How many calories are in coconut?
A 1-cup serving of fresh shredded coconut weighs 80 g and carries 283 calories. Raw coconut meat runs 354 calories per 100 g, and almost all of that is fat: 33.49 g per 100 g against 3.33 g of protein. A single 45 g piece pried off the shell is 159 calories.
You'd need to walk about 57 minutes to burn the 283 calories in a 1-cup (80 g) serving.
How long does it take to burn off coconut?
A 1-cup (80 g) serving is 283 kcal. Enter your weight and the amount you ate to see how long it takes you to burn that off:
lb
| Activity | Time to burn 283 kcal |
|---|---|
| Walking, brisk | 57 min |
| Cycling, moderate | 35 min |
| Swimming, moderate | 40 min |
| Jogging | 33 min |
| Weight training, moderate | 1 hr 3 min |
Times are for a 155 lb adult at a steady pace; change the weight to see yours. The amount is set to the portion in the text (80 g); change it to what you actually ate. BodyPal works this out from your steps automatically.
On this page
- Coconut quick facts
- US servings from one ounce to a whole coconut
- Dried sweetened and flaked coconut
- Liquid coconut and coconut oil
- Saturated fat is the row to watch
- How does coconut compare?
- Most popular coconut brands
- FAQ
Coconut quick facts
The row behind every number here is SR Legacy 170169, "Nuts, coconut meat, raw". It is the white meat you scrape out of a fresh nut, still about 47% water, and it is the only coconut record that ships with the household measures Americans actually use: a cup of shredded, a 2" x 2" x 1/2" piece, the meat of one medium coconut. A second record, FNDDS "Coconut, fresh," reports the same composition but gives no gram weights for a piece or a cup, so it adds nothing.
If you are holding a bag from the baking aisle rather than a fresh nut, skip ahead. Dried and sweetened coconut is a different food with a different calorie count, and the gap is not small.
| Nutrient | Per 100 g | Per 1 cup, shredded (80 g) | % Daily Value |
|---|---|---|---|
| Calories | 354 | 283 | — |
| Total fat | 33.49 g | 26.8 g | 34% |
| Saturated fat | 29.7 g | 23.8 g | 119% |
| Carbohydrate | 15.23 g | 12.2 g | 4% |
| Dietary fiber | 9 g | 7.2 g | 26% |
| Total sugars | 6.23 g | 5.0 g | — |
| Protein | 3.33 g | 2.7 g | 5% |
| Sodium | 20 mg | 16 mg | 1% |
% Daily Value is based on a 2,000-calorie diet.
Verified nutrition data
Numbers on this page come from USDA FoodData Central, the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s food composition database, and from manufacturer labels where a branded product is named. Last verified September 2026. How we verify our data →
There is no added sugars row and no trans fat row in this table, because the SR Legacy edition of the record does not publish them. Nothing is lost: raw coconut meat has no added sugar in it, and its 6.23 g of total sugars per 100 g are the fruit's own. Cholesterol is 0 mg, as it is in every plant food, and potassium is 356 mg per 100 g, which works out to 285 mg in a cup, or 6% of the Daily Value.
US servings from one ounce to a whole coconut
| Serving | Weight | Calories |
|---|---|---|
| 1 oz | 28.4 g | 100 kcal |
| 1/2 cup, shredded | 40 g | 142 kcal |
| 1 piece, 2" x 2" x 1/2" | 45 g | 159 kcal |
| 1 cup, shredded | 80 g | 283 kcal |
| 1 medium coconut, meat only | 397 g | 1405 kcal |
| Per 100 g | 100 g | 354 kcal |
The cup, the piece and the medium coconut are USDA's own household measures for this record. The ounce and the half cup are our own arithmetic from the USDA 100 g figure, not USDA servings, which is why an ounce lands on a tidy 100 calories.
That medium coconut deserves a warning label. The 397 g is white meat only, with the shell and the coconut water already gone, so the 1,405 calories are what you would swallow if you ate an entire nut clean. Scaling the 100 g figure gives roughly 118 g of saturated fat in that meat, again our own arithmetic, close to six times the 20 g Daily Value. Nobody sits down to a whole coconut, but people do hack one open, snack all afternoon and never count it.
Dried sweetened and flaked coconut
Drying is where the numbers move. Pull the water out of coconut meat and everything left doubles up per gram, which is how dried unsweetened coconut reaches 660 calories per 100 g. Add sugar for the baking aisle and the sugar figure explodes instead: sweetened shredded coconut carries 43.17 g of total sugars and 262 mg of sodium per 100 g, against 6.23 g and 20 mg in raw meat. That sodium is about a tenth of a teaspoon of table salt per 100 g, added for taste rather than for keeping.
| Version | Per 100 g | Typical serving | Calories |
|---|---|---|---|
| Raw meat, fresh | 354 kcal | 1 cup, shredded, 80 g | 283 kcal |
| Dried, unsweetened (desiccated) | 660 kcal | 1 oz, 28.4 g | 187 kcal |
| Sweetened shredded | 501 kcal | 1 cup, shredded, 93 g | 466 kcal |
| Sweetened flaked, packaged | 456 kcal | 1 cup, 85 g | 388 kcal |
Read the cup rows next to each other and the trap is obvious. A cup of fresh shredded coconut is 80 g and 283 calories; a cup of the sweetened shredded stuff packs to 93 g and 466. Same measuring cup, 183 calories apart, and the flaked version sits in between at 388 because bigger flakes leave more air in the cup.
Retail labels round the dried numbers up. Bob's Red Mill unsweetened shredded coconut declares 100 calories per 3 Tbsp (15 g), which is 667 per 100 g; Let's Do Organic and Reasor's land on the same 667 with a 15 g serving of their own. Signature Select's sweetened shredded coconut lists 80 calories per 2 Tbsp, or 533 per 100 g. The spread between a 15 g label serving and the fistful most people actually scatter over oatmeal is where the counting goes wrong.
Liquid coconut and coconut oil
| Product | Per 100 g | Typical serving | Calories |
|---|---|---|---|
| Coconut water, unsweetened | 18 kcal | 1 cup, 240 g | 43 kcal |
| Coconut milk, used in cooking | 230 kcal | 1 fl oz, 30 g | 69 kcal |
| Coconut oil | 895 kcal | 1 tablespoon, 14 g | 125 kcal |
These three come from the same nut and behave nothing alike. Coconut water is the thin liquid inside, essentially fat-free at 18 calories per 100 g, so a full cup is 43 calories. Coconut milk is the meat grated and pressed with water, which carries the fat across: a 1 fl oz splash in a curry is 69 calories, and a can goes into a pot fast. Coconut oil is the fat with nothing else attached, 125 calories a tablespoon, the same as any other cooking oil.
One footnote for the oil: USDA publishes two records for it, an older one at 892 calories per 100 g and the newer one at 895 used above. The difference is rounding in the analysis, not a difference in the product, and it is under half a calorie per tablespoon.
Saturated fat is the row to watch
Coconut is not a calorie problem so much as a saturated fat one. A cup of raw shredded coconut supplies 23.8 g of saturated fat, which is 119% of the 20 g Daily Value the FDA sets for the Nutrition Facts label. One garnish-sized cup, and the day's allowance is already spent. Even the 45 g piece runs 13.4 g of saturated fat by our own arithmetic from the 100 g figure, two thirds of the DV.
The federal advice is to keep saturated fat under 10% of daily calories, which the Dietary Guidelines for Americans put at about 22 g on a 2,000-calorie day. Nothing here says avoid coconut. It says treat it as a topping, not a snack bowl: two tablespoons over yogurt behave very differently from a cup eaten in front of the TV.
The fiber, meanwhile, is genuinely good. Coconut delivers 9 g of fiber per 100 g, more than most nuts, so that same cup covers 26% of the fiber Daily Value. And with 3.33 g of protein per 100 g, coconut is not a protein food at all, whatever the health-store shelf suggests; MyPlate counts nuts and seeds as protein foods, but coconut is the outlier that leans fat.
How does coconut compare?
| Nut | Per 100 g | US serving | Calories |
|---|---|---|---|
| Coconut, raw meat | 354 kcal | 1 oz, 28.4 g | 100 kcal |
| Ginkgo nuts, dried | 348 kcal | 1 oz, 28.4 g | 99 kcal |
| Chestnuts, japanese, dried | 360 kcal | 1 oz, 28.4 g | 102 kcal |
| Chestnuts, chinese, dried | 363 kcal | 1 oz, 28.4 g | 103 kcal |
Our take: by calories these four are the same food, all within four calories an ounce, and ginkgo is the only row lighter than coconut per 100 g. What separates them is where the calories come from. Coconut has 33.49 g of fat per 100 g; the chestnuts and ginkgo have between 1.24 g and 2 g, at least sixteen times less, and they carry roughly five times coconut's carbohydrate. If you are counting calories alone, swap freely. If you are watching saturated fat, the chestnuts win outright, and if you want protein, dried ginkgo at 10.35 g per 100 g triples coconut's 3.33 g.
Most popular coconut brands in the United States
Ranked by how widely each product appears among foods sold in the United States, from the BodyPal food database of over 3.3 million products. Calories are the figures printed on each Nutrition Facts label, checked against USDA FoodData Central.
| Product | Calories (per 100 g) |
|---|---|
| Bob's Red Mill Unsweetened Shredded Coconut | 667 cal |
| Sunridge Farms Organic Shredded Coconut | 650 cal |
| Reasor's Shredded Coconut | 667 cal |
| Big Y Shredded Coconut | 733 cal |
| Signature Select Sweetened Shredded Coconut | 533 cal |
| Let's Do Organic Unsweetened Shredded Coconut | 667 cal |
Brand popularity: BodyPal food database. Nutrition: manufacturer labels / USDA FoodData Central.
Coconut FAQs
How many calories are in one cup of shredded coconut?
A cup of fresh shredded coconut meat, 80 g, is 283 calories. That cup also carries 26.8 g of fat, 23.8 g of it saturated, and 7.2 g of fiber. Sweetened shredded coconut from a bag is denser and heavier: a cup of that runs 93 g and 466 calories.
How many calories are in a whole coconut?
The meat of one medium coconut weighs 397 g and comes to 1,405 calories, which is USDA's own household measure for this food. That figure is white meat only, with no shell and no coconut water counted. Very few people eat a whole one in a single sitting.
Is coconut healthy or high in saturated fat?
Both: one cup of shredded raw coconut delivers 23.8 g of saturated fat, 119% of the 20 g Daily Value, alongside 7.2 g of fiber, which is 26% of the fiber DV. The Dietary Guidelines cap saturated fat at 10% of daily calories, so coconut works best in small amounts.
How many calories are in 1 oz of coconut?
One ounce of raw coconut meat, 28.4 g, is 100 calories, our own arithmetic from the USDA 100 g figure of 354 rather than a USDA serving. That ounce brings 9.5 g of fat and 2.6 g of fiber. Dried unsweetened coconut nearly doubles it, to 187 calories per ounce.
Raw or dried coconut: which has more calories?
Dried, by a wide margin: unsweetened desiccated coconut is 660 calories per 100 g against 354 for raw meat, because drying removes most of the water and concentrates everything left behind. Weigh it rather than eyeballing it: an ounce of raw is 100 calories, an ounce of dried unsweetened 187.
How many carbs and how much fiber does coconut have?
Raw coconut has 15.23 g of carbohydrate per 100 g, and 9 g of that is fiber. A 1-cup serving of 80 g gives 12.2 g of carbohydrate and 7.2 g of fiber, 26% of the Daily Value. Total sugars stay low for a fruit at 6.23 g per 100 g.
Is shredded coconut from the bag sweetened?
Often, yes: USDA's sweetened shredded coconut is 501 calories and 43.17 g of total sugars per 100 g, with 262 mg of sodium, against 6.23 g of sugars and 20 mg of sodium in raw meat. Unsweetened bags exist and run 660 calories per 100 g. Check the label.
How many calories are in coconut milk versus coconut water?
Coconut milk is 230 calories per 100 g and 69 for a 1 fl oz splash; coconut water is 18 calories per 100 g and 43 for a full 240 g cup. Milk is pressed from the grated meat, so it carries the fat. Water comes straight out of the nut.
Similar foods
- Summer Sausage — 203 cal for 4 slices
- Salami — 102 cal for 3 slices
- Sausage Link — 75 cal per link
- Coconut Shrimp — 250 cal for 4 shrimp
- Torta — 215 cal per serving
- Italian sub — 610 cal per regular sub
Count it without the math
Point the camera at the bowl and BodyPal counts the coconut for you, fresh or from the bag.
