Going through keto at the beginning is tough, especially when you don’t know where to get your sweet fix. It’s hard enough to give up sugar, but not knowing which sugar alternatives are keto-friendly can be even more daunting. I know that when I started the keto diet, I was completely in the dark.

After years of research, I found out a lot about the different types of sugar substitutes out there, and figured out exactly which ones are best for maintaining a state of ketosis.

In this article, I’ll do a deep dive on sorbitol, and will explain just how keto-friendly it is.

What Is Sorbitol?

Sorbitol is characterized as a sugar alcohol, which is essentially just a poorly digestible carbohydrate that is either naturally found in fruits or is semi-artificially produced and added as a low calorie sweetener alternative to a variety of pre-packaged foods and drinks. At a chemical level, sorbitol is fairly similar to fructose and mannitol, but has different effects when consumed.

Sorbitol also may be referred to in ingredient lists as sorbit or glucitol.

Sorbitol has been approved by the FDA, contains about a third of the calories of table sugar, and is about 60% as sweet.

It’s also widely used within keto and low carb diets, because as a sugar alcohol it isn’t digested by the body in the same way that sugar is, so it doesn’t contribute to your net carb counts in the same way.

There are no formal recommendations for how to consume sorbitol, but it’s often mixed into prepackaged foods and is harder to find in stores on its own.

Benefits of Sorbitol?

• Prevents tooth decay

Sorbitol, like other sugar alcohols, has no adverse effects on our oral health, which makes it a great option as a table sugar replacement to help avoid the corrosive effects you’ll get from normal sugar.

Replacing sugar with sorbitol or other types of sugar alcohols can help drastically improve the quality of your teeth, preventing and improving conditions like tooth decay, gum disease (gingivitis), plaque build up, and cavity growth.

• Helps reduce calories

As you’ll often fine with most types of low carb, low calorie, and low glycemic sugar substitutes, sorbitol can be an effective tool to help promote weight loss when used consistently in place of sugar.

Sorbitol has roughly only half of the calories per serving compared to normal table sugar (2.6 kcal per gram compared to sugar’s range of 4-6 kcal per gram). This means that by replacing sugar with it, you’re effectively cutting one key ingredients calories in half in a lot of your meals and snacks, which can really add up in the long run if you’re shooting for a caloric deficit to help promote weight loss.

In fact, studies have shown that even just small changes in caloric deficits can contribute to a large amount of weight loss over time, and because sorbitol can help a lot of formerly sugar-dependent people start to cut down on calories and carbohydrates, it can contribute to activating the natural weight loss benefits of ketosis as well.

• Lowers blood glucose levels

Another big benefit that sorbitol and a lot of other sugar alcohols share is that it is only partially digested by the body’s enzymes once it is eaten, which characterizes it as a low digestible carbohydrate.

This means that eating sorbitol instead of glucose or table sugar can leads to lower levels of blood glucose and insulin, and help to curb the increase in these levels after eating other types of foods.

By comparing the glycemic response of sorbitol with sugar and glucose, we can see that sorbitol has a very low glycemic index value of 9. Glucose on the other hand tends to yield a glycemic index value of 100, and table sugar generally has a glycemic index value of 68.

Other sugar alcohols are a little better in this department, with isomalt only having a glycemic index value of two for example, but sorbitol is still a great safe bet when compared to sugar.

The low glycemic index value makes sorbitol a great option for both those who struggle with diabetes and need to keep their insulin in check, as well as for those trying to maintain a healthy state of ketosis by not rapidly fluctuating their blood sugar levels.

• Doesn’t contribute to net carbs

As a sugar alcohol, sorbitol’s possibly most impactful benefit when it comes to keto is its ability to behave like fiber when being digested. Sorbitol and other sugar alcohols do have some amounts of carbs, but when calculating your net carbs for keto, they actually can also be subtracted from total carbs just like fiber because of the way our digestive enzymes treat them.

Side Effects of Sorbitol

• Digestion issues

Unfortunately like a lot of sugar substitutes, if eaten in too large of quantities, sorbitol can result in indigestion, nausea, and even diarrhea. These effects vary from person to person, and generally should be looked out for if you already have a digestion problem such as irritable bowel syndrome.

These effects take place largely because of the fact that sorbitol and other sugar alcohols are known to attract water from the intestine wall, which can then  cause diarrhea when consumed in large amounts via osmosis.

On average, most healthy people can handle up to 50 grams of sorbitol per day, so I don’t think it’s something you’ll have to necessarily be concerned about if you’re already sticking to low total carb and low calorie amounts for the keto diet.

• Potential allergies

Some people are particularly susceptible to sugar alcohol allergies, including sorbitol. If you already know that you’re allergic to honey, certain types of fruit, or other sugar alcohols like erythritol, xylitol, or isomalt, you may want to talk to your doctor before trying out sorbitol as a sugar replacement.

The symptoms of allergic reactions to sorbitol can also vary pretty widely, resulting in milder effects like sneezing and a runny nose to more difficult effects like hives, rashes, and trouble breathing.

• Can negatively interact with prescription medications

While sorbitol doesn’t have a lot of negative interactions with commonly prescribed medications, it still can have negative effects when combined with certain types of chemical compounds that may appear in rarer types of prescription meds. If you’re on any prescription medications, you should talk to your doctor to see if sorbitol is still safe to consume.

Sorbitol has been known to interact poorly with medications containing sodium polystyrene sulfonate, dichlorphenamide, and deflazacort.

• Can cause issues for those with Fructose Malabsorption

Individuals that already struggle with fructose malabsorption often also have a sorbitol malabsorption without even realizing it. If those with sorbitol malabsorption then consume sorbitol, it can trigger the same symptoms as fructose malabsorption, including: abdominal bloating, pain or cramps, loose stools, insomnia, diarrhea resulting in unintentional weight loss (beyond healthy and recommended amounts) constipation, excessive burping as well as headaches.

Is Sorbitol Keto-Friendly?

Because of its low carb, low calorie, and low glycemic index value, sorbitol is definitely a keto-friendly option as far as alternatives to sugars go. Sorbitol, like a lot of other sugar alcohols is a great way to cut down your total net carb counts while still helping fight off sugar cravings by sweetening your dishes and snacks.

Sorbitol can be hard to find however, so I’ve compared some other sugar alternatives that are more common, to see how they stack up so you know what’s safe when traversing the keto diet.

Sorbitol vs Other Alternative Sweeteners

• Monk Fruit

Monk fruit is probably my favorite option out of all alternative sweeteners that are good to eat on the keto diet.

As a substitute, it is roughly 100 to 250 times sweeter than table sugar, meaning just a little can really go a long way, especially when compared to something like sorbitol, which only has about 60% of the sweetness of sugar.

Another great aspect about monk fruit is that it’s zero carb, so you can use as much of it as you need compared to other sugar alcohols that might raise your net carb count if they’re mixed with other materials and if you’re not paying close enough attention.

• Sucralose

Sucralose, which is more frequently referred to as Splenda by most manufacturers and restaurants, is also fairly common when it comes to alternative types of sweeteners, but unfortunately it isn’t always the best option for maintaining a state of ketosis.

When used as a sweetener by itself, sucralose has zero calories and zero glycemic index, which does make it a pretty great keto-friendly option.

However more commonly but when it is sold as a powder (as in splenda packets) or mixed into some prepackaged foods, it likely will be mixed with other sweeteners that can easily add to your overall carb counts and even contribute to spikes in your blood glucose levels.

• Maltitol

Maltitol is definitely one sugar alternative that I think should be avoided whenever possible if you’re sticking to a keto diet.

While maltitol may have a slightly lower glycemic index value than your average table sugar, it’s still derived from malt starch, and is technically classified as a carbohydrate – so by using it in your keto cooking, it will still likely surge up your net carb counts fairly quickly. Furthermore, it still has a recorded affect on blood sugar levels too, so I would just avoid it wherever possible.

• Maltodextrin

Maltodextrin’s another one of those non-sugar sweeteners that you’re really just better off avoiding when trying to stick to a keto diet.

Maltodextrin is perfectly fine to eat in moderation, and admittedly it can be hard to avoid with a lot of sugar-free products containing it. However, it’s still important to know that maltodextrin also has both a high sugar content and high glycemic index value, which means that it can pretty easily contribute to net carbs and has a lot of potential to spike your blood glucose level – both very negative affects when trying to maintain a state of ketosis.

• Allulose

Allulose is technically characterized as a monosaccharaide, which is a rare type of natural sugar.

As a naturally occurring substance, it is completely natural, and is usually found in dried fruits such as raisins, jackfruit, and figs, but really only in trace amounts.

When allulose is produced for human consumption, it is typically processed into an extract, so that it can be used as an effective substitute for sugar.

Similar to sorbitol, allulose has roughly 60-70% of the sweetness of sugar, and does have some slight amounts of carbohydrates per serving.

• Xylitol

Xylitol, like sorbitol is another type of sugar alcohol that is often used by a lot of keto dieters.

Typically, xylitol is great to use on the keto diet in moderation, but when it comes to sugar alcohols I’m more inclined to recommend erythritol over xylitol or sorbitol if you’re going to frequently use it, and especially if you plan to use it in large quantities for certain recipes

Another drawback of xylitol is that it doesn’t come with as many of the benefits that other sugar alcohols have, and it does come with some discouraging side effects like gastrointestinal problems, and can potentially impede weight loss over time.

• Erythritol

Erythritol, like sorbitol is a fairly popular keto-friendly sugar alcohol.

One big way that erythritol is different that other types of sugar alcohols is that it occurs in nature more frequently, and has a much lower glycemic index value (similar to that of sorbitol).

Erythritol also has far fewer calories that other sweetener alternatives, which makes it much more effective as a sugar replacement for those who want to use it in bulk for certain baking recipes.

• Agave Nectar

While a lot of people generally think that agave nectar is a pretty great sugar substitute, it’s actually quite bad for you. The biggest benefit of agave nectar is that it is low glycemic because it doesn’t contain any glucose, but it makes up for that with incredibly high levels of fructans, which can converted into fructose in the body. This essentially behaves like the carbs from sugar in the digestive system, and can lead to a considerable amount of weight gain pretty quickly if eaten in abundance.