Sultanas vs Raisins: What's the Difference? A UK Guide
Sultanas vs raisins: both are dried grapes. In the UK, sultanas are made from pale green seedless grapes, so they're golden, plump and juicy. Raisins are darker and dried more slowly, with a richer, deeper flavour. Currants are the smallest, from the tiny Black Corinth grape. You can swap sultanas and raisins 1:1 by weight in most bakes.
At a glance
- 1:1swap sultanas and raisins by weight in most recipes
- 69.4gcarbs per 100g of sultanas, almost all sugars
- 62.6gcarbs per 100g of raisins (CoFID 2021)
- ~80%of the world's Zante currants come from Greece
On this page
Open any British baking cupboard in the run-up to Christmas and you'll probably find a bag of sultanas, a bag of raisins and, if you're serious about your Christmas cake, a bag of currants too. They look similar, they're sold side by side and recipes seem to use them interchangeably. So what actually separates them, and does it matter which one you use?
Sultanas vs raisins: what's the difference?
The short version: all three are dried grapes, and the differences come down to which grape is used and how it's dried. When people ask about the difference between sultanas and raisins in the UK, this is what it usually means on the shelf:
| Fruit | Looks | Taste |
|---|---|---|
| Sultanas | Golden, plump, medium | Sweet, juicy, light |
| Raisins | Dark brown, larger | Rich, deep, caramel |
| Currants | Black, very small | Intense, slightly tart |
General descriptions; colour and size vary by grape variety, producer and drying method.
Part of the confusion is that the words don't mean the same thing everywhere. Technically, "raisin" is the general word for any dried grape, and sultanas and currants are particular types of raisin. In everyday British English, though, "raisin" is used for the dark ones, "sultana" for the golden ones and "currant" for the tiny black ones. Wikipedia's entry on raisins makes the same split, citing Kew Gardens: the word raisin is commonly used for the dark seedless grape, sultana for a golden dried grape and currant for the dried Black Corinth grape.
Currants in your Christmas cake have nothing to do with blackcurrants or redcurrants, the fresh berries. Dried currants are grapes; blackcurrants are a different plant entirely.
What are sultanas?
So, what are sultanas exactly? Sultanas are made from a pale green ("white") seedless grape variety, also called the sultanina and, in the United States, Thompson Seedless. The variety is thought to come from Asia Minor and has long been grown around İzmir and Manisa in western Turkey, which is still where many of the sultanas in UK shops come from. Morrisons' own-label sultanas, for example, list Turkey as the country of origin.
The golden colour comes from the drying. Grapes for dried fruit are often pre-treated with a dip before drying: the historical method, developed around the Mediterranean and Asia Minor, used a cold dip of potassium carbonate and fatty-acid esters, and newer methods use oil emulsions. The dip helps water move out of the grape faster, and faster drying means less browning. The result is a lighter, softer, juicier fruit than a slowly sun-dried raisin.
The same grape is a bit of an all-rounder. It's eaten fresh as a table grape, dried as sultanas and raisins, and used to make wine. Its "three-way" use is part of why Thompson Seedless is the most planted grape in California.
What are raisins?
A raisin is simply a dried grape, and raisins are made all over the world. In the UK, the bag marked "raisins" usually holds darker, larger fruit that has been dried more slowly, often in the sun, which lets it turn deep brown and develop a richer, almost caramel flavour.
Different grapes make different raisins:
- Muscat raisins are larger and sweeter than most other varieties.
- Flame raisins come from Flame Seedless grapes.
- Monukka raisins, grown in the Middle East and Asia, are made from large black grapes and are correspondingly large.
Turkey, China, Iran and the United States are the largest producers of raisins, sultanas and currants combined, with estimated world production of about 1.1 million tonnes in 2023–24, according to the International Nut and Dried Fruit Council figures quoted by Wikipedia.
Where currants fit in
Currants, also called Zante currants or Corinth raisins, are dried Black Corinth grapes. The berries are tiny, reddish-black and thin-skinned, and when dried they become small, dark and intensely flavoured, with a slight tartness that sultanas don't have. The name comes from the Greek city of Corinth, and Greece still produces about 80% of the world's Zante currants.
Currants have been part of British baking for centuries. They're the classic fruit in Eccles cakes, currant buns and spotted dick, and they share the job with raisins and sultanas in fruit cake, Christmas pudding, mince pies, Welsh cakes and bara brith. Because they're so small, they scatter through a dough in lots of little flecks rather than a few big pockets of fruit.
UK vs US names
If you've ever followed an American recipe and wondered why it asks for "golden raisins", this is why. The US and the UK use the same words for slightly different things:
| UK name | US name | Grape |
|---|---|---|
| Sultanas | Golden raisins | Pale seedless (e.g. Thompson) |
| Raisins | Raisins | Dark, or slow-dried pale |
| Currants | Zante currants | Black Corinth |
Based on Wikipedia's Raisin, Sultana (grape) and Zante currant entries. In the US, most dark raisins are also made from Thompson Seedless grapes; the colour comes from how they're dried.
The twist is that in the US most ordinary dark raisins are made from the same Thompson Seedless grape as sultanas. They're simply left to dry and darken. American golden raisins get their colour from a treatment with sulphur dioxide, which slows the browning reaction, rather than from the grape alone. So in the US, the difference really is mostly about processing. In the UK, it's a mix of grape variety and processing.
This UK and US naming tangle crops up a lot in baking. We've covered a few others, including whether black treacle is the same as molasses and demerara vs brown sugar.
Carbs in sultanas, raisins and currants
Drying a grape removes most of its water, which concentrates everything else, including the natural sugars. That's why a handful of dried fruit carries far more carbohydrate than the same weight of fresh grapes. Here are the UK figures from CoFID, the government's food composition dataset:
| Per 100g | Carbs | Sugars | Per 25g |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sultanas | 69.4g | 69.4g | 17.4g |
| Raisins | 62.6g | 62.6g | 15.7g |
| Currants | 67.8g | 67.8g | 17.0g |
| Grapes | 16.1g | 16.1g | 4.0g |
CoFID 2021 food codes 14-263 (sultanas), 14-393 (raisins, dried), 14-074 (currants) and 14-350 (grapes, average). "Per 25g" is carbs in a 25g portion, our own calculation. Carbohydrate excludes fibre, as on UK labels.
A few things stand out. All three are almost entirely sugar once you look at the carbohydrate, split roughly evenly between glucose and fructose. Sultanas and currants come out a little higher than raisins per 100g in CoFID, but the differences are small, and figures vary between brands and harvests. Swapping one for the other won't change the carbs in a recipe much. Using less of it will.
If you're tracking carbs, the useful number is the per-portion one. A modest 25g of sultanas, scattered over porridge or stirred into a bake, adds around 17g of carbs, about the same as 100g of fresh grapes. If you're curious how much dried fruit is in your usual cereal, our guide to granola vs muesli looks at how the two compare.
Swapping sultanas and raisins in recipes
Good news for anyone halfway through a recipe: sultanas, raisins and currants are interchangeable in almost every bake. Swap them 1:1 by weight and the recipe will work. What changes is the flavour, texture and look:
- Sultanas give a lighter, juicier result and look golden against a pale crumb. They're the usual choice for scones, tea loaves and lighter fruit cakes.
- Raisins add a deeper, more caramel flavour and a darker look. They're good in rich fruit cakes, Christmas puddings, bread pudding and anything soaked in tea, brandy or rum.
- Currants are best where you want lots of small flecks of fruit, such as Eccles cakes, Welsh cakes and currant buns.
For fruit cakes and puddings, soak dried fruit in warm tea, orange juice or a splash of brandy for at least an hour (or overnight) before baking. Plumped fruit stays juicy and is less likely to sink or burn on the surface. Drain it well before folding into the batter.
Two more practical tips. Large raisins can be roughly chopped if you're using them in place of currants, so the fruit spreads more evenly. And tossing dried fruit in a spoonful of the recipe's flour or dry mix before folding it in helps stop it sinking to the bottom of a cake.
Lower-carb bakes with less dried fruit
Because all three dried fruits are so concentrated, the lower-carb approach is simple: keep the fruit, but use much less of it, and let spices, citrus zest and nuts do more of the flavour work. That's what we did in our keto Christmas cake, which uses 90g of dried fruit in the whole cake, where a traditional cake that size often has around 900g. Our keto mincemeat works the same way, with 50g of dried fruit in the whole jar.
You can do the same with a baking mix. Here's the maths for a modest 25g of fruit spread across a whole batch, using the CoFID figures above and the yields shown on our packs and product pages:
- Fruit scones: our Keto Scone Mix makes 6 scones. Adding 25g of sultanas adds roughly 2.9g of carbs per scone.
- Carrot cake: our Keto Carrot Cake Mix makes around 12 slices. Adding 25g of raisins, as many traditional carrot cakes do, adds about 1.3g of carbs per slice.
- Tea-loaf style banana bread: our Keto Banana Bread Mix makes about 12 slices. Adding 25g of sultanas adds about 1.4g of carbs per slice.
Chopping the fruit small makes 25g go further, so you get a little in every bite. For a scone recipe made from scratch, see our keto scones, and our keto Christmas guide has more festive bakes.
Net carb figures per scone or slice are as shown on each product page and include the eggs and butter (and Greek yoghurt for the scones) you add. The extra carbs from fruit are our own calculations.
All three mixes contain nuts (almonds) and milk, and you make them with eggs and butter. Always check the pack for full allergen information.
What's on the label
Most plain sultanas and raisins in UK shops have a very short ingredients list. Ocado's and Morrisons' own-label sultanas, for example, both list just sultanas and sunflower oil. The light coating of oil stops the fruit clumping together in the bag.
A few other things are worth checking:
- Sulphites. Some golden sultanas and golden raisins are treated with sulphur dioxide to keep their colour. Under UK food labelling rules, sulphur dioxide and sulphites must be declared as an allergen when present at more than 10mg per kg, so they'll be highlighted in the ingredients list.
- Pips and stems. Many packs carry a warning that a few pips or stems may remain, even after cleaning. It's worth a quick look through before baking.
- Added sugar. Plain sultanas, raisins and currants usually have no added sugar, but other dried fruits often do. Dried cranberries, for example, are commonly sweetened with sugar or apple juice, as we noted in our Christmas cake recipe.
- Mixed fruit. "Dried mixed fruit" bags are usually a blend of sultanas, raisins and currants, sometimes with candied peel, which is cooked in sugar syrup. CoFID lists dried mixed fruit at 68.1g of carbs per 100g.
Key takeaways
- All three are dried grapes. Sultanas are golden, raisins are dark and currants are tiny.
- The grape and the drying differ. Sultanas come from pale seedless grapes and dry faster, so they stay light and juicy.
- Swap them 1:1. The recipe will work; only the flavour and look change.
- Use less, not different. Carbs are similar across all three, so cutting the amount is what makes the difference.
Frequently asked questions
Are sultanas the same as raisins?
Not quite. Both are dried grapes, but in the UK sultanas are made from pale green seedless grapes and dried quickly, so they stay golden, plump and juicy. Raisins are darker and dried more slowly, giving a richer, deeper flavour. In the US, sultanas are usually sold as golden raisins, which adds to the confusion.
Can I use raisins instead of sultanas?
Yes. Raisins and sultanas can be swapped 1:1 by weight in almost any recipe, including scones, fruit cakes, tea loaves and puddings. Raisins give a darker look and a deeper, more caramel flavour, while sultanas are lighter and juicier. Currants work too, but they're much smaller, so you'll get more, tinier flecks of fruit.
What do Americans call sultanas?
Americans usually call sultanas golden raisins. The grape variety behind them is called Thompson Seedless in the US, and most ordinary dark American raisins come from the same grape, simply dried until they darken. Golden raisins are treated with sulphur dioxide to keep their pale colour, so check the label if you avoid sulphites.
What is the difference between sultanas and currants?
Sultanas are made from pale seedless grapes and are golden, plump and sweet. Currants are dried Black Corinth grapes, which are tiny and reddish-black, so currants are much smaller, darker and slightly tart. Despite the name, dried currants aren't related to blackcurrants or redcurrants, which are fresh berries from a different plant.
How many carbs are in sultanas?
According to CoFID 2021, the UK government's food composition dataset, sultanas contain 69.4g of carbohydrate per 100g, all of it sugars. That works out at about 17.4g of carbs in a 25g handful. Raisins are slightly lower at 62.6g per 100g and currants contain 67.8g, so all three are similar.
Sources
- Public Health England / Food Standards Agency. Composition of Foods Integrated Dataset (CoFID) 2021: food codes 14-263 (sultanas), 14-393 (raisins, dried), 14-074 (currants), 14-350 (grapes, average) and 14-087 (dried mixed fruit), sheet 1.3 Proximates. Per-portion and per-slice figures are our own calculations.
- Wikipedia. Raisin (definitions, varieties, pre-treatment and drying, golden raisins and sulphur dioxide, world production), Sultana (grape) (grape names, origin, US usage, uses) and Zante currant (Black Corinth, Greek production, British baking).
- legislation.gov.uk. Regulation (EU) No 1169/2011 as retained in UK law, Annex II (substances causing allergies or intolerances, item 12: sulphur dioxide and sulphites above 10mg/kg).
- Retailer product pages: Ocado Sultanas and Morrisons Sultanas (ingredients, plus Morrisons' country of origin and pips and stems warning). Checked 29 October 2026.
- Groovy Keto product pages: Keto Scone Mix, Keto Carrot Cake Mix and Keto Banana Bread Mix (ingredients, yields, net carbs per serving and allergens). Checked 29 October 2026.
