While no candy is really “good” for your teeth, there are some that are better than others. The type of candy below is in order from worst to best. Number five being the worst candy for your teeth and number one being the least damaging.
Continue reading below to find out how your favourite candy ranks.
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Sour & Pure Sugar Candies
The worst candy for your teeth are the sour and pure sugar candies. As you already know, sugar can be quite damaging to your teeth. The bacteria that causes tooth decay feeds on sugar found in foods and drinks and is the leading cause of plaque. But aside from this obvious fact, sour candy can also be quite acidic. This acid can weaken and damage the hard outer shell of your teeth and can make your mouth more susceptible to cavities.
Sour & Sugar Candy Examples:
- Pixy Stix
- Rockets
- Sour Patch Kids
- Sour Watermelons
- Cherry Blasters
- Fuzzy Peaches
- Fun Dip
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Sticky & Gummy Candies
Falling just short of the “worst candy for your teeth” title are sticky and gummy candies. Just like the sour and pure sugar candies that we talked about above, these candies too are packed with sugar— albeit only slightly less than the candies above. What makes these candies so bad for your teeth is their sticky nature. This makes their cavity-causers much more difficult to remove from your teeth. This means stay in your mouth longer and can potentially damage your teeth longer. And unlike other candy that can simply be rinsed or lightly brushed away, these sticky candies can sometimes require more than one brushing before all traces of them are gone from your mouth.
Sticky & Gummy Candies:
- Wine Gums
- JuJubes
- Toffee
- Taffy
- Airheads
- Caramel Cubes
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Hard Candy
Next up in the list of candies bad for your teeth are hard candies. Unlike the candies talked about above, hard candies are bad for your teeth for a whole different reason. Sure, they’re loaded with sugar just like the rest, but it’s their hard characteristic that truly makes them bad for your teeth. For starters, hard candy, if not appropriately consumed, can chip or crack your teeth— causing severe immediate damage. This can lead to emergency dental work that can be quite painful. Secondly, due to its hard nature, a person typically keeps a hard candy in their mouth for much longer than a sour or sticky candy. This means more sugar and cavity-causing bacteria comes in contact with your teeth and can even end up in your saliva extending how long your teeth come in contact with these culprits.
Hard Candies:
- Jolly Ranchers
- Jawbreakers
- Lollipops
- Life Savers
- Werther’s Originals
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Popcorn
Now before you go questioning your dentist’s word about popcorn, yes, popcorn can have some benefits for your teeth. This article, however, is not referring to the regular popcorn you’d pop in your microwave. Typically, at this time of year, the popcorn that ends up in Halloween treat bags is soaked in sugary coatings (caramel corn, etc.). And for the same reason that regular popcorn helps clean your teeth, this popcorn poses a risk. This is because those same kernels that would typically clean your teeth are coated in sugar and once wedged in between your teeth, will constantly transfer that sugary bacteria until removed. For this reason, popcorn sits at number 2 on our list.
Popcorn Treats:
- Caramel Corn
- Kettle Corn
- Marshmallow Popcorn Balls
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Chocolate
By process of elimination, you’ve probably guessed that chocolate is the winner of the “least damaging candy award”. But as we mentioned above, it’s still not “good” for your teeth, but somewhat less harmful than other Halloween treats. Chocolate is less harmful because of its dissolvable nature. Unlike other candies that require vigorous brushing to remove from your mouth, most chocolate can be removed by simply rinsing your mouth with water.
Chocolate:
- Dairy Milk
- Aero
- Hershey’s Milk Chocolate
- Cadbury Milk Chocolate
But there’s a catch. This points raised above refer to plain milk chocolate found in the example candies above. When we start to look at chocolate mixtures, it’s important to realize that those chocolates start to fall into the earlier candy categories of this article.
These more harmful chocolate treats include:
- Chocolate-coated Sponge Toffee
- Crunchie Bars
- Hershey’s Cookies & Cream
- Mars Bars
- Kit Kat
- Oh Henry
- Wunderbar
- Butterfingers
As we mentioned at the beginning of this article, our hope wasn’t to scare you away from eating candy, but instead make you conscious of the type of candy you choose. We love a sugary snack as much as the next person, but by understanding the risks each kind of candy poses, we can limit the damage done to our mouths. If you have any questions regarding anything discussed above, we encourage you to get in touch with us by phone, email or even social media. And in the rare event that you suffer a dental emergency while snacking on Halloween candy, we strongly recommend you contact your dentist immediately to limit the damage.
Happy Halloween!
