Which Foods Are the Most Ultraprocessed? New System Ranks Them
NEWS | 28 March 2025
Most U.S. grocery stores seem to offer endless options in their aisles, which are full of cereals, pastas and baked goods available in hundreds of shapes and flavors. But a closer look at these foods’ ingredient lists shows that in some ways, there’s not much choice at all. A recent study found that most of the products on our grocery shelves have one big thing in common: they’re highly processed. Grocery stores, not fast-food outlets or convenience stores, are the primary source of ultraprocessed foods in U.S. diets. Such foods are made using industrial processes and ingredients that aren’t found at home. To measure just how prevalent these foods are on shelves, researchers used a machine-learning algorithm to analyze more than 50,000 items at three major chain stores that sell groceries in the U.S.: Whole Foods, Walmart and Target. The results, published in Nature Food, revealed that highly processed options dominated the inventory at all three retailers. But Walmart and Target stocked a higher proportion than Whole Foods, which offered a slightly greater variety of minimally processed choices. Having a wide array of brands available gives shoppers the “illusion of choice,” says study co-author Giulia Menichetti, a statistical and computational physicist at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School. Despite the variety in their packaging, most ultraprocessed foods share a common formula: they’re high in sugar, salt and oil, and they typically contain additives that enhance their flavor, color and shelf life. Certain industrial processes also alter the texture of the raw ingredients, and these steps can strip foods of their nutrients. On supporting science journalism If you're enjoying this article, consider supporting our award-winning journalism by subscribing. By purchasing a subscription you are helping to ensure the future of impactful stories about the discoveries and ideas shaping our world today. Diets high in ultraprocessed foods have been linked to poor health, including higher risks of obesity, type 2 diabetes and heart disease. Not all these foods are equally bad for you, however. A 2024 study by researchers at the Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health found that diets high in sugary drinks and processed meats were associated with a higher risk of cardiovascular disease than diets low in these foods, but the opposite was true for ultraprocessed breads, cereals, yogurts and dairy desserts. But even though such foods can be part of a healthy diet, the new findings show that options within those categories are sometimes limited. Among breads, for example, consumer choices are often dominated by shelf-stable varieties that contain extra sugar and other additives instead of whole wheat bread that is minimally processed without additives. Blaming health risks exclusively on the ultraprocessing of foods might oversimplify the problem, says Maya Vadiveloo, an associate professor of nutrition at the University of Rhode Island and chair of the American Heart Association’s lifestyle nutrition committee. Diets high in ultraprocessed foods are often dominated by items loaded with saturated fats, salt and added sugar, Vadiveloo says, which suggests some harm might come from poor nutrient balance rather than processing alone. But some research suggests that ultraprocessed foods—which often lack protein and are designed to be easy to eat and highly palatable—can lead to overconsumption and corresponding weight gain, too. While researchers learn more about the specific harms of ultraprocessed foods, the challenge for consumers lies in the limited alternatives available. In some categories, consumers face little to no real choice, according to the Nature Food study. Certain products—such as chips, bread and pizza—were almost universally ultraprocessed across the three stores. Other categories such as cereals, milk and snack bars offered more options that ranged from minimally processed to highly processed. But the choices depend on where you shop. The cereals at Whole Foods, for example, had a wider range of processing and contained relatively less sugar and fewer flavor additives compared with the other two chains’ cereals, which were far more likely to contain corn syrup. Most ultraprocessed foods are high in sugar, salt and oil, with additives for flavor, color and shelf life. Affordability complicates the picture. Menichetti and her colleagues found that generally, as the level of processing increased, the price per calorie decreased—a trend that was most pronounced in soups, cakes, macaroni and cheese, and ice cream. On average, ultraprocessed foods cost about half as much as their minimally processed counterparts, which reinforces nutritional inequalities, Menichetti says. “This is hitting a specific segment of the population,” she adds. The real proportion of ultraprocessed foods on our shelves could be much, much higher than has been reported, says Barry Popkin, a distinguished professor of nutrition at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, who was not involved in the study. He adds that the authors used a “guesstimate” of what foods counted as ultraprocessed, as well as “a sample representing about an eighth of the unique packaged foods in the U.S.” The study’s new scoring method marks a shift from the widely used NOVA classification, which defines ultraprocessed foods as those containing additives or industrial ingredients. The authors’ system, called FPro, goes a step further. It estimates the degree of processing by analyzing a food’s nutrient profile—in other words, it recognizes that “processed” foods exist along a spectrum. The team is now refining the model to predict the specific industrial processes a food undergoes before reaching consumers. Beyond the complexities of scoring processed foods, Popkin offers a simple rule to follow: shop for items around a store’s perimeter as much as your budget allows—“the produce, the fish, the dairy,” he suggests. And although a processing score might distinguish between similar-looking items, less processed doesn’t necessarily mean healthy. A cookie is still a cookie, Vadiveloo says, no matter how it is processed.
Author: Tanya Lewis. Lori Youmshajekian.
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