Strawberries: a cup is almost a whole day of vitamin C

A cup of strawberries, 150 grams of them, carries 89.4 milligrams of vitamin C. The Daily Value is 90. One berry gives 10.7 milligrams, so the cup does the work and the single berry on a plate is decoration. All of that belongs to one row of the table below, Strawberries, raw. The same table lists strawberries canned in heavy syrup at 31.7 milligrams of vitamin C per 100 grams and 23.53 grams of carbohydrate, and sweetened frozen ones at 41.4 and 25.92. The raw fruit carries 7.96 grams of carbohydrate. Those are different foods and the cup figure does not carry across to them. The raw number is about as firm as food numbers get. USDA measured 59.62 milligrams per 100 grams, the British table measured 57 in the same food, and the eight USDA samples ran from 47.25 to 72.1, which is the honest width of what a strawberry is. Past the vitamin C it thins out quickly. Eleven randomised trials pooled together moved one inflammation marker, C-reactive protein, down by 0.63 milligrams per litre, and left blood pressure, blood lipids and fasting glucose alone. And the trial people quote for the brain gave older adults 26 grams of freeze-dried strawberry powder a day, which the authors describe as the equivalent of two cups of fruit. Nobody in it ate a strawberry.

The numbers, per 100 g

How much is actually in it

• Two countries measure the same strawberry and land within a few percent of each other. — 4 USDA records with 8 Foundation Foods samples (FDC 2346409) against CoFID Strawberries, raw (code 14-324) (n = 8 samples) Evidence E source
  Vitamin C 59.62 mg per 100 g in USDA against 57 in CoFID, a 4% gap, with USDA samples running 47.25 to 72.1; potassium 160.7 mg against 170, a 5% gap, samples 121.5 to 195; copper 0.035 mg against 0.03, a 14% gap, samples 0 to 0.073

What a real portion looks like

• A cup of strawberries carries almost the whole day's vitamin C, and one berry carries a ninth of it. — one FNDDS food with three household measures (n = fdc_id 2709283) Evidence E source
  Vitamin C 59.6 mg per 100 g; 1 cup = 150 g = 89.4 mg, which is 99% of the 90 mg Daily Value; 1 fruit = 18 g = 10.7 mg; quantity not specified = 75 g = 44.7 mg

What cooking and storage change

• We cannot say what cooking does to a strawberry, because our copy of the cooking table files it under beverages. — group 14, Beverages, as strawberries are currently classified in our data (n = 10 method rows, none of them about fruit) Evidence E source
  Every row the table returns for strawberries is an alcoholic beverage method, including ALC BEV,FLAMED and ALC BEV,STIRRED,BKD/SIMMRD 2.5 HR, all showing 100% vitamin C retention; these describe alcohol handling and have nothing to do with fruit

What it does to your health

• Across eleven trials strawberries left blood pressure, blood lipids and blood sugar unchanged, and lowered one marker of inflammation. — 11 randomised controlled trials, of which 6 reported blood pressure, 7 lipid profile, 7 fasting blood glucose and 6 C-reactive protein (n = 11 trials) Evidence A source
  C-reactive protein fell by 0.63 mg/l (95% CI -1.04 to -0.22) while blood pressure, lipid profile and fasting blood glucose did not change in the main analyses; in subgroups, total cholesterol fell 0.52 mmol/l (-0.88 to -0.15) among people starting above 5 mmol/l and LDL fell 0.31 mmol/l (-0.60 to -0.02) among those starting above 3 mmol/l; there was little heterogeneity and no evidence of publication bias

What people believe that the data does not support

• No regulator on either side of the Atlantic has ever ruled on a strawberry claim. — food labelling in the United States and the European Union (n = 0 entries in each register) Evidence E source
  21 CFR contains no mention of strawberries in any claim section, and the EU Register contains no entry mentioning strawberries, neither authorised nor non-authorised, out of 2330 claims

Who this works differently for

• In older adults strawberries sped up mental processing while the placebo improved memory, and the paper is titled for the first result. — 35 healthy older adults, 17 women and 18 men, aged 72 ± 6 years with BMI 26.4 ± 3.9 kg/m2 (n = 35) Evidence B source
  Processing speed improved during the strawberry phase (p < 0.001) while episodic memory improved during the CONTROL phase (p = 0.002); strawberry lowered systolic blood pressure (p = 0.044), a main effect of time reduced waist circumference (p = 0.043), serum triglycerides rose in the control phase (p = 0.012) but not on strawberries, and total antioxidant capacity fell on control (p = 0.032) and rose on strawberries (p = 0.047)

The bottom line

Two things on this page are worth knowing for what they admit. The first is that the cognition trial improved processing speed during the strawberry phase and improved episodic memory during the placebo phase, and the paper is named for the first result. Both numbers are in the same table. The second is that we cannot tell you what cooking does to a strawberry. The USDA retention table is organised by food group, our data files strawberries under beverages, and every row it returns is an alcohol handling method, including stirred and baked or simmered for an hour. Those rows say 100 percent of the vitamin C is retained and they are about drinks, so we will not hand them to you as fruit. Where the eleven pooled trials did find something, it was in people who started high. Total cholesterol fell 0.52 millimoles per litre in those above 5, and LDL fell 0.31 in those above 3. If your numbers are already normal, those trials say there was nothing to move. One more piece of silence, so you know its shape. Out of 2330 claims in the European register, not one mentions strawberries, and 21 CFR does not mention them either. A regulator saying nothing has not weighed the evidence and found it wanting. It has not been asked. Safety is quiet here too, and that quiet is ours. We hold no evidence card on strawberry allergy or on who should be careful with them, so this page says nothing about either. Read that as a hole in our work. It is not an all-clear.

Sources

1. str-p1-03 · reference dataset comparison
   USDA Strawberries, raw [FDC 2346409, foundation] вітамін C 59.62 мг, зразки Foundation 47.25–72.1 n=8; калій 160.7 мг, зразки 121.5–195; мідь 0.035 мг, зразки 0–0.073 n=8 || CoFID Strawberries, raw [14-324] Vitamin C (mg) 57 · Potassium (mg) 170 · Copper (mg) 0.03
   USDA FoodData Central, Foundation Foods (FDC 2346409) and CoFID 2021, Public Health England / OGL v3.0 (code 14-324) · checked 2026-09-22
2. str-p1-04 · reference dataset
   Strawberries, raw · Vitamin C, total ascorbic acid 59.6 MG на 100 г [fdc_id 2709283] · 1 fruit 18 г 10.7 MG · 1 cup 150 г 89.4 MG · Quantity not specified 75 г 44.7 MG
   USDA FNDDS 2021-2023, Strawberries, raw (fdc_id 2709283) · checked 2026-09-22
3. str-p1-05 · reference dataset defect
   «strawberries» таблиця поіменно не називає — вона задана на ГРУПИ. За data/entities/foods.jsonl це група «Beverages» (код 14)...5003 ALC BEV,FLAMED — 100% · 5001 ALC BEV,NO HEAT,STORED OVERNIGHT — 100% · 5006 ALC BEV,STIRRED,BKD/SIMMRD 1 HR — 100%
   USDA Table of Nutrient Retention Factors, Release 6 (2007) · checked 2026-09-22
4. str-p1-01 · meta-analysis of randomised controlled trials
   Overall, the strawberry interventions significantly reduced CRP levels by 0·63 (95 % CI -1·04, -0·22) mg/l but did not affect blood pressure, lipid profile or fasting blood glucose in the main analyses.
   British Journal of Nutrition, 2020 · checked 2026-09-22
5. str-p1-06 · registry search
   [7] FDA (США, 21 CFR): ЖОДНОЇ ЗГАДКИ «strawberries» || [7] ЄС (EU Register, знімок 2026-09-21): ЖОДНОЇ ЗАЯВИ про «strawberries» — ні дозволеної, ні відхиленої.
   21 CFR part 101 (eCFR) and EU Register on nutrition and health claims, знімок 2026-09-21 · checked 2026-09-22
6. str-p1-02 · randomised crossover double-blind placebo-controlled trial
   Processing speed (p < 0.001) improved during the strawberry phase and episodic memory (p = 0.002) improved during the control phase.
   Nutrition, Metabolism and Cardiovascular Diseases, 2025 · checked 2026-09-22