If you’re using nicotine pouches, it can be good to understand what they contain. One of the questions that may arise is ” Do nicotine pouches have carbs?”.
In order to answer this questions, we need to understand what nicotine pouches contain.
First off, nicotine pouches are meant to be placed under the upper lip and absolutely not be consumed orally. The primary ingredient in nicotine pouches that make up most of its content is plant fiber. Plant fiber can not be absorbed by the body when consumed but since nicotine pouches are not meant to be absorbed, it’s frankly not a question worth discussing anyway. In Mayo Clinic’s own words: ”Dietary fiber, also known as roughage or bulk, includes the parts of plant foods your body can’t digest or absorb. Unlike other food components, such as fats, proteins or carbohydrates — which your body breaks down and absorbs — fiber isn’t digested by your body.”.
Nicotine pouches ingredients
All nicotine pouches on the market contain similar ingredients. The primary variations is related the manufacturing methods, flavorings, and nicotine strength.
For reference, let’s therefore have a closer look at the ingredients list of ZYN Citrus slim:
Bulking Agents (E 965, E 460, E 414), Acidity Regulator (E 500), Stabiliser (E 463), Flavourings, Nicotine, Sweetener (E 950).
Do nicotine pouches have carbs?
As you can see, the primary ingredients in a nicotine is plant fiber, sweetener, and nicotine. Since we cannot absorb plant fiber, the question is whether there are any carbs in sweetener, flavorings, and nicotine.
First off, there are no calories in nicotine (source) so the nicotine can be crossed off the list.
Second, are there any carbs in the sweetener? To cite the University of California (Diabetes education online) ”Artificial sweeteners, or non-nutritive sweeteners offer the sweet taste of sugar, but have no carbohydrates or calories. Artificial sweeteners do not raise blood sugar levels.”. So the sweetener in nicotine pouches can be crossed off the list as potentially containing carbs.
Lastly, we have the flavorings. Different nicotine pouches may use different types of flavoring, but they all use food-grade flavorings, most often in the form of different
Ingredients in nicotine pouches and their carbohydrates
Let’s summarize the ingredients in ZYN Citrus Slim and their carbohydrates. Do note that there may be minor variations in the contents between different brands but overall, the ingredients are mostly the same:
- Bulking Agents (E 965, E 460, E 414): May contain a low amount of carbs.
- Acidity Regulator (E 500): 0g carbohydrates
- Stabiliser (E 463): 0g carbs
- Flavourings: 9g carbs
- Nicotine: 0g carbs
- Sweetener (E 950): 0 carbs
As you can see, the only form of carbohydrates that can be found in nicotine pouches comes from the bulking agent. With that said, some nicotine pouches may contain some levels of carbohydrates but due to the small portions paired with the extremely low levels of bulking agents used for nicotine pouches, we are talking about virtually insignificant levels of carbs that are barely noticeable. ZYN themselves state that “One ZYN pouch contains less than 1% of the daily recommended carbohydrate allowance”. In practice, this translates to less than one calorie per pouch.
In the case that a certain nicotine pouch contains traces of carbs, they are extremely low and it could be debated whether or not it is possible to say that they actually contain carbs.
