Background The retail milk tea industry is in a period of rapid development, but there is little research on its nutrient content, which restricts the nutritional guidance of milk tea.

Objective To determine the levels of nutrients in best-selling handcrafted milk tea in Shanghai and analyze the nutritional characteristics.

Methods In 2018 and 2021, a total of 13 handcrafted milk tea brands with ≥3 branch stores in Shanghai were selected by searching for milk tea on Meituan and Ele.me food delivery platforms, and a total of 122 types of handcrafted milk tea products were collected from the top three sales milk tea (including all sweetness levels available), milk cover tea, and fruit tea. National standard methods were used to detect energy, protein, fat, carbohydrate, sugar, trans fatty acid, calcium, caffeine, and tea polyphenol.

Results The median energy of the milk tea samples was 310 kJ (per 100 g sample). The main sources of energy were carbohydrate and fat. The levels of energy, protein, and fat in milk cover tea and milk tea were significantly higher than those in fruit tea (P＜0.05), and there was no significant difference in carbohydrate among them. The total sugar, fructose, and glucose levels in milk tea were significantly lower than those in milk cover tea and fruit tea, and the lactose level in fruit tea was significantly lower than those in milk tea and milk cover tea (P＜0.05). Themedian trans fat acid level in milk cover tea was higher than that in milk tea (P＜0.05). The median levels of caffeine and tea polyphenol were higher in milk tea than in milk cover tea (P＜0.05). The levels of energy, carbohydrate, sucrose, total sugar, and calcium in milk tea were positively correlated with the number of ingredients added (0-3) (r=0.386, 0.371, 0.238, 0.698, 0.466, respectively, P < 0.05). The levels of energy, carbohydrate, and total sugar tended to increase with increasing sweetness (P<0.05), and total sugar was mainly sucrose, followed by fructose and glucose. The total sugar levels of the samples labeled sugar free, light sugar, half sugar, less sugar, and regular sugar were 3.40 (2.20, 4.9), 4.97 (4.25, 5.97), 5.80 (4.31, 6.88), 6.59 (5.17, 8.53), and 7.96 (6.82, 9.20) g, respectively; the proportions of the samples containing more than 0.5 g of total sugar were 93.3% for sugar free milk tea, 47.4% for light sugar milk tea, and 94.0% for regular sugar milk tea; the proportion of the regular sugar samples with sugar content greater than 10 g was 18.0% (all samples with nominal sugar content were measured per 100 g).

Conclusion The retail handcrafted milk tea in Shanghai is characterized by high energy, high added sugar, high fat, and low protein. It is necessary to standardize the added sugar content and sweetness labeling, strengthen the nutrition education of milk tea, and guide residents to limit its intake.