BBQ Sauce Sodium Database: 2026 Label-Verified Reference

What the data says, in one paragraph

The typical commercial BBQ sauce carries 795.5 mg of sodium per 100 g, normalized from each label's stated serving so sauces with different serving sizes compare honestly. Measured on the label's own serving (typically 2 tablespoons), the median works out to 273 mg — roughly 12% of the American Heart Association's 2,300 mg daily upper limit — and the saltiest entry delivers 2640 mg, 115% of the daily limit from a single dollop. Per 100 g the catalog spans 0 to 3450 mg — a 100×+ spread inside a single condiment category, almost entirely driven by which regional style and what base ingredients the brand chose. Pick a different bottle, eat a meaningfully different amount of salt.

Methodology

Sodium values are taken directly from the printed Nutrition Facts label on the bottle as it appeared on the date shown. We accept three label sources: manufacturer site, retailer product page, and Open Food Facts (a consumer-contributed third-party label database). Each sauce's detail page links the specific source we captured, so the reader can audit any datum.

A sauce enters this dataset when it has a published sodium number, a serving size we can convert to grams, AND clears our standard publication gate (ingredient line confirmed against a source, nutrition not entirely missing). Sauces tagged as duplicates, bundles/variety packs, or not-yet-approved are excluded, as are products whose printed serving is under 10 g — dry seasonings, brine and liquid-smoke concentrates, dash-style hot sauces — because they are not consumed at sauce quantities and would distort per-100g comparisons. All comparative statistics — the headline numbers, style and brand medians, and the leanest/saltiest rankings — are normalized to milligrams per 100 g using the label's metric serving weight, so a brand that prints a 1-tablespoon serving cannot rank ahead of one that prints 2 tablespoons. Volume-only servings convert at 1.14 g/ml and carry a ~ marker. The per-serving value is reproduced as printed and shown alongside in the full table, because sodium claims on labels (and most daily-intake guidance) speak per serving.

Bands match the FDA sodium-claim thresholds: a product can be labelled sodium free at <5 mg per serving, very low sodium at <35 mg, low sodium at <140 mg. Above 140 mg there is no formal claim ladder; we use 240 mg (10% of the AHA daily limit) and 480 mg (20%) to split the upper range.

Formulations change. The "last updated" date at the top of this page is the most recent capture across the catalog. Individual sauces are recaptured on a rolling basis. If you want to verify a specific value, click through to the sauce detail page — the source URL and capture date are linked.

How to cite this database

Free to cite, quote, and link without permission. We ask that you link back to this page when reusing the statistics so readers can verify the underlying data.

Working on a story and want a custom cut of the data (e.g. sodium against sugar, by-state-of-origin, time-series for a specific brand)? We can usually answer within a day — see the contact information on the imprint page.