Sorbitol
Sorbitol carries a source-backed screening score of 4/5 and appears in 5,052 indexed US food products. CSPI rates it “Cut Back.”
Source-backed answer
Sorbitol appears in 5,052 catalogued products. CSPI rates it “Cut Back.” No FDA SAFFA status is attached. Those source labels describe the ingredient; they do not establish whether a particular product, dose, allergy, or diet is safe.
- 5,052
- catalogued products
- #208
- usage rank of 247,206
- 1,056
- named brands represented
- 40%
- average depth down ingredient lists
Catalog prevalence comes from Open Food Facts ingredient lists. FDA SAFFA and CSPI Chemical Cuisine labels are shown only when the source record contains them.
Sorbitol: top-decile catalog footprint (#208 of 247,206)
- Usage rank
- #208
- of 247,206 ingredients that appear in at least one catalogued product, listed in more products than 99.9% of them.
- Typical depth in an ingredient list
- 40%
- Mean relative depth 40% across 5,052 parsed labels, slot 12.9 on average. Sorbitol tends to sit in the upper half of the list. Depth is location on the label, not a measured dose.
Computed from parsed product ingredient lists (Open Food Facts). The ranking covers 247,206 ingredients that appear at least once. Neither usage rank nor label depth is a safety clearance.
How to use this page
Audit the co-occurring flags first
68% of the linked products contain at least one separately flagged ingredient, making co-occurrence the dominant follow-up question. That figure does not identify Sorbitol as the trigger. Open records such as 12g protein meal bar, double chocolate; 12Pc Shrimp Temp Kabuki Roll, Shrimp Temp Kabuki; 12pc shrimp tempura kabuki roll wr and inspect which ingredient row carries the caution marker. The 67.3/100 product average is therefore a triage signal for this surrounding formulation set, not an ingredient verdict. Its 40% average label depth helps locate the term when checking the package.
68% of linked products contain a separately flagged ingredient
Processing is unusually concentrated here: Group 4 accounts for 5051 of 5052 NOVA-tagged records. That describes the surrounding products, not the substance. For a useful comparison, hold category and processing level constant, then inspect which named component changes alongside the caution flag; otherwise the product mix will confound the ingredient question.
Next check: open the lowest-scoring linked formulation and locate the exact caution-marked component.
What else is usually in the same product as Sorbitol
Across the 5,052 products on this site that list Sorbitol, these flagged additives appear alongside it most often. The comparison column is how often each one appears across every product with a parsed ingredient list, so the two figures are measured over the same set. Red 40 shows up about 4.5x more often with Sorbitol than in the catalogue at large.
| Additive | Shared products | Share of Sorbitol products | Share of all products |
|---|---|---|---|
| Red 40 | 1,218 | 24.1% | 5.4% |
| Blue 1 | 1,078 | 21.3% | 4.2% |
| Yellow 5 | 985 | 19.5% | 4.8% |
| Titanium Dioxide | 804 | 15.9% | 2.1% |
| Acesulfame Potassium | 790 | 15.6% | 1.8% |
Co-occurrence describes what manufacturers formulate together. It is not a claim that these additives interact, and it carries no regulatory meaning. Counted over products with parsed ingredient lists; Open Food Facts, 2026-09-01.
Function
Sweetener
How do the sampled products compare?
Each point is one of the 16 sampled products listed below: its overall safety score against how many separately flagged ingredients its label carries. Bubble size is the number of ingredient rows the label actually resolved to.
Safety score vs. flagged-ingredient count for products containing Sorbitol
Products Containing Sorbitol
A sample of 16 high-volume listings among the 5,052 indexed products containing Sorbitol:
High-volume peers for Sorbitol beside “Sodium Phosphates”
Sorbitol sits among other busy catalog rows (5,052 products, mean score 67.3/100). Catalog-mass neighbours in view: Sodium Phosphates; Potassium Citrate; Corn Flour. Count peers and score peers are listed separately on purpose.
Similar product count
Nearest other ingredients by Open Food Facts product count (floored at ≥50).
Similar mean product score
Score-axis peers only, mean screening score among ingredients with ≥50 scored products, not a second count list.
Using the Sorbitol evidence
Use the 5,052-product footprint and source labels as a starting point, then inspect the records most relevant to your question.
- Check the listed products containing Sorbitol before treating the aggregate count as a personal conclusion. See listed products
- Move to a second ingredient page and compare registry fields plus catalog mass side by side. Open a peer record
- Read how PlainFoodSafe joins source records before treating a screening label as a personal food or health conclusion. Read the methodology
This page describes published source classifications and product-label coverage. It is not dietary, allergy, or medical advice.
Questions readers ask about Sorbitol
How should I read safety signals when Sorbitol sits in heavily flagged products? ▼
68% of linked products contain at least one separately flagged ingredient, so the first task is locating which row carries the caution marker — not assuming Sorbitol is the trigger. Where a source rating exists, Sorbitol scores 4/5 on this site's screening scale and CSPI lists it as "Cut Back". None of that replaces a product-, dose-, allergy-, or person-specific determination.
Which product shelves show up most often with Sorbitol? ▼
Sorbitol ranks in the top decile by product count (#208 of 247,206), appearing in 5,052 indexed products led by Snacks. The sample list below is a slice of that footprint, not the full universe.
What function does Sorbitol serve when it appears beside other flagged additives? ▼
Sorbitol is recorded as a sweetener in source technical-effect fields. In high co-flag products, that function coexists with other caution-marked components — inspect the full list rather than isolating this role.
Regulatory status: FDA SAFFA (Sorbitol). Safety ratings: CSPI Chemical Cuisine; product presence: Open Food Facts via PlainFoodSafe (September 2026). Figures are computed from those sources, no editor-typed counts. Methodology · State regulations.