Glycemic index of Indian foods
Every value here was measured by feeding the food to people and sampling their blood. That is the only way a glycemic index can exist — which is why this table is short and why the ones with three hundred rows are not real.
Nothing here can diagnose you, and nothing here is a treatment plan. Blood glucose results are interpreted by a doctor alongside your history, your symptoms and a repeat test — a single number on a screen is not a diagnosis. If any reading concerns you, or if you feel unwell, see a doctor rather than a website.
The measured values
| Food | GI | Band | Carbohydrate | GL for the stated portion | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ragi mudde (finger millet stiff porridge) | 98.2 | High | 26.7 g per 100 g | 39.3 (one ball, about 150 g) | Indian J Med Res 2022 |
| Jowar roti (sorghum) | 84.1 | High | 49.4 g per 100 g | 24.9 (one roti, about 60 g) | Indian J Med Res 2022 |
| Onion dosa | 79.7 | High | not published | cannot be calculated | J Food Sci Technol 2022 |
| Makki roti (maize) | 74.8 | High | 44.8 g per 100 g | 20.1 (one roti, about 60 g) | Indian J Med Res 2022 |
| Wheat flakes chivda | 72.5 | High | 42.8 g per 100 g | 9.3 (a 30 g bowl) | Indian J Med Res 2022 |
| Bajra roti (pearl millet) | 70.1 | High | 47.8 g per 100 g | 20.1 (one roti, about 60 g) | Indian J Med Res 2022 |
| Adai (mixed lentil pancake) | 66.2 | Medium | 32.6 g per 100 g | 21.6 (one adai, about 100 g) | Indian J Med Res 2022 |
| Multigrain roti (whole-grain blend) | 64.7 | Medium | 55.4 g per 100 g | 21.5 (one roti, about 60 g) | Prev Nutr Food Sci 2020 |
| Wheat dosa (godhuma dosa) | 61.8 | Medium | 32.5 g per 100 g | 18.1 (one dosa, about 90 g) | Indian J Med Res 2022 |
| Jowar idli (sorghum idli) | 61.3 | Medium | 27.6 g per 100 g | 13.5 (two idli, about 80 g) | Indian J Med Res 2022 |
| Methi paratha | 60.2 | Medium | 42.4 g per 100 g | 20.4 (one paratha, about 80 g) | Indian J Med Res 2022 |
| Dalia upma (broken wheat) | 51.7 | Low | 26.3 g per 100 g | 27.2 (one katori, about 200 g) | Indian J Med Res 2022 |
| Vada sambar | 36.9 | Low | not published | cannot be calculated | J Food Sci Technol 2022 |
| White peas sundal (safed vatana) | 29.8 | Low | 13.6 g per 100 g | 4.0 (a 100 g bowl) | Indian J Med Res 2022 |
| White chickpea sundal (kabuli chana) | 24.1 | Low | 22.3 g per 100 g | 5.4 (a 100 g bowl) | Indian J Med Res 2022 |
15 foods. That is a small table on purpose — glycemic index is measured by feeding a food to volunteers and sampling their blood, so it exists only where somebody has run that study. Sites listing a GI for hundreds of Indian dishes are, for most of those dishes, publishing a guess.
Source: Shobana S, Geetha G, Ramya Bai M, et al. Carbohydrate profiling & glycaemic indices of selected traditional Indian foods. Indian J Med Res 2022;155(1):56–65. Link
Source: Shakappa D, Naik R, Sobhana PP. Glycemic carbohydrates, glycemic index, and glycemic load of commonly consumed South Indian breakfast foods. J Food Sci Technol 2022;59(9):3619–3626. Link
Source: Nagaraju R, Sobhana PP, Thappatla D, Epparapalli S, Kandlakunta B, Korrapati D. Glycemic index and sensory evaluation of whole grain based multigrain Indian breads (rotis). Prev Nutr Food Sci 2020;25(2):194–202. Link
Rice, honestly
The most-searched food in this subject, and the one where a single number would be most misleading.
| Rice | Published GI range | What moved it |
|---|---|---|
| White polished rice | 64 – 93 | Varies with variety and cooking time; longer boiling generally pushed values higher. |
| Parboiled rice | 39 – 79 | The widest spread of any category. Pressure-parboiled rice sat at the bottom of the range, quick-cooking parboiled at the top. |
| Basmati rice | 50 – 96 | Commonly sold as a low-GI rice. Several commercial basmati samples in the review fell in the low-to-medium band, but others did not. |
| Brown rice | 51 – 87 | Not automatically low. Brown rice generally produced a lower response than white rice cooked the same way, but the range still reaches high. |
This is why SugarCheck does not print "the GI of rice". Variety, amylose content, whether it was parboiled and how long it was boiled each move the result by more than the difference between the low and high categories. Anyone quoting one number for rice is quoting one study and calling it a fact.
Source: Boers HM, Seijen ten Hoorn J, Mela DJ. A systematic review of the influence of rice characteristics and processing methods on postprandial glycaemic and insulinaemic responses. Br J Nutr 2015;114(7):1035–1045. Link
The categories
| Category | Glycemic index | Glycemic load, per serving |
|---|---|---|
| Low | 55 or less | 10 or less |
| Medium | 56 to 69 | 11 to 19 |
| High | 70 or more | 20 or more |
Glycemic load matters more than glycemic index for anything you eat in a normal portion. The arithmetic, with worked examples →
How a glycemic index is produced
Volunteers eat a portion of the test food containing 50 g of available carbohydrate. Their blood glucose is sampled repeatedly over the next two hours, and the area under that curve is compared with the same people's response to 50 g of pure glucose, which scores 100 by definition. The published value is an average across the group, and it carries a standard deviation — several of the Indian values above have one of five points or more.
Nothing about that process can be shortcut. You cannot derive a glycemic index from a food's carbohydrate, fibre or starch content, which is exactly why a composition table cannot produce one and why this site will not print a value it has not found in a study.
PeakForm is a training and accountability programme. It is not a treatment for diabetes or prediabetes, it is not a substitute for your doctor's advice, and nothing on this site should be acted on before speaking to one.
Carbohydrate per real Indian serving
What is knowable for hundreds of Indian dishes is how much carbohydrate a normal serving contains — from composition tables rather than feeding studies. Every food page gives that, and gives the glycemic index only where one has been measured.
Common questions
What is the glycemic index of Indian foods?
Why does this site list so few foods?
What is the glycemic index of rice?
Is low glycemic index food good for diabetes?
Glycemic index values from the peer-reviewed studies named beside each row. Composition figures from the Indian Food Composition Tables 2017 (ICMR–NIN). General information only — NOT medical advice, and never a diagnosis. Only a doctor can interpret your results and diagnose or treat diabetes. If a reading concerns you, see a doctor rather than a website. Every threshold, equation and glycemic index value used on this site is listed with its publication on the data & method page.