Low-Calorie Foods: Top 40 Ranked
Low-calorie foods let you eat a large, satisfying volume of food while staying in a calorie deficit. The list below ranks foods by energy density — calories per 100 g — so the most "filling per calorie" options rise to the top.
Low-Calorie Foods ranked (per 100 g)
Ranked by calories per 100 g, lowest first. Tap any food for full nutrition facts and a serving calculator.
Data: USDA FoodData Central (public domain, CC0). General information only — not medical or dietary advice.
How this ranking was built
Ranked by calories per 100 g, lowest first. The ranking runs over 321 of our 321 foods, which is every food in the database. Nothing here is hand-picked or sponsored: the order is arithmetic on measured values, so it changes only when the data does.
- Top of the list: Pickles at 12 kcal per 100 g.
- 40th place: Mushrooms at 31 kcal — so even the bottom of this table is well inside the useful range.
- Top ten average: 17 kcal per 100 g, against 192 kcal across all 321 ranked foods.
What a real portion actually gives you
Per 100 g is the only fair way to line foods up next to each other, but nobody serves 100 g of everything. Here is the top of the list again at each food's own household serving:
| Food | Typical serving | Calories in that serving | Calories |
|---|---|---|---|
| 🥒 Pickles | 1 spear (40 g) | 5 kcal | 5 kcal |
| 🥜 Almond milk | 100 g | 15 kcal | 15 kcal |
| 🥒 Cucumber | 100 g | 16 kcal | 16 kcal |
| 🍽️ Celery | 100 g | 17 kcal | 17 kcal |
| 🥬 Lettuce | 1 bunch (581 g) | 99 kcal | 99 kcal |
| 🥬 Lettuce | 100 g | 17 kcal | 17 kcal |
Servings are the default portion recorded for each food; every food page has a calculator for any weight you like, in grams, ounces or pounds.
Which food groups dominate this list
The top 40 come from 4 different food groups, which is a faster way to shop than reading forty rows:
- 🥦 Vegetables — 36 entries in the top 40
- 🥤 Beverages — 2 entries in the top 40
- 🍎 Fruits — 1 entry in the top 40
- 🍲 Soups & Sauces — 1 entry in the top 40
Foods that win on two counts
One nutrient never decides whether a food fits your day. These are the other rankings this list overlaps with — where a food appears in both top 40s, it is doing two jobs at once:
| Also in… | Shared | Examples |
|---|---|---|
| 🍚 Low-Fat Foods | 20 of 40 | Beet greens, Eggplant, Fennel |
| 🚫 Low-Sugar Foods | 6 of 40 | Almond milk, Almond milk, Arugula |
| 🧂 Low-Sodium Foods | 2 of 40 | Eggplant, Lettuce |
| 💪 High-Protein Foods | 0 of 40 | No overlap — these two lists pull in opposite directions |
| 🌾 High-Fibre Foods | 0 of 40 | No overlap — these two lists pull in opposite directions |
| 🥚 Low-Carb Foods | 0 of 40 | No overlap — these two lists pull in opposite directions |
| 🥑 High-Calorie Foods | 0 of 40 | No overlap — these two lists pull in opposite directions |
What this ranking does not tell you
- Preparation changes the number. Drying concentrates every nutrient per 100 g; cooking with added water dilutes them. Each row maps to one specific USDA record, and the food name says which.
- Per 100 g is not per serving. A food can top this list and still be something you eat 15 g of, or sit mid-table and be your whole dinner. The portion table above is the corrective.
- Nutrients travel together. The leader here may be high in something you are limiting — check the full row, not just the ranked column.
- Whole foods only. This database holds single ingredients, not branded products. For those, scan the barcode in the free barcode scanner, which reads label values from the manufacturer.
- It is not a shopping mandate. A ranking is a menu of options, not an instruction. The foods you will actually eat repeatedly beat the theoretically optimal ones you won't.
What to do with this list
Energy density is the single biggest lever on how full a meal feels for its calorie cost: water- and fibre-rich foods sit at the top of this list.
Pair a low-calorie base (vegetables, broth-based soups, fruit) with a protein source to build meals that are both light and satiating.
Build your day around a handful of these foods, then log them in the free calorie tracker to see how the totals stack up against the target from your calorie calculator. If you are cutting, the calorie deficit calculator turns that target into a weekly rate of loss; the macro calculator splits it into grams of protein, carbs and fat.
More food lists
- 💪 High-Protein Foods — ranked by grams of protein per 100 g.
- 🌾 High-Fibre Foods — ranked by grams of dietary fibre per 100 g.
- 🥚 Low-Carb Foods — ranked by grams of carbohydrate per 100 g, lowest first.
- 🍚 Low-Fat Foods — ranked by grams of fat per 100 g, lowest first.
- 🥑 High-Calorie Foods — ranked by calories per 100 g, highest first.
- 🚫 Low-Sugar Foods — ranked by grams of total sugars per 100 g, lowest first.
- 🧂 Low-Sodium Foods — ranked by milligrams of sodium per 100 g, lowest first.
Low-Calorie Foods FAQ
What is the number one low-calorie food on this list?
Pickles, cucumber, dill or kosher dill, with 12 kcal per 100 g and 12 calories per 100 g. Ranked by calories per 100 g, lowest first.
How is this low-calorie foods list ranked?
Ranked by calories per 100 g, lowest first. Every value comes from USDA FoodData Central (public domain, CC0) and is shown per 100 g so foods are directly comparable.
Can I log these foods for free?
Yes. Open any food and add it to the free calorie tracker — pick your serving and the calories and macros are logged instantly. No account, no paywall, no ads.
How much should I be eating each day?
Use the calorie calculator for your daily calorie target and the macro calculator to split it into protein, carbs and fat.
Does this list cover every food in the database?
It ranks all 321 of our 321 foods that report calories in their USDA record. The table shows the top 40.
Is the top food the one I should eat most of?
Not necessarily. Ranking is per 100 g, which is the only fair way to compare foods, but you eat portions — and portion size varies enormously (100 g of oil versus 100 g of lettuce). Check the calories column beside the ranked figure, then use the portion table on this page to see what a normal serving actually delivers.
Are these values for raw or cooked food?
Each entry maps to one specific USDA record, and the food name states the preparation — raw, cooked, dried, canned. Cooking removes water, so 100 g of cooked food is a larger amount of the original ingredient and its nutrients per 100 g read higher. Weigh food in the same state as the entry you pick.
Can I combine this list with another one?
Yes, and the overlap is often where the best choices are. 20 of these 40 foods also appear in the top 40 of low-fat foods, starting with Beet greens. See all food lists to cross-reference the rest.
How often do these rankings change?
They are generated from the dataset when the site is built, not maintained by hand, so the list, the individual food pages and the calculators can never disagree with each other. Any change to the underlying USDA values or the set of foods re-ranks the list automatically.