If It's a Non-Sugar Sweetener, Is It Better for You?

Updated July 2026

So there's another zero-calorie sweetener at your local co-op, and the name even sounds healthy — something ending in "ia." It's got to be better than sugar, right? Not really.

Are non-sugar sweeteners better for you than sugar?

For weight and long-term health, no — and the world's largest health body now says so outright. In 2023 the WHO advised against using non-sugar sweeteners to control weight or lower disease risk, after a review found they don't reduce body fat over the long run and may actually raise the risk of type 2 diabetes, heart disease, and early death.

What's actually in "natural" sweeteners like stevia and Truvia?

Less of the plant than the label implies. Truvia was developed through a partnership between Cargill and Coca-Cola, and although it presents itself as stevia-based, it's mostly erythritol — a sugar alcohol — plus rebaudioside A (one isolated stevia compound) and unspecified "natural flavors." Stevia in the Raw doesn't contain whole stevia leaves either. That matters, because real stevia leaves carry two sweet compounds, stevioside and rebaudioside A, and only stevioside is linked to benefits like lower blood sugar and blood pressure. Both products use purified rebaudioside A alone, so neither offers any special health benefit beyond calorie control.

How do artificial sweeteners raise your diabetes risk?

By disrupting the gut. Non-nutritive sweeteners can change the gut's microbiome, blunting the release of GLP-1, the hormone that keeps blood sugar in check after a meal. Blunt GLP-1 and blood sugar climbs higher after you eat; bombard your cells with that surplus often enough and you eventually exhaust the pancreas. It's why people who use artificial sweeteners develop type 2 diabetes at the same rate as heavy sugar users.

Why is added sugar a problem too?

Because it overwhelms the same system from the other side. Added sugars — even honey — may not interfere with GLP-1, but they flood it. Circulating blood sugar triggers insulin, and insulin shifts the body into storage mode, which means churning out the storage form of cholesterol: LDL, the kind you don't want.

What about allulose and other "rare sugars"?

Same story, new label loophole. Allulose is a "rare sugar" found in tiny amounts in figs, raisins, and jackfruit; it tastes like table sugar but barely moves blood sugar or calories. The FDA has even ruled it doesn't have to be counted under Total or Added Sugars on the label, just as it has never counted aspartame, saccharin, sucralose, or stevia. So a product can be full of sweeteners and still look clean on paper. Sounds too good to be true. And it probably is. Allulose is rare in nature for a reason: we're wired to encounter it seldom, not by the spoonful. Even if it proves gentler than sugar, you know what's better and needs no FDA review? An actual fig… or a few raisins.

Is any sweetener actually fine?

Yes — the sugar packaged inside whole fruits and vegetables. No company has out-packaged nature: an orange carries just enough pith and fiber to blunt its own sugar as you digest it. Squeeze it into juice and that balance disappears.

At Step One Foods we lean on exactly that principle — our sweetness comes from whole-food ingredients wrapped in fiber and complex grains, with as little added as possible, which is why our foods often taste less sweet than what's on the shelf. It's that attention to composition that let us measurably improve health in testing. If it tastes too sweet to be true, it probably is.

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