11 Fruits That Have More Sugar Than Strawberries

Fruits are nature's gift of a perfect snack: deliciously sweet, high in essential vitamins and minerals, and ideally, ready to eat right off the tree (bush, vine, you get the idea). The most popular fruit in the U.S. is the humble strawberry, with an 86% popularity rating on YouGov. Strawberries are tasty indeed, but what are their nutritional benefits? A cup of strawberries provides 85 milligrams of vitamin C (about 94% of your daily needs), and significant amounts of manganese, vitamin B9, and even iron. The sweet fruit also contains 7 grams of sugar per cup. which is probably a lot less than you might think. How does that compare with the amount of sugar that other fruits contain? 

The following list ranks the sugar content of popular fruits by cup (not weight!), and these figures can help you make informed choices about your daily fruit consumption. Eat them out of hand, with yogurt or cereal, or try them in the many fruit-adjacent recipes available on Mashed. 

There is nothing quite like a cool slice of watermelon on a hot summer day. Clocking in at 9 grams of sugar per 1 cup of diced fruit, its sheer juiciness can sometimes dilute its sweetness. If that is the case, there are many delicious ways to season watermelon, including Tajín seasoning or balsamic vinegar. 

Have you ever wondered what actually happens when you eat an apple a day, every day? You get a good dose of fiber, potassium, and vitamins C and K, that's what! A cup of apple slices also contains about 11.4 grams of sugar. The natural sugars in varieties like Cortland, Gala, and Golden Delicious are perfect for sweetening the best homemade applesauce you will ever make.

Did you know that you can (and should try to) cook fruit in the air fryer? Cantaloupe is a relatively hardy fruit well-suited for grilling, and its sugars and flavors are concentrated when heat is applied to the flesh. At 12.5 grams of sugar per 1 cup of cubed cantaloupe, it is a deliciously sweet snack whether cold or hot.

According to "Chopped "host Ted Allen, one of the best ways to eat a peach is out of your hand while standing over the sink. And at 13 grams of sugar per 1 cup of sliced peaches, why wouldn't you? These fuzzy stone fruits are at their height of deliciousness in the summer, so be sure to get them when they are in season.

If apples are not your jam, you can get a similar amount of dietary fiber when you eat pears every day. Sliced pears come in at about 13.4 grams of sugar per 1 cup (and 4 grams of fiber). Their delicate sweetness also makes them perfectly suited for baking, as evidenced by this super simple pear crisp recipe.

Berries are a perfect addition to desserts and breakfast smoothies, and the deliciously petite blueberry is a popular choice for either application. Blueberries contain 15 grams per 1 cup of fruit – a little more than twice the amount of sugar in strawberries. Try them in this blueberry lemon overnight oats recipe for a filling and nutritious breakfast.

Did you know that you can safely eat kiwi skin? That's one less hurdle to getting these vitamin C powerhouses into your body. While they contain 16 grams of sugar per cup of sliced fruit, they are also a significant source of vitamin K. Just don't mix kiwi with dairy, or the latter will split and make for an unpleasant eating experience.

Did you know that one pineapple is not a single fruit? Instead, it comprises many fruits that grow clustered together, known as a multiple or compound fruit. Whether one fruit or many, 1 cup of pineapple chunks contains 16 grams of sugar. If you're worried about the physical irritation sometimes caused by eating this sweet fruit, soaking it in salt water is one way to keep pineapple from hurting your tongue.

Oranges are one of the most perfect sweet snacks. A fruit that comes in its own packaging (aka skin) and is already segmented into bite-sized pieces? Nature could not have come up with a more convenient piece of produce. Orange segments contain 16.6 grams of sugar per cup. If you would prefer to transform them in the kitchen, these are the absolute best recipes to try if you love oranges.

There are many types of bananas beyond the ubiquitous Cavendish yellow variety that you see on grocery store shelves. That said, this default banana contains 17.2 grams of sugar per 1 cup of sliced fruit, which helps provide a quick energy for those looking for a pick-me-up. Bananas also contribute significant levels of potassium and vitamins B6 and C.

No roundup of sugary fruits is complete without the extremely snackable sweet cherry. A cup of unpitted sweet cherries brings 18 grams of sugar to the table, twice the amount that's in 1 cup of sour cherries.  Cherry season comes around in the summer, so you can make these delicious cherry dessert recipes to belatedly celebrate National Cherry Month — which is inexplicably celebrated in February.