We Tested 14 Ketchup Brands, And This One Was The Obvious Winner

Ketchup is a workhorse of a condiment. The perfect dip for a batch of humble French fries, this umami-rich cheeseburger topper is also an essential ingredient in a classic meatloaf, providing both color and sweetness, and an instant flavor injector for sauces and stews. All this is to say that a pantry without a bottle of ketchup is like a puzzle with a missing corner piece: incomplete. There is an abundance of ketchup brands on the market, from organic and sugar-free options to varieties that feature sweeteners, chilis, and even a dash of sriracha. However, after taste-testing and ranking 14 ketchup brands, the obvious winner was Heinz.

This world-renowned brand has been producing ketchup since the 1870s, signaling its popularity among its diehard fans. It's even the official supplier to the British Royal Household and was approved by NASA for use on the International Space Station, so it's no wonder it took the top spot in our ranking. Along with the original Heinz tomato ketchup recipe, we tasted several other offshoot flavors, including the No Salt Added, Zero Sugar Added, Organic, Simply All Natural Ingredients, Pickle, and Simply Spicy options. 

The pickle flavor was our favorite because it successfully combined all those well-known tomatoey flavors with the sharp sourness of pickles (the tanginess comes from acidified cucumber juice and seasonings, while the sweetness is derived from a measure of sugar). However, the organic and simply all-natural options were also clean, sweet, and tangy. Plus, every variety we tried was thick and smooth.

In our opinion, the best ketchup should have a slight sweetness to it to balance out the tartness of the tomatoes and vinegar, which Heinz excels at and explains why it won across the board. That said, the brand does carry no salt added and zero sugar added options, which still tasted better than the others we tried. The zero sugar variety is sweetened with stevia leaf extract, which is a zero-calorie natural plant sweetener that has a concentrated quality. One shopper on Walmart's website gave it a five-star rating and explained that "most ketchup is loaded with corn syrup. This is not. 

Compare the nutrition facts: nearly one-third of regular Heinz Ketchup (5 grams out of 17) is carbs, mostly added sugar. Only 1 gram out of 16 in this product is carbs, and that comes from tomatoes. Interestingly, the classic Heinz ketchup in European countries like the UK doesn't contain corn syrup and is sweetened with regular sugar. 

Meanwhile, the worst ketchup in our ranking — Primal Kitchen's organic ketchup — was unusually thin in texture and had an overwhelming tang from balsamic vinegar because there's no sugar or sweetener in the recipe to counteract its natural sourness.