Beverages sweetened with high-fructose corn syrup have about 60.6% fructose and 40.4% glucose by weight, making fructose 50% more abundant than glucose. This differs from table sugar, which contains...

Pro

Against

Mechanism

Synthesis from 1 study

How it works

High-fructose corn syrup is made by turning some of the corn sugar into more fructose, so it ends up with half again as much fructose as glucose. Table sugar, by contrast, has exactly the same amount of each.

Most probable mechanism

In Simple Terms

High-fructose corn syrup is made by converting some of the glucose in corn starch into fructose, resulting in a mixture where there is 50% more fructose than glucose. This is different from table sugar, which is made of equal parts fructose and glucose bonded together.

Causal chain

Corn starch is processed to break down into glucose molecules, then a portion of those glucose molecules is enzymatically converted into fructose.

Verified by multiple studies

Evidence from Studies

Supporting (1)

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Fructose content in popular beverages made with and without high-fructose corn syrup.

Cross-Sectional Study

2014 Jul-Aug

Contradicting (0)

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No contradicting evidence found

Gold Standard Evidence Needed

According to GRADE and EBM methodology, here is what ideal scientific evidence would look like to definitively prove or disprove this specific claim, ordered from strongest to weakest evidence.

Source Study

Fructose content in popular beverages made with and without high-fructose corn syrup.

Score: 33

DOI: 10.1016/j.nut.2014.04.003

Similar Assertions

Beverages sweetened with high-fructose corn syrup contain more fructose relative to glucose than table sugar does, and because dietary surveys treat all added sugars as if they were table sugar, they may not accurately capture how much fructose people are consuming.

90%

When scientists measure the sugar in drinks sweetened with high-fructose corn syrup using three different lab methods, they get the same results for the ratio of fructose to glucose, showing the measurements are consistent.

87%

Some sweetened drinks and fruit juices have more unbound fructose sugar than table sugar, which is made of fructose and glucose molecules stuck together.

86%

Lab studies that give people pure fructose or pure glucose don’t reflect what people actually eat — we usually consume sugar as table sugar or corn syrup, which are mixtures, so those lab results don’t apply to real life.

73%

Fruit juices made purely from fruit can have up to 67% of their sugar as fructose, which is about twice as much as glucose, making their sugar profile similar to that of sodas sweetened with high-fructose corn syrup.

72%