth” of varying levels, Pure Leaf offers a lineup of these black tea based teas: Sweet, Extra Sweet, Lower Sugar, and Organic Black Tea.

The sugar content in Pure Leaf Sweet tea is 42 grams per 18.5-oz. bottle. Their Extra Sweet variety is a whopping 65 grams packed into a 18.5-oz bottle.  The "Subtly Sweet" is 5 grams per 18.5-oz while Organic Lemon & Honeysuckle has 20 grams of sugar and comes in a 14-oz. bottle.

Gold Peak

Gold Peak’s Sweet Black tea sugar content is 48 grams per 18.5-oz bottle. With a hefty dose of sugar, it’s not surprising that Gold Peak also offers a Slightly Sweet version with 24 grams of sugar and a Unsweetened Black, both 18.5-oz. 

Honest

Honest brand's line up of  "Just a Tad Sweet" teas range from 9 to 19 grams of sugar in their 16-oz (glass) or 16.9-oz (PET) bottles.  Their "Just Black" tea has 0 grams sugar per 16-oz and 16.0-oz bottle, but be sure to look at the ingredient list carefully.  Why does "Just Black" tea have lemon juice concentrate and malic acid in it?  

Snapple

Snapple’s Straight Up sounds like it's just tea and water, but beware.  This line up comes in three sweetness levels. Straight Up Sweet contains black tea and 45 grams of sugar while the sister teas, “Sorta Sweet” has 21 grams of sugar and “Unsweetened” with no sugar per 18.5-oz bottle.

Tejava

Our comparisons wouldn’t be complete without mentioning our very own Tejava Tea. No matter what size or flavor Tejava you pick up, there is no sugar, no sweeteners, and no calories.  And no acids like the other brands.

It's no surprise our Original Black Tea has won the Global Tea Championship(TM) nine times in a row. We proudly brew tea leaves sourced from Rainforest Alliance Certified farms and add nothing else -- no preservatives or acids. So all you taste is tea, pure and simple. Our flavored teas add a hint of sweetness, with natural flavors such as peach and lemon, but they are still unsweetened and boldly smooth. Available in 1L, 12oz and 16.9-oz bottles.

You be the judge, but we’re not shy in saying we have the best black tea around, proudly sourced from Java, the Indonesian island where Tejava was inspired.