How many calories are in a turkey hot dog?
One regular turkey hot dog weighs 57 g and carries 127 calories. Per 100 g the link runs 223 calories. That is the sausage alone: slide it into a white bun and the same hot dog becomes a 253-calorie sandwich. The bigger surprise sits on the sodium row, at 493 mg.
You'd need to walk about 25 minutes to burn the 127 calories in one hot dog (57 g).
How long does it take to burn off a turkey hot dog?
One hot dog (57 g) is 127 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 127 kcal |
|---|---|
| Walking, brisk | 25 min |
| Cycling, moderate | 16 min |
| Swimming, moderate | 18 min |
| Jogging | 15 min |
| Weight training, moderate | 28 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 (57 g); change it to what you actually ate. BodyPal works this out from your steps automatically.
On this page
- Turkey hot dog quick facts
- US servings from a cocktail link to a footlong
- What the bun adds
- Reduced-fat and beef franks
- Sodium is the row to watch
- How does a turkey hot dog compare?
- Most popular turkey hot dog brands
- FAQ
Turkey hot dog quick facts
The row used here is FNDDS 2706170, "Hot dog, turkey" — the link on its own, no bread, no mustard, no chili. That is what people are holding when they ask the question, and it is what the package on the counter shows. Once bread enters the picture the food changes into a sandwich, and USDA tracks those as separate records, which is why they get their own section below rather than being blended into this table.
Serving size is one regular or bun-length link, 57 g. Larger footlong links and pinky-sized cocktail franks are handled in the servings table.
| Nutrient | Per 100 g | Per 1 hot dog (57 g) | % Daily Value |
|---|---|---|---|
| Calories | 223 | 127 | — |
| Total fat | 17.29 g | 9.9 g | 13% |
| Saturated fat | 4.03 g | 2.3 g | 11% |
| Carbohydrate | 3.81 g | 2.2 g | 1% |
| Dietary fiber | 0 g | 0 g | 0% |
| Total sugars | 1.21 g | 0.7 g | — |
| Protein | 12.23 g | 7.0 g | 14% |
| Sodium | 865 mg | 493 mg | 21% |
% 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 →
Two rows you will not find above: added sugars and trans fat. This edition of FNDDS does not publish either value for frankfurters, so listing them would mean inventing numbers. Cholesterol and potassium are published: one link gives 44 mg of cholesterol, 15% of the Daily Value, and 212 mg of potassium, a modest 5%. The percentages come from the FDA Daily Values for the Nutrition Facts label.
US servings from a cocktail link to a footlong
"One hot dog" is not a fixed amount of food. The standard supermarket pack holds eight regular links at 57 g each. Ballpark and grill-pack footlongs weigh 88 g, more than half again as much, and cocktail franks for a party tray weigh about 10 g apiece.
| Serving | Weight | Calories |
|---|---|---|
| 1 cocktail frank | 10 g | 22 kcal |
| 1 oz | 28 g | 63 kcal |
| One hot dog, regular or bun-length | 57 g | 127 kcal |
| 1 footlong | 88 g | 196 kcal |
| Two links | 114 g | 254 kcal |
| Per 100 g | 100 g | 223 kcal |
The 57 g link, the footlong and the cocktail frank are USDA household measures. The 1 oz row and the two-link row are our own arithmetic from the USDA 100 g figure, not USDA servings — useful if you are weighing straight onto a scale, or if you eat two at a cookout without thinking about it.
That 69-calorie gap between a regular link and a footlong is the single most common logging error with this food. Same word, same shape, same wrapper in the fridge, and roughly half a hot dog's worth of difference. If the link runs the length of your palm plus your fingers, weigh it.
What the bun adds
USDA keeps four separate records for the assembled sandwich, and the bread is doing more work than most people expect. A white bun turns a 127-calorie link into a 253-calorie sandwich — the bread costs 126 calories, essentially a second hot dog made of flour.
| Version | Per 100 g | Typical serving | Calories |
|---|---|---|---|
| Link only | 223 kcal | one hot dog, 57 g | 127 kcal |
| On a white bun | 248 kcal | one sandwich, 102 g | 253 kcal |
| On a wheat bun | 241 kcal | one sandwich, 102 g | 246 kcal |
| On white bread | 238 kcal | one sandwich, 87 g | 207 kcal |
| On wheat bread | 237 kcal | one sandwich, 87 g | 206 kcal |
Notice how the per-100-g number goes up when you add bread, from 223 to 248, while the fat number goes down from 17.29 g to 11.39 g per 100 g. The bun is denser in calories per gram than the sausage is, but it dilutes the fat. This is why "calories per 100 g" alone can mislead you on composite foods: the sandwich looks richer per gram and is leaner per gram at the same time.
Bread choice matters less for calories than for fiber. A wheat bun brings 2.4 g of fiber to the sandwich against 0.8 g for white — three times as much — for a 7-calorie saving that is basically noise. Dropping the bun for a folded slice of bread saves more: 207 calories on white bread, 46 below the bun version, because a slice is simply less dough than a split roll.
Reduced-fat and beef franks
Two neighbors on the shelf are worth pricing out. A reduced-fat hot dog runs 216 calories per 100 g, so a 57 g link is 123 calories — four calories under the turkey version. Four. If you are buying reduced-fat franks expecting a meaningful calorie cut over turkey, the label is overselling it, though the reduced-fat record does carry more protein at 13.75 g per 100 g against turkey's 12.23 g.
The beef frank is the real jump: 310 calories per 100 g, 177 for a 57 g link. That is 50 calories more than turkey for the same bite, and it comes almost entirely from fat — 28 g per 100 g against 17.29 g. A blended meat-and-poultry frank sits between them at 277 calories per 100 g, or 158 per link.
Brand labels sit lower than the USDA generic across the board, because most turkey links sold as "uncured" or "organic" are smaller and leaner. Sugardale's uncured turkey hot dogs list 80 calories on a 43 g link, the 365 Whole Foods Market organic version 90 calories on a 57 g link, and Applegate's three turkey franks land between 50 and 70 calories on links of 42 to 48 g. Weigh yours or read the package before assuming 127.
Sodium is the row to watch
Calories are not the interesting number on a turkey hot dog. Sodium is. One 57 g link carries 493 mg — 21% of the 2,300 mg Daily Value — while its 127 calories are around 6% of a 2,000-calorie day. That ratio is unusual: you are spending a fifth of your sodium budget for a sixteenth of your calorie budget. In kitchen terms, 493 mg is roughly a fifth of a teaspoon of table salt, before the bun, the relish and the pickle add theirs.
Two links come to 986 mg by our own arithmetic from the USDA figure. The Dietary Guidelines for Americans put the ceiling at 2,300 mg a day for adults, and CDC's sodium pages note that most of the sodium Americans eat arrives already inside packaged and prepared foods rather than from the shaker. Hot dogs are a textbook example. If you are watching sodium, one link with a plain bun is the sensible build; two links with chips beside them is not.
The fat row deserves a mention too. "Turkey" reads as lean, but 9.9 g of fat per link is 13% of the Daily Value, and 2.3 g of that is saturated, 11%. Turkey franks are ground meat plus fat plus water plus salt, and the bird only changes the first of those four by degrees.
How does a turkey hot dog compare?
| Frank | Per 100 g | US serving | Calories |
|---|---|---|---|
| Turkey hot dog | 223 kcal | one link, 57 g | 127 kcal |
| Reduced-fat hot dog | 216 kcal | one link, 57 g | 123 kcal |
| Meat and poultry hot dog | 277 kcal | one link, 57 g | 158 kcal |
| Beef hot dog | 310 kcal | one link, 57 g | 177 kcal |
Our take: for calories, the turkey link is the pick of the four in practice — the reduced-fat record beats it by four calories, which is not a reason to change what you buy. Swapping a beef frank for a turkey one saves 50 calories per link, and at two links on a Saturday that is 100 calories for a change nobody at the table will notice. What the swap does not fix is sodium, which stays around a fifth of the day whichever frank you pick. Treat the bun as the other half of the decision: it costs more calories than the sausage saves.
Most popular turkey hot dog 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) |
|---|---|
| Sugardale Uncured Turkey Hot Dogs | 186 cal |
| Applegate Natural Uncured Turkey Hot Dog | 149 cal |
| Applegate The Great Organic Uncured Turkey Hot Dog | 125 cal |
| Applegate Uncured Turkey Hot Dog | 119 cal |
| 365 Whole Foods Market Organic Uncured Turkey Hot Dogs | 158 cal |
| Organic Valley Organic Uncured Pasture-Raised Turkey Hot Dogs | 128 cal |
Brand popularity: BodyPal food database. Nutrition: manufacturer labels / USDA FoodData Central.
Turkey hot dog FAQs
How many calories are in one turkey hot dog?
One regular turkey hot dog weighs 57 g and carries 127 calories, from a base of 223 calories per 100 g. That is the naked link straight out of the pack, with no bun and no toppings. A footlong link weighs 88 g instead and lands at 196 calories.
How many calories in a turkey hot dog with a bun?
A turkey hot dog on a white bun is 253 calories for the whole 102 g sandwich, so the bread costs 126 calories on top of the 127-calorie link. A wheat bun is close behind at 246. Served on a slice of white bread instead, the total drops to 207.
Is a turkey hot dog healthier than a beef hot dog?
On calories, yes: 127 per link against 177 for a beef frank of the same 57 g weight, a 50-calorie gap that comes almost entirely from fat. Turkey runs 223 calories per 100 g, beef 310. Sodium is the catch, since the turkey link still delivers 493 mg.
How much protein is in a turkey hot dog?
One link gives 7.0 g of protein, 14% of the Daily Value, for 127 calories. Per 100 g the figure is 12.23 g. That is respectable for a sausage but modest next to plain poultry, so a hot dog dinner usually wants a second protein source somewhere on the plate.
How much sodium is in a turkey hot dog?
A single 57 g link holds 493 mg of sodium, 21% of the 2,300 mg Daily Value and roughly a fifth of a teaspoon of table salt. Two links come to 986 mg by our own arithmetic, before the bun, the relish or anything salty sitting beside them.
How many calories in an Applegate turkey hot dog?
Applegate lists 70 calories for its Natural Uncured turkey hot dog on a 47 g link, 60 for The Great Organic version at 48 g, and 50 for the Uncured link at 42 g. All three sit under the 127-calorie USDA generic, because the links are smaller and leaner.
Do turkey hot dogs have carbs?
Barely: 2.2 g per 57 g link, 1% of the Daily Value, with 0.7 g of that as sugars and no fiber at all. The carbs arrive with the bread. A white bun takes the sandwich to about 24.7 g of carbohydrate by our own arithmetic, more than ten times the link on its own.
How many calories in a footlong turkey hot dog?
A footlong turkey link weighs 88 g and comes to 196 calories, 69 more than the regular 57 g link. Fat rises with it, to about 15.2 g by our own arithmetic. Add the long bun and you are into sandwich territory, where the standard white-bun build already costs 253.
Similar foods
- Chuck Steak — 360 cal per steak
- Skirt Steak — 187 cal for 3 oz cooked
- Chile relleno — 326 cal per chile relleno
- Hash Brown — 119 cal per patty
- Beef brisket — 208 cal per thick slice
- Chicken Taco — 222 cal per taco
Count it without the math
Point the camera at the plate and BodyPal counts the hot dog for you, bun and all.
