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Greek yogurt protein, nonfat and whole

Nonfat Greek yogurt is 10.2 g of protein per 100 g for 59 calories. Whole milk Greek is 9.0 g for 97. The protein barely moves; the calories nearly double. That ratio is the entire reason the product exists.

What straining does

Greek yogurt is regular yogurt with the whey drained off. Removing liquid whey removes water and lactose while leaving the casein behind, which is why the protein concentrates and the carbohydrate falls — 3.6 g of carbs per 100 g in nonfat Greek, against roughly double that in unstrained plain yogurt. It also takes about three times as much milk to make, which is why it costs what it does.

Container sizes

The standard single-serve container.

A 170 g container of plain nonfat is about 17.3 g of protein for 100 calories. Very little else in a supermarket chiller does that.

Plain is doing the work, and flavored undoes it

Every figure on this page is plain. Flavored Greek yogurts add sugar, and they add it at a scale that changes the product’s reason for being: a fruit-on-the-bottom cup can carry more added sugar than protein by weight. The honest move is plain yogurt with fruit you added, and it is cheaper.

Do not take a flavored product’s numbers from this page. Scan the tub — the barcode scanner in EatSleepRep is free and reads the label rather than a generic entry.

Against the other high-protein staples

Per 100 g, nonfat Greek gives 10.2 g of protein at 59 calories. Raw chicken breast gives 22.5 g at 120. That is 0.17 g of protein per calorie against 0.19 — close enough that yogurt is not a weaker source, only a less dense one, which is a different thing and often the more useful one at breakfast.

Source: USDA FoodData Central, SR Legacy release 2018-04. Figures are per 100 g as published; serving weights are USDA’s own. Records used: Yogurt, Greek, plain, nonfat (Includes foods for USDA's Food Distribution Program) (FDC 170894), Yogurt, Greek, plain, whole milk (FDC 171304).

Common questions

Plain nonfat Greek yogurt is 10.2 g of protein per 100 g. A standard 170 g container is about 17.3 g of protein for roughly 100 calories.

Nonfat, marginally — 10.2 g against 9.0 g per 100 g — but the real difference is calories: 59 against 97. Whole milk versions are not higher in protein.

It is strained. Draining the whey removes water and lactose while leaving the casein, so what remains is more concentrated in protein and lower in carbohydrate.

No. Every figure here is for plain. Flavored versions add sugar, sometimes enough to rival the protein content by weight — scan the actual tub instead.

Compare it with

All twenty-four are on the food macros index.